Sejtember j, 1887,] 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 199 
INDIAN EXPEKIENCES : 
The Coffee Leaf Disease. 
As stated in my last paper, I returned in 1871 to 
the Wymad from the Neilghemes, after an absence 
of some five years, to find matters relative to coffee 
plauting greatly altered. As a crowning blow to the 
hopes and prospects of the planter, leaf disease had 
taken firm hold of the plantations that had struggled 
through all the other ills that the Coffee plant is 
heir to, and was making such rapid and destructive 
progress as seemed to have paralysed the planter 
and well nigh ciuaed him to give up in despair. 
The disease appeared first, in Ceylon a year or two 
previous to the above date, then amongst the Coffee 
estate of Travancore, the most southern limit of 
Coffee cultivation in India. From Travancore the 
malady gradually travelled northwards till it reached 
Wynaad, Ooorg, Mysore, and the most northern 
limits of the industry. "With regard to Ceylon, I 
believe that at the earlier stages of the leaf disease 
Dr. Thwaites unhesitatingly recorded his opinion, 
after close and careful examinat'on of the subject, 
that the disease would only finish its march of 
destruction with the death of the last Coffee tree 
in the island ; and although he subsequently modified 
this opinion, I, for one, am incliued to believe that 
Dr. • Thwaites' first impression was a correct one. 
It is at least quite certain that no more formidable 
enemy, or one more difficult to attack and subdue, 
has ever appeared on the earth to test the powers 
of scientists and the patience of any community of 
cultivators. To accurately describe the ravages of 
this mysterious fungoid growth on the leaves of 
the Coffee trees, and the consternation it caused 
throughout the Coffee districts of Southern India, 
is no easy task. I had seen the Potato blight in 
its worst form, as well as other kinds of plaut 
diseases and injury by insects in England, and of 
course I had come face to face with the wide-spread 
injury caused to Coffee plantations by bug, borer, 
drought, &c, but such an afflictisn as this leaf 
disease, at once so rapid, devastating, and ruinous 
in its nature, I had never before seen, nor even 
dreamt of. It took a stout heart on the part of 
any plauter to boldly face the difficulty, and after 
the first shock had passed over to begin courageously 
to battle with the disease and endeavour to eradicate 
it by a highor system of cultivation than he had 
previously resorted to. This was done in numerous 
instances, and large sums of money wore again spent 
in artificial aud other manures in order to sustain 
the vigour of the plant and, as it was supposed, to 
tender it less liable to the attacks of the fungus ; 
but up to the time I left the country in 1877, all 
this expenditure of energy and money had resulted 
ouly in a partial and limited degree of success. 
The fuugus could be seen more or less on the 
leaves of the Coffee bushes throughout the whole year, 
but the time of its greatest appearance was between 
the ending of the south-west rains — about the middle 
of September — and the end of crop-gathering — the 
end of December. At the latter date it was no 
unusual sight to sou plantations denuded of leaves 
and with quantities of fruit of a greenish yellow 
colour, which refused to ripen, and which h.i.l bo 
be gathered in that .slate, dried in the cherry, 
an 1 afterwards pounded out in mortars, yielding 
Coffee of a very inferior quality. The fungus, or rust 
as it was sometimes called, first appeared on the 
leaves in tho form of spots of a bright orange-red 
eolour, which gradually merged into each other till 
the whole of the bick of the leaf became covered 
with a thick coating of the fungus, resembling 
a red powder, Staining the fingers freely whou 
touched. On the first appearance of tho fungus in 
the form of spots alluded to above, ouch spot con- 
tained a smad worm about 3-10tb of an inch in 
longth, »hich could be easily seen by the naked 
cyo ; but wliether thin little worm or maggot wis 
tile outocmo of tho growth of the fungus on which 
it ted or whether it was the attack of tho insect 
vtt tho lu.-l which uiuscd tho growth of the fungus. 
no one seemed to be able to say, but the presence 
of the insect was an undoubted as well as a curious 
and interesting fact. As the fungoid growth spread 
on the under side of the leaf, the upper surface 
gralually became yellow, owing no doubt to the 
tissues of the leaf being destroyed and ending in 
the leaf falling. The disease was not confined to 
Coffee under any particular condition as regards cul- 
ture, but appeared everywhere, on highly cultivated 
estates, on estates receiving cultivation only in name, 
on the trees remaining on abandoned plantations, 
and on trees that had sprung up from stray seeds 
in the jungle, so that it would appear that the 
disease was propagated by the spores floating in the 
atmosphere, detecting a cougenial lodging place on 
the leaves of the Coffee plant, wherever or in what- 
ever coudition found. 
An idea sprung up in the minds of a number of 
planters — after it was found that the highest cultiv- 
ation it was possible to adopt had but a limited effect 
in checking the disease — that such a deterioration 
had taken place in the constitution of tho ordinary 
Coffee grown in Southern India- from some cause 
unknown, that it was absolutely necessary to pro- 
cure "fresh blood" in the form of a distinct 
species of Coffee, possessing, if possible, a more 
robust constitution. Just at that time the Liberian 
Coffee was much spoken of, and an English firm of 
nurserymen was raising plants from seed procured 
direct from the West Coast of Africa for export to 
India or elsewhere to any one wishing to try the 
experiment. I was induced amongst others to order 
a Wardian case of plants to be sent out, which 
was done very promptly by the firm alluded to. 
The case contained seventy plants in thumb pots, 
aud so admirably were thov packed that every plant 
reached me in perfect health after a voyage and journey 
covering some forty days. The case reached me in 
December. I opened it at once and shifted the 
plants, which were then only about 3 inches high, 
into larger pots ; they at once started into growth, 
and by plauting-out time had grown into strong, 
healthy plants of an average height of 1 foot. 
These I planted out very carefully on a piece of good 
land on a new plantation I was then engaged in 
forming. The plants did not make much progress 
in the open ground during the continuance of the 
heavy monsoon rains ; but as soon as these began 
to moderate, the plants began to grow rapidly, aud 
by the time the dry weather had fairly set in had 
produced shoots of a very satisfactory growth, and 
leaves of an enormous size in comparison with the 
ordinary Coffee of the district. As time went on I 
found traces of the leaf disease on the young Coffee 
trees of the ordinary type, of which I had planted 
some 150,000 at the same time as the Liberiau species ; 
but no appearauce of disease of any kind on the 
plants from England. 
Matters grew gradually worse with the common 
species of Coffee ou the estate t ; ll at last they were 
utterly divested of every leaf and left to weather 
the ensuiug hot seasou uuder bare poles as best 
they could. The Liberian plants resisted the disoase 
for such a length of time that I thought they were 
going to he proof against it; but in this I was 
mistaken, they caught the contagion at last and 
perished more rapidly than the plants of tho old 
species of the same age. This was a very disappoint- 
ing and disheartening experiment to me. It cost 
the respectable sum of 500r., or £50, which was, 
of course, thrown to the winds. I may also add 
that this particular plantation, although formed 
under the most favourable circumstances with re- 
gard to richness of soil, abundauee of water, favour- 
able a>peot, Sec,, had to be abandoned long boforu 
the period at which it ought, under ordinary 
circumstances, to havo yielded its first crop, nun 
this solely in consequenco of tho leaf disease H 
would appear from the above experiment, that the 
disease was propagated by atmospheric inlliiotices 
alone, and was not tho result of any inherent weak- 
ness in the ordinary Coffee of the district produced 
by raising plant.-, from the same seed lor a uumbcr 
