December r, 1887.] THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
379 
THE SUGAR INDUSTRY IN QUEENSLAND. 
No change of importance lias taken placo since the 
dato of my last letter in the circumstances and prospects 
of those engaged in the sugar industry of this colony. 
Tho trouble then was the excessive wetness of the 
spring seasou, usually the dry period of tho year, and 
this uuusual recurrence of heavy rains has continued 
to the present time. Perhaps this trouble through 
rain has been more severely felt in the Mackay dis- 
trict than in any other. During the 18 years the 
industry has been fairly established there such wet 
weather has never been known during the crushing 
months, scarcely a week having passed without rain 
(more or less) since last April. The difficulties and 
extra expense this involves can only be fully under- 
stood by one practically acquainted with the manage- 
ment of a plantation. It will suffice for me to say 
that the principal fuel used in the mill furnaces is 
the crushed cane (megassj, and that bofore this can 
be utilised it must bo spread over the yard and 
dried. The slightest rain neutralises this operation, 
therefore the furnaces have either to burn wood or 
coal, or stop work, and the quantity of wood required 
to keep a first-class mill going is something outra- 
geous. In the field the wet is equally troublesome 
and expensive; true it keeps the cane growing, but 
this is just what the planter does not care about, 
for it ought to be ripeniug and acquiring juice showing 
a high density of sugar. The normal density of cane 
juice in the spring season in the Mackay district is 
10 to 11 deg. Beaume; a heavy rain will bring it down 
to nine, eight, or even seven degrees, which makes a 
wonderful difference in the quantity of cane to be 
crushed in order to get one ton of sugar, and the 
consumption of fuel for ovaporatiug the watery juice 
is, of course, also greatly increased.* It must be 
remembered that it is not so much the increased 
juice in the caue that is the trouble as it is that 
the sugar has goue; it is not in the cane. The difficulty 
of cirtmg from the fields when the season is wet 
is very great. The fields are principally lovcl, and 
have a great depth of soil, which has been well loosened 
to a depth of 18 iu. After a heavy tropica! rain, 
they necessarily are as boggy as a swamp, and the 
horses and drays cannot get upon them. Only those 
have been able to keep the mills supplied who hap- 
pen to havo invested in some oue or other of the 
expensive portable railway systems. The crop every- 
where has been a fairly good one. Iu the dry district 
of tho Burdekin delta it has breu an extraordinary 
good one. In the Mackay district the estimates are 
that quite one-third of the crop will remain as a 
" stand over " for next season's operations. Planters 
there and elsewhere are still continuing crushing, for 
the weather since the new year has been tine, but, 
as a rule, this late crushing never pays, and can only 
be justified when money must be had, for the actual 
sugar is not iu the cane, whioh now begins to put on 
its rapid tropical growth j and, what is of equal im- 
portance, tho labour and horse stock are required to 
attend to the growing crop for tho following year. 
The output from Mackay last year was 25,000 tons, 
and this would again have been reached had not tho 
weather proved so uupropitious for manufacturing. 
As hu approximate estimate, 15,000 to 18,000 tons 
probably will not be far wrong. 
In tho Herbert Rivor district the rains also havo 
been almost continuous, and work has been greatly 
impeded, nevertheless good work bus been dono, princip- 
ally owing to the fact that the tramway system is 
exteusively adopted ; but tho density has been low, 
ami the yields not what should havo boen ; labour 
again has been scarce. A great ileal of caue grown 
by farmers was crushed by tho Oolonial Sugar Com- 
pauy. and this company has also taken the initiative 
in exporting a large quantity ot sugar direct to China. 
On the Burdekin the wet spring has boen rather ad- 
vtint.igcous, the growth of the rami there being far 
and away beyond what it ww over known to bo in 
any year of normal spring weather. Tho output will 
probably bo the greatest yet from that rather uufor- 
• Hero is tho reason for the failure of sugar in Ceylon. 
— eicoAMvw moisture. — Ld. 
tunate district. Some remarkablo returns from the 
Mourilyan Sugar Company wore recently published iu 
the Brisbane papers -and, I believe, re-copied into 
The Aryus — but I refer to them again because tbey 
point to one of the most anomalous facts connected with 
sugar-growing in Queensland. The returns showed that 
up to the 19th November the Mourilyan Sugar Company 
had crushed 3991 acres. This produced 1,313 tons 
3 cwt. 3 qrs. of sugar, of which 77 per cent was white 
sugar of first quality. The yield per acre, therefore, 
was 65 cwt. 3 qrs. out of the acreage crushed there 
were 171 acres of "stand over" cane — that is, cane 
left from last year, and having 1G to 18 months' 
growth on it — which yielded 4 tons 13 cwt. 1 qr. per 
acre. These astonishing yields equal those of the 
Hawaiian Islands. The remarkable point in connection 
with this is that the Mourilyan Company's estate is 
at tho Johnstone River, which admittedly is the most 
rainy zone fall in Australia, and in proof of which I 
will state that 140 inches in depth had fallen from 
January 1 to November 29, the date of the returns. 
Your readers may therefore be inclined to ask how 
it is this company can not only combat with excessive 
rains, but also get extra return? in consequence ? This 
is a fair question, more especially when taken in 
connection with the fact that this district was con- 
sidered by the early sugar planters of the colony to 
be unsuitable for cane, owing to this abundant rain- 
fall. The explanation lies in the character of the soil ; 
it is an alluvial detritus washed down by these excessive 
preciptations, and intermingled with superabundant or- 
ganic matter, the result of the decaying tropical jungle 
forced into exuberant growth by this essentially tropical 
climate. The soil is many feet in depth, and all of 
the same fertile character ; it is porous to an excessive 
degree, so much so that a rainfall of 5 in. will show 
nothing of itself in a few hours' time. Nevertheless 
tho land is never dry, the capillary attraction inherent 
in so much burning, cau«es it always to be sufficiently 
moist without saturatiou to sourness. The company 
have not a plough upon the place, the cane cutting 
being simply placed iu a hole scratched by the hoe. 
Neither have they any carting, all the cane being 
conveyed to the mill by a system of portable tramway 
laid down iu the fields; also, they have their furnaces 
so adapted upon the modern principle that the megass 
cau be burned while still wet from the rollers, a 
due allowance of wood also beiug used to commence 
the fire, and at stated times. Thus it will be seen 
that, given tho most favourable conditions of a really 
fertile soil of unlimited depth in a tropical climate 
and modern appliancoa, then sugar growing oau bo 
made profitable at present prices, providing an 
exorbitant initiatory expenditure for land and improve- 
ments has not been foolishly entered into. Also the 
difficulties of the labour question are to be considered, 
but on this topic I shall not touch iu this letter, 
for it is a subject in itself. 
On tho Burnett River (Buudaborg) tho season has 
been a satisfactory one as regards tho yield, which is 
expected to more than equal that of last year. The 
same remark, too, applies to tho Mary River, still 
further south. The large refineries on these two 
rivers intend to re-commence work at a very early 
date. In the Brisbane and Logan districts sugar 
maunfacture bids fair, in a few moro years, to be 
a thiug of tho past. Neverthelesisome few of the mills 
in tho I.ogan district have this season boen worked 
with vigour, and the owners beiug able to buy cane 
from growers at their own figure, will doubtless show 
a profit. 
Tho Governmout schemo of central mills, for tho 
carrying out of which the Legislature of 1885 rated 
£5i>,fM>, has developed so far that two associations 
of farmor cane-growers near Mackay havo organised, 
and applied for tho funds required to erect mills, 
and the Covernmeut havo agreed to the proposals. 
Of course the Government hold a lien on the mills 
and machinery, and also on tho private estates of 
the association. One of the points of this movement 
is supposed t*t bo that of demonstrating the feasibility 
of growing cane by Kurope.m labour, never! heb «■• :• 
is a fact that most of these farmers who have 
