May i, 1889.J THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
723 
THE FUTUEE OF COFFEE AND OF 
JAVA PLANTATIONS. 
A well-known Bogawantalawa proprietor, now in 
Europe, sends us a copy of the Morning Post with 
the following article on coffee, chiefly referring to 
Java and Sumatra, which he rightly judges is worth 
reading, if only to afford amusement, in Ceylon : — 
A matter of considerable interest to coffee drinkers 
all over the world is just now engaging the attention 
of the Dutch Government. For some years past there 
has been a great falling-off in the quality and quantity 
of the coffee produced in the Dutch East Indies, where 
the berry is cultivated ; and latterly the decline has 
become so serious that a Commission has been ap. 
pointed, under the presidency of M. Oanne, to consider 
the deoadence of the Government plantations in Java 
arid Sumatra, and suggest means for improving them. 
Our principal supply of coffee, as most people are 
aware, is derived, not from the islands of the Eastern 
Archipelago, held by Holland, but from Brazil, which, 
indeed, grows nearly as much as all other coffee-growing 
countries combined. But the quality of that produced 
everywhere in the New World is greatly inferior to the 
growth of the Bast ; and since genuine Mocha is almost 
unobtainable now-a-days, and the coffee gardens of Cey- 
lon are being grubbed up to make room, for the more pro- 
fitable tea plantations it is to Java and Sumatra that 
coffee drinkers must look in the future for a supply 
of really good beans at a reasonable price, and 
these, as every householder has no doubt discovered, 
have been dearer and more and more difficult to 
obtain in the last two or three years. Allowing for 
the effects of the disease which has attacked the 
coffee shrub in many parts of the E.ist, where it has 
long been successfully grown, it is still difficult 
to account for the extraordinary decadence of the 
Dutch plantations, bearing in mind the peculiar 
conditions under which coffee culture is carried on 
in both Java and Sumatra.* It is not, as in any 
other part of the world, an industry in which 
people may or may not engage just as they please. 
Coffee cultivation is compulsory in the two islands. 
Every head of a family, every villager, is obliged 
to cultivate a specified number of trees each year. 
He is compelled, moreover, to plant a certain number 
of young shrubs every season, to replace old ones 
no longer profitable, or in bearing, and a large 
staff of Dutch inspectors supervises the culture, and 
sees that due compliance is made with the several 
prescriptions of the law. And neglect in any parti- 
cular is punished with the utmost rigour and 
severity. 
And not only does the Dutch Government prescribe 
to the Javan and Sumatran peasant how many coffee- 
shrubs he must cultivate, and in what way they are 
to be planted, but it compels him to sell the produce 
to the authorities at their own price. In fact 
coffee is a strict Government monopoly, with 
the notable addition that every family is compulsorily 
engaged in it for the benefit of the State. For the 
convenience of cultivators small store-houses are con- 
structed all over the islands whereever coffee is grown, 
and thither the cultivator carries the beans as soon 
as he has gathered and ripened them. From these 
local depots they are transferred to the larger towDS 
and sea ports of the coast. Padang is the great centre 
of the Sumatra coffee trade and the shipping port for 
Europe, as Batavia is for Java. Tho so-called 
Padang coffee is the product of the Western portions 
of the island of Sumatra and the highlands of the 
south. The shrnb, curiously enough, objects to low- 
lands and an excess of heat, so that none is grown in 
the low-lying regions near Padang. The plant thrives 
at an altitude of eighteen hundred to two thousand 
feet, and does best on the declivities of mountains 
and hilly terraces, in soil where forest trees have for- 
uierly grown, and where the woods have been cut 
down in such a way as to leave a certain number 
standing- at intervals to shelter the tender young 
* Tho leaf f uugua is quite enough to account for the 
ailing. off.— .En. 
coffee plants. In Sumatra the yield of the coffee bush 
is exceptionally heavy owing to the favourable climatic 
conditions of the island. The bush is covered all the 
year round* with the small snowwhite blossoms that 
precede the fruit, while ripe and unripe berries are 
found on the stem at the same time. Picking is, 
therefore, always going on at regu'ar intervals 
and the cherry-like little fruit is dried, removed 
from its thick outer covering, and then laid 
out in the sun until the husk enveloping the 
berry can be rubbed off. In Sumatra the fruits are 
just thrown down upon the ground and left where they 
are until the husk is loosened, hence Padang coffee 
often contains many small stones mingled with the 
beans when they have been carelessly gathered from 
the drying heaps on the bare earth. This is never the 
case with tb« finer produce of Java- The Javanese are 
rather particular in the matter of drying their coffee- 
berries, and spread them with the greatest care upon 
straw mats, which are then placed in the sunshine. 
The shrub in the Dutch Indies begins t o yield in its 
third year, and continues in bearing condition until it 
is about twelve years old. After this time the plant 
assumes its mantle of moss, precursor of decay, and 
slowly dies off.t The natives of Java and Sumatra 
make use of the leaves of the coffee plant in exactly 
the same way as we do tea. They make an infusion 
of them — of course, after first drying them, and this 
is not only as good as coffee in the opinion of many 
connoisseurs, but actually contains a greater propor- 
tion of caffeine, the active constituent of the berry, 
on which its exhilarating- and stiniulatii g effects en- 
tirely depend. 
The coffee berry is not only a favourite with a large 
section of mankind, but many members of the animal 
world show a strange predilection for it. The red 
envelope in which the bean is contained is a favourite 
edible of a notable proportion of the wild creatures of 
the forest in all coffee growing lands. In Java and 
Sumatra the " mussang," better kaown as the "musk 
oat," visits the nearest plantations night after night in 
search of this vegetable delicacy, though it is notable 
that the creature is unable to digest or assimilate the 
brown berry itself. So, too, tht " kolong," a huge 
Sumatran bat, with wings four feet across, commits its 
nocturnal raids for the purpose of securing the dainty, 
which it appears to highly appreciate. It is, however, 
not the depredations of such and similar creatures, or 
even the leaf disease to which the plant has become 
subject, which is wholly responsible for decadence of 
the coffee plantations of the Dutch East Indies. If 
fine Java and Sumatra coffee is now expensive, 
comparatively speaking, and difficult to obtain, it 
is because the antiquated system of compulsory 
cultivation in vogue in the islands, the expense 
entailed by method of storage, and the army of offi- 
cials required to superintend the industry combine to 
make it so. This is the more to be regretted as there 
is good reason to believe that the falling-off in the 
consumption of coffee, in England especially, is due 
rather to the fact that really good and well prepared 
coffee is so rarely to be had, than to any lack of ap- 
preciation on the part of Englishmen of the merits 
of the genuine berry. Somehow few people in this 
country can discriminate between ordinary and in- 
ferior qualities of tea, while the coarsest palates seem 
readily to distinguish good from bad ooffee, and will, 
therefore, have none ' of it. It is a pity that coffee 
is not more generally consumed, for it is an undoubted 
fact that those who are habitual coffee drinkers very 
seldom care for spirits. Indeed, it has been pointed 
out that in those parts of South America where coffee 
is the recognised beverage drunkenness is extremely 
rare, and even emigrants who have brought with 
them a love of alcohol abandon it and take to coffee 
in preference, owing to its stimulating effect upon 
the brain and nerve centres. Still, in spite of our 
insular preference for tea, the number of people who 
* Certainly not : often the blossom and flower are 
only seen for a few days. — Ed. 
t Absurd : the coffee tree bears for 30 up to 50 or 60 
yearn under favorable conditions. — Kp. 
