2D 
THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. 
[July 2, 1888. 
instance, with sulphate of quinine against malaria, 
which destroys the germs. ., But it very often hap- 
pens that the secondary effect, the fever heat is 
more dangerous to the body than its primary cause. 
Either the primary cause is not dangerous at all 
if only the secondary effect, the fever heat, can 
be prevented, or the fever heat threatens to grow 
dangerous to the body before the primary cause, 
the germ, can be destroyed. In both cases Dr. 
Seyferth's Acetanilid is by far the most effective 
febrifuge that can be used.' " — Oil, Paint and Drug 
Reporter. 

TEA PROPEETY INVESTMENT. 
A correspondent writes: — "Tea property is never 
likely to attract the ordinary investor. Unless 
something is known of the garden, and of the 
inner working of the company, it is not ad- 
visable to buy tea shares." This is rather a 
wild statement. Pray what is known of the 
property and the "inner working" of ninety- 
nine out of every hundred of the joint stock 
companies formed except that given in the 
companies' reports. One would think that 
there was some hidden mystery about the pro- 
duction of tea. Information is obtainable about 
Indian tea companies, and those responsible for 
their management are certainly as frank and 
explicit as the managers of joint stock companies 
generally ; and we venture to think that this form 
of investment contrasts very favourably in all re- 
spects, including " inner working," whatever that 
may mean, with joint stock companies generally. 
The average investor in mining shares, for in- 
stance, is in a very hazy position as to " inner 
working." He reads the report of a mining ex- 
pert full of technical expressions meaning nothing 
and he has to live on this sort of thing. If he 
receives a dividend he is extremely fortunate. 
"Inner workings" in this case are cloudy indeed, 
and the investor who thirsts for knowledge in this 
direction is usually sadder and wiser. Tea shares, 
provided the selection be made with care and judg- 
ment, are a positive haven of rest and dividends 
for the investor, as compared with the majority of 
industrial undertakings. 
JAVA CINCHONA BARK CROPS. 
IMPORTANT CONTRADICTION . 
(Copy of letter to one of the leading firms of Brokers 
in London, dated Java, April 6th, 1888.) 
Gentlemen, — " Referring to your fortnightly 
market report upon cinchona bark dated 15th Feb. 
past, in which you fixed the attention of parties 
concerned upon the publishing of a letter headed 
Amsterdam, and in which a most exaggerated account 
was given of the quantity of sulphate of quinine 
Java is going to produce in the course of this 
year and next, we have resolved to act upon the 
advice you have given to planters on page 3 of 
said report. In consequence we are now drawing 
up by taxation of planters themselves a statistical 
survey of the quantity and quality of cinchona bark 
Java will probably deliver on tho market in the 
course of this year, and we intend in future to do 
the same at the beginning of each new year. 
As soon as our taxation will be ready we shall 
be happy to forward a copy of the results to your 
firm, but in the meantime, while waiting for the 
exact figures being published, we beg to state " that 
in our estimation the contents of the letter men- 
tioned are wholly inexact and utterly untrust- 
worthy." 
FOREST CONSERVATION IN CEYLON. 
col. Clarke's report for 1887. 
(/S'ce pages 33-36.) 
Our regular readers are aware that we hold 
modified and moderate views, formed on a long 
and close observation of facts in Ceylon, as to the 
climatic influence of forests. That the denudation 
of forest for planting purposes on our mountain 
system, -trees averaging forty feet high being re- 
placed by plants averaging four feet (not to speak 
of portions of the natural forest reserved and 
ornamental and useful trees planted on portions of 
estates), — can affect the absolute rainfall, we deci- 
dedly disbelieve. In the south-west of Ceylon rises 
a mountain system equal to one sixth at least of 
the whole area of the island. This mountain system 
stands right in the track of the moisture-laden ocean 
currents, the offspring of a series of cyclones (" long 
drawn out") to which we give the name of "mon- 
soons." As the currents and clouds approach our 
hills and mountains, their temperature is reduced, 
and they are compelled to part with their moisture. 
Hence the existence of our moist zone in Ceylon, 
embracing not only the mountain system and the 
outlying hills but a large portion of neighbouring 
" lowcountry." All this wet region was once 
densely covered with forest, produced under the 
influence of equally perennial heat and moisture. 
And if our good friend Col. Clarke, quotes the scien- 
tists and endorses their opinions, as to the good 
effects on climate of forests and the evil effects of 
their destruction ; we refer him to the history of 
the early military operations of the British in the 
then " Kingdom of Kandy," for proof of the evil 
effects of excessive dense and damp forest growth 
on climate and human health. The Kandyans, whe- 
ther in the wars at the early period of this cen- 
tury, the conquest of Kandy (for such it really 
was) in 1815, or the rebellion of 1817-18, were 
contemptible as enemies in the field. The real enemy 
the British had to contend with was a dense covert 
of forest in which the wily foe lay in treacherous 
ambush, and the damp, land leeches and malaria 
of which proved so fatal to our poor fellows, lead- 
ing Capt. Anderson to say of what is now one of 
the very finest climates of the world, — 
" For thou art fatal as thou 'rt fair, 
As many other beauties are." 
What the late Emperor Nicholas of Russia said 
of " Generals January and February " as the most 
formidable enemies of the allies in the Crimea, 
might have been said of " Generals Damp and 
Malaria" as the real enemies of the British soldiers 
in the forest fastnesses of Kandy. The victims of 
the Kandyans fell to foul treachery and cruel mas- 
sacre. But they who so fell were a mere fraction 
to the victims of the dense, damp, malarious 
forest, on far-extending and unbroken ramparts of 
which the Kandyans had always relied as their 
first, last and complete line of defence from 
foreign invasion. Take the case recorded in the 
annals of early British rule in Ceylon, of the 
British regiment which, within a short period 
of its return to Colombo from traversing the 
Kandyan forests and serving amongst them, buried 
three hundred of its number including the com- 
manding officer from " jungle fever." We are no 
advocates of the entire "destruction" of forests, 
even in our wonderfully recuperative moist climate, 
but we most strongly hold ttu one of the first 
and chief benefits conferred on the mountain 
region of Ceylon by the energetic soldier-Governor 
who pierced it by a grand road and by the 
European planters whose enterprise that road 
rendered possible, has been the amelioration of 
climate winch has followed the clearing away of 
so considerable a portion of the damp and dark 
