May i i 1890.] THE TRQP.OAL AGRICULTURIST. 
737 
THE FALL IN CINCHONA BARK 
reported by Renter yesterday is inexplicable unless i' 
be that unsuspected stocks of quinine in Europe are 
coming to light. Java is the only country now liberal 
in its supply of bark and there has been nothing as 
yet to justify a fall to If d per unit. Our latest ma'' 
information from the United States is favouraole as 
may be judged by the following article in the Drug 
Beporter of New York (February 19th) : — 
The Position of Quinine. — There are more elements 
of strength in the quinine situation now than there has 
been, possibly, at any time during the past three or 
four years. The influenza epidemic, which has now 
about run its course, proved to be a factor of the 
greatest importance in the revivification of the market, 
as but for its seasonable advent, the demoralization 
which for so long a time has been a feature of the trade, 
might have been indefinitely prolonged. The improve- 
ment in the bark situation, or at least in the position of 
Ceylon cinchona should have exerted a powerful in- 
fluence to remove the depression in the market value of 
the prinoipal salt of that bark, but the surplus, and in 
many instanoes high-priced stock of quinine that has 
so long hung a dead weight on the market, nulified to 
a great extent the beneficial effects of the advance in 
the cost of the crude material. It may be considered 
surprising that in view of the rapidity with whioh the 
offerings of the quinine were absorbed during the 
height of the excitement that prices did not advance 
to much higher limits than have been attained ; but the 
necessarily evanescent nature of this extraordinary 
activity and the natural fear that it would be followed 
by a corresponding depression, may have operated to 
prevent suoit a rise in values. The fact that the move- 
ment was accompanied by little or no speculative buy- 
ing, or what is ordinarily considered as such, bears 
out this argument as it also emphasizes the lack of 
confidence in the future of quinine heretofore pointed 
out. Whatever may have been the causes contributing 
to the result the fact remains that quinine today rests 
upon a firmer basis than it did even so late as two 
months ago. The large surplus stook, so long the iete 
noire of operators in quinine, is gone, or nearly gone, and 
the wholesale market must in future draw its supplies 
from the extra stocks held in other markets, notably in 
London, or from the manufacturers. The latter for the 
present, at least, are not in the position of free sellers 
either for prompt or future delivery, and if we have 
been truly informed they have joined the ranks of buy- 
ers, finding it is cheaper to buy back the stock they have 
sold than to convert new bark into quinine. Some of 
the operators in this market, according to report, an- 
ticipating all this have recently been heavy buyers in 
London, and their purchases are now beginning to 
arrive here. 
This may develop a weak phase of the situation. It 
is not certain that all of the stock bought during the 
last month by distributors has actually passed into cou- 
sumption, though the continuance of the distributing 
demand on an active scale to the present time might 
indicate that it ha 1. If a large proportion of the 
Btoch bought by dealers, as some believe, remains on 
their shelves, it would indicate that the activity of the 
demand is about at the end, with little prospect that it 
will be renewed until the fall season sets in, if then. In 
that case the purchases made in London, which accord- 
ing to some reports are as large, if not larger than the 
stock taken out of this market, would on its appearance 
here be likely to exert a depressing effect, and oause 
the reactiou which it has been expected would follow 
the subsidence of the present aotivity. 
Such a result, if the market is to be governed in the 
future by the bark situation, must be temporary, and 
whatever its oourse may be during the coming two or 
three mouths, there is now a probability, heretofore 
lacking, that in the near future much better prioes will 
be obtained than have been realized in this market for 
several voare. 
03 
JAPANESE TEA FOR RUSSIA. 
The Ceylon Tea Fund will note the following ; — 
The/Central Tea Association at its reoent meeting 
passed a resolution of ai. important character. It de- 
cided that, a determined effort should be made to de- 
velop the export of lea to Russia, and with that object 
it voted a grant in aid to the amount of six thousand 
yen for five years. In order to raise this money the 
meeting agreed that the tax of il sen per box, now 
levied upon tea intended for transport, should be in- 
creased to 4 sen. This resolution has not been univer- 
sally endorsed by the members of the Association. It 
was evidently taken after due consideration, and the 
debate th'.t marked its passage bythe meeting not only 
showed that the subject had been fully thought out, but 
also acquired an aspect of importauce from the fiot 
that it was attended by several high officials, aaaong 
them being the Minister of State for Agriculture and 
Commerce, and the Minister of State for Education, the 
latter doubtless takiug special interest in the pro- 
ceedings and being also in a position to afford valu- 
able information owing to his long residence as 
Japanese Representative in St. Petersburg and Peking. 
Nevertheless the extra impost of 2 sen per box upon 
tea exported to other countries is obviously regarded 
with uneasiness. All Japanese engaged in the cul- 
ture of tea are sensible of the precarious nature of 
their present foreigu market, of the constantly increas- 
ing competition to which they are subjected from the 
direction of India and Oeylon, and of the vital neces. 
sity of finding a new outlet for their product. But 
they are also influenced by the sound idea that a 
bird in the hand is worth two in the bush, and 
they feel some uncertainty about the wisdom of 
imposing burdens on the trade which they already 
possess for the sake of developing a trade which 
may or may not be successful. They have accord- 
ingly had recourse to the old-fashioned alternative, 
a petition for official aid. What the result is, we have 
not yet heard. We doubt, however, that the Autho- 
rities will consent to undertake any fresh respon- 
sibilities in the nature of tradal bounties or grants in aid. 
— Japan Weekly Mail, March 8th. 
*- 
THE SHADOW OF THE PEAK OF 
TENERIFFE [AND OF ADAM'S PEAK, 
CEYLON]. 
[We are indebted to a correspondent for drawing 
our attention to the following letter in the London 
Times with the interesting reference to Adam's Peak. 
—Ed. T. A.] 
Sir, — I have read with interest the picturesque and 
vivid letter of your correspondent, the English chap, 
lain at Orotava, in The Times of Monday, upon the 
shadow of the Park of Ten -n'ffe. He ascended the 
peak at night in order to witness the phenomenon of 
the shadow thrown across the sea by the beams of the 
rising sun. The same phenomenon is visible in many 
parts of the globe, where high solitary peaks, with 
cone-like summits, rise in proud isolation from the 
surrounding oountry. I have myself olimbed Mount 
Etna in Sicily, and Adam's Peak in Ceylon, at night, 
in order to observe this exquisite, but purely natural, 
effect at sunrise. It is also visible from the summit 
of Fujiyama, the peerless volcano of Japan, and I 
doubt not, has been seen by travellers in other partB of 
the world's surface. ^ 
I write to point out that this phenomenon, though a 
beautiful and a remarkable, is in no sense aa extra- 
ordinary or inexplicable, occurrence. Long treatises, 
exhibiting the most profound scientific erudition, along 
with a hopeless obtusity of mental vision, have been 
written to demonstrate the singularity of the shadow 
of Adam's Peak in Ceylon, and to discuss the peculiar 
atmospherio conditions responsible for its production. 
These do not, in reality, differ from the experience 
described by your correspondent at Teneriffo, and 
illustrate no more abnormal iucideut than the pro- 
jection of the shadow of an opaque object by a 
bright light thrown from behind. It will readily bo 
