292 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [November i, 1887. 
The Java teas were all packed in chests, and averaged 
about 3,350 lb. to the break, whilst the China averaged 
10,150 lb. 
In view of these figures it behoves the Indian and 
Ceylon planters to bestir themselves in the direction of 
sending larger breaks. 
It seems to ordinary minds a curious fact that with 
all the resources of British enterprise the results are 
so far behind China in this matter ; the deliveries of 
Indian teas are now about equal to those from China, 
and if the trade is ultimately to double its present pro- 
portions the existing arrangements must give place to 
better. 
This subject will be periodically brought before the 
Committee of "Wholesale Dealers, who will narrowly 
watch the effect of the increase in the size of the breaks, 
and I believe the time is not far distant when the im- 
ports from India and Ceylon will so grow in importance 
that a further increase in the limit of small lots will 
be imperatively necessary in order that the large breaks 
may receive fair attention at the hands of buyers ge- 
nerally.— Yours, &c, E. Sedgwick, Hon. Sec. 
London Wholesale Tea Dealers' Association. 
3, Great Tower Street,E. 0., Sept. 7th, 1887. 
[The question still remains, however, whether the 
smaller lots do not suit the smaller tea buyers and so 
obtain better prices^?— Ed.] 
♦ 
TEA LEAF CROPPEB. 
The latest addition of machinery to the production 
of tea is one which has often been projected by plant- 
ers, but which, so far as we know, has never till 
now been carried to completion. The " Swinburne 
Cropper," which is simple in construction, though an 
ingenious and not inelegant machine, is de&igned to 
supersede hand plucking altogether on Indian tea 
gardens, and there can be no doubt that if it fulfils 
its purpose it will be by far the most import- 
ant invention which has yet been applied to 
tea proJuction. The prima facie objection to machine 
plucking is the possible injury which the plants may 
suffer from the somewhat drastic treatment ; but 
the inventor who has tried the system on his 
own gardens in Assam for two seasons, asserts 
that so far from this danger being a real one, 
the bushes are actually strengthened by system- 
atic pruning. The machine [is calculated to do 
the work of about ten coolies, being worked by one, 
and as very little skill or practice is required in 
its manipulation there should be no difficulty in its 
general introduction. The blades of the cutter are so 
arranged as to be incapable of taking off mor6 of the 
flush than is necessary to make good tea, and as the 
surface is reduced by the process to a perfect level, 
it follows that on the second pruning all the leaves 
must be of the same age. The leaf is therefore more 
homogeneous, and the quality consequently improved, 
while the quantity, according to Mr. Swinburne's 
experiments, is not diminished. The operation is 
likened to the clipping of garden hedgerows with 
shears, when the bushes are rendered even more 
luxuriant than they would be in a state of 
nature, from the fact of the strength of 
the plants, which has a tendency to con- 
centrate in particular branches, being distributed 
evenly over the whole surface. The only difference 
between the effect of the shears and the " Cropper " 
being that the latter automatically makes the surface 
an exact level, an effect which could not of course be 
obtained by any amount of care with unassisted manual 
labour. In order for a planter to ascertain the value 
of the inveutiou it would only bo necessary to try the 
experiment on about half-an-acre for one season, and 
the machine is in actual operation on some gardens at 
the present time. It would, of course, be impossible 
for us to predict with any certainty the ultimate suc- 
cess of an invention which can only be tested by indivi- 
dual experience ; but, as far as we can judge, there 
■ ems every chance of its successful operation. Should 
ne machine answer the expectations of the inventor 
there can be no doubt that it will be of incalculable 
servic e to the Indian planter, as by appreciably dimi- 
nishin g the cost of tea production, it would give him 
another char.ee over his Chinese competitor. — South 
of India Observer, 
An Insect Enemy of Fruit Trees. — From the Aus- 
tralian Times and Anglo-New Zealander of Sept. 9th 
we learn that at the meeting of the British As- 
sociation at Manhester : — 
In the Biology section, Professor Riley contri- 
buted a paper on " Icerya Purchari," an insect in. 
jurious to fruit trees. The species of which he wrote 
is the most polyphagous of coccids, living on a great 
variety of plants, and thriving particularly on acacia, 
lime, lemon, oraDge, quince, pomegranate, and walnut, 
it is capable of motion at all stages of development 
after hatching, and can survive without food for a long 
period. These characteristics have rendered it the 
most grievous enemy which the fruit grower has to 
contend with in Australia, New Zealand, South Africa 
and California. It is believed to have originated in 
Australia, and to have been introduced into other 
parts of the world upon living plants. This icerya, 
on account of the protection offered by its fluted 
waxy ovisac, and of its other characteristics, is one 
of the most difficult of all insects to control, as few 
insecticides will reach the eggs. These difficulties 
have been surmounted in California by judicious 
spraying of kerosene emulsions and of resin soaps, as 
well as by a combination of gases under a portable 
tent. 
Phosphate of Lime as an Insecticide. — Aphides, or 
plant lice, are marvellously abounding owing to the 
drought. These insects are to the invertebrata what rab- 
bits are among the mammalia. They depend for their 
specific existence on their marvellous fecundity. Seven 
generations of aphides can be produced asexually. 
Ten become a thousand, and a thousand a great na- 
tion. In the last number of the Agricultural Gazette 
there appears a paragraph which is worth quoting 
for the benefit of all those who have dealings with 
aphides. A Mr. Barlow says that, having a field of 
turnips much infested with " fly," he tried the experi- 
ment of dusting a few of|the plants with superphosphate 
of lime, and he found that it completely destroyed 
the insect pest. He then had the whole field dusted, 
and the result was the entire annihilation of the 
" fly." The experiment was carried a step 
further in a horticultural direction- Some fine 
pansies in his garden were much infested with slugs 
They got notice to quit by the application of the 
phosphate dust, and were all ejected accordingly. 
Those who have ears to hear let them hear. — From 
Science Notes in the Australasian. [The great point 
is that, after acting as an insecticide, phosphate of lime 
will fertilize the soil. — Ed.] 
The Consumption of Tea and Sugae. — This month 
" facts and figures," especially figures, are very much 
to the fore. Mr. R. Giffen, that master of statis- 
tics of all kinds, in his inaugural address at Man- 
chester, on Thursday, as president of the Economic, 
Science, and Statistics Section of the British Associ- 
ation, gave figures to show that the rate of commercial 
progress has not been so great in the United King- 
dom during the last ten years as in the preceding 
twenty years. Having referred to the production of 
coal and of pig iron, he said : " As to the consump- 
tion of tea and sugar, which are again commonly 
appealed to as significant of general material progress, 
what we find as regards tea is that the consump- 
tion per head rises between 1855 aid 1865 from 
2-3 lb. to 33 lb., or 43 per cent.; between 1865 and 
1875 from 33 lb. to 4'4 lb., or 33 per cent. ; and 
between 1875 to 1885 from 4'4 lb. to 5 lb., or 13£ 
ner cent. In Sugar the progression is, injthe]first period 
from 30-61 lb. to 39 8 lb. per head, or 30 per cent ; 
in the second period from 39 8 lb. to 627 lb., or 58 
per cent. ; and in the third period from 62 - 7 lb to 
74 3 lb., 19 per cent. only. In the last ten years in 
both cases the rate of increase is less than in the 
twenty years before.— H. & O. Mail. [In the latest 
years of the decade, however, the rate of increase 
has risen considerably. — Ed.] 
