THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST, [June 2, 1890. 
CEYLON UPCOUNTEY PLANTING EEPOET: 
INFLUENZA. EPIDEMIC AND THE SINHALESE HOLIDAYS — 
SHORTHANDEDNESS ON ESTATES — GOVERNMENT INTER- 
FERENCE WITH COOLY IMMIGRATION AND STOPPAGE 
OF FERRIES— OPINION OF PLANTERS AS TO THE "SIXTY 
DAYS" CLAUSE — RUSH OF LEAF AND THE QUALITY OF 
THE TEA BEING MADE — THE SPRING CACAO CROP — 
WEATHER. 
May 8th. 
The Ceylon planters are not likely to forget this 
sickly season. Most of us are at present worried 
dreadfully, and work on all hands is falling behind. 
You hear of men with clearings, unable to do 
anything to them ; of others being so handicapped 
that coolies for the transport of leaf cannot be had ; 
and in some places the roll of the sick have reached 
to such magnificent proportions, that the flush is 
allowed its own sweet will, and has run away with 
itself. As the morning muster grows less and less 
and the call for work becomes more pressing, one 
has an idea that things have but to go on long 
enough and we will muster " the last man." Then 
there is the mighty contingent of the incapacitated 
which grows stronger daily and parades at the 
bungalow, shivering and barking in quite a harrow- 
ing way. What gallons of oastor oil and handfuls 
of quinine have been swallowed, and even with it all 
our working foroe remains at a pitiably low ebb. 
Our best efforts seem to but drive the influenza 
devil out of one man, that it may find a home in 
another. 
On the head of it all there comes this Sinhalese 
holiday, and your Sinhalese labourers somehow 
disappear : gone to sing carols, or erect pandals or 
decorations in honour of their lord Buddha, any- 
thing but stick to their work. If you chance to 
fall in with any of them just clearing out, 
the festive expression on their face before they 
saw you, changes into funereal sadness once 
they get their eye on you. If they are not 
dying themselves some of their relations are, 
and it is on an errand of mercy they are bound. 
It is at a time like this, when " the harvest is 
plentiful and the labourers are few, " that the 
Sinhalese contingent is felt to be so unreliable. 
You may get Tamil coolies to work on a Pongal 
or Tivali, although perhaps not very willingly ; but 
when a Sinhalese holiday comes round, it matters 
nothing how much you may be handicapped or 
behind with your work, the Sinhalese leave you 
to fight it out as best you can. If our old sources 
of supply had been untampered with, the_ tide of 
immigrant labourers would have been at its flood 
now, and there would have been help at hand. But 
the stopping of the ferries has done far more 
harm than those who ordered the measure know 
of. The Kangani who intended to do his best 
has had his resouroes wasted, and his recruited 
gang diminished by the uncertainty and delay : 
while those who have not been " square," will 
seize on the stoppage of the ferries as an excuse 
for their own misdeeds, and the amount of coolies 
whioh will have been lost to Ceylon, according to 
the calculation of those gentry will simply be limited 
by the force of their imagination. I would almost 
guarantee to say that there will hardly be an 
estate in Ceylon that will not hear of the Govern- 
ment interference with our labour supply as the 
reason why more coolies have not been brought in. 
The opinion of Planters as to the sixty days' 
clause, and the fight which our member made in 
Council is not by any means a unanimous or solid 
one. Those however who seem to know best about 
all the diOioulties whioh the hon. Mr. Christie 
had to oontend with, aocount his efforts as highly 
Euooessful, and that he has done a smart thing. 
Z'here are however, on the other hand, those who 
think differently and the meeting at the end of the 
month should be a more animated one than there 
has been for some time. 
The rush of leaf keeps going on, and the short- 
handedness on estates will certainly tell on the 
quality of the tea being made. 
The spring cacao crop is ripening, although not 
very rashly. Still with the present good prices, 
all that comes is welcome. 
The weather is cloudy and windy. We would 
willingly take more rain, and we will get it in due 
time. Peppercorn. 
«, 
NOTES ON POPULAR SCIENCE. 
Papier Mache Nuts — Diamonds- Ink-Plant. 
By Dr. J. E. Taylor, p.l.s , f.g.s., &c, Editob of 
"Science Gossip." 
Many of the huts which are being sent from this 
country to the South African goldfields, and to other 
places where portability is important, are made of wire- 
woven waterproof sheets. The sheets are less than 
half the weight of 24-gauge corrugated iron, for which 
they are intended as a substitute. Being composed of 
stout papier-mache, with fine steel-wire foundations, 
they are good non-conductors both of heat and cold. 
The total weight of a settler's hut, 14 ft. by 10 f t.j is 
thus brought down to a little more than half a ton. 
The origin of the diamonds in South Africa has just 
been discussed before the French Academy of Sciences. 
It was argued that the South African diamonds were 
not formed in situ, but were erupted from great depths, 
together with the fragmentary materials in which they 
are embedded. The presence of the diamond in its 
natural state, and as carbonado, as well as transformed 
from graphite,* in variou? stages of meteorites, is now 
placed beyond doubt. Attention was called to the 
analogous conditions of association under which this 
crystal occurs in South Africa, and also in meteorites. 
M. Daubree is of opinion that the diamond is not fas 
is generally supposed) of vegetable origin, but is of 
inorganic nature, as is also the graphite foiiud in the 
same rocks. This will be a new idea for many geo- 
logist?. 
The last new tip from South America is the dis- 
covery of a plant in the United States of Columbia 
aled Coriaria thymifoiin, whose juices supply a ready- 
made ink, which is at first of a reddish colour but after- 
wards turns black. On this account it has been called 
the " ink plant." — Australasian. 
NEWS EEOM BEAZIL. 
COFFEE UNDER SHADE — TEA, COTTON AND GANE IN 
CEYLON — THE REVOLUTION IN BRAZIL — COFFEE AND 
CAPITAL. 
Mr. Hugh Blacklaw has kindly placed the fol- 
lowing letter from his brother, Mr. A. Scott Black- 
law, at our disposal :— 
Rio de Janeiro, March 18th. 
I notice there is an attempt to revive coffee culti- 
vation under shade in Ceylon: I believe the idea a 
good one. In the province of Rio which suffered 
much from a coffee disease some years ago plant- 
ing has for sometime been again continued under 
shade, and some seven years old coffee and down 
to three years which has come under my observa- 
tion I have noticed have grown and produced well, 
The tree used is of a family I have seen some in 
Ceylon, the Ingas of which there are several species 
here : Ingd hymenafolia is the best for this purpose, 
but others are being tried, and which I shall note 
by and by. 
I have never seen any of the Jig speoies tried, and 
shall be pleased to hear that ficus ghmerata is a suc- 
cess with you in Ceylon. Nowhere is a field for young 
* Ceylon with its deep beds of graphite should be 
interest in connection with diamonds.— Ed, T, 4- 
