746 
THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. [Mat i, 1889. 
The " Tea Fund " has done as much as lay within 
its means, but these means were the contributions 
of a few estates, for many have yet to be enrolled, 
but this company is the " Ceylon Planters' American 
Tea Co.;" and as planters we should acknowledge 
how hartily we support the company, by at once 
communicating with Mr. Harry Whitham, who will 
be pleased to enroll all who have not yet taken 
one or more shares. — Yours faithfully, 
A MATALE SUPERINTENDENT. 
A NEW CEYLON TOBACCO COMPANY. 
Colombo, 4th April 1889. 
Dear Sie, — Mr. Thomas Dickson, whose letter 
advooating the cultivation of tobacco in our 
colony you recently published, has not been long 
in giving effect to a project in that direction 
which he had in view, for we learn from him 
by the last mail that he has formed and registered 
a Company, the prospeotus of which we hope shortly 
to lay before the public with the usual forms of 
application for shares. 
In the meantime we are informed that it is 
oa'led the Ceylon Tobacco Company, Ltd., with the 
following office-bearers : — 
Directors: — Thomas Dickson, Esq., Ingram House, 
165 Fenchurch, Street E.C., (Director, >cottish Trust 
and Loan Co. of Ceylon, Ltd.) ; J. Wilson, Esq., 64 
Chester Square, S.W. ; P. Shaw, Esq., Rochester 
House, Surbiton (Managing Director, Anglo Dutch 
Tobacco Company, Ltd.) ; D. Brown, Esq., 46 Lan- 
caster Gate, W. (Managing Director, Lankat Plan- 
tations Company, Ltd. ; Sumatra). 
Bankers : - Royal Bank of Scotland, Bishopsgate 
Street, and the New Oriental Bank Corporation, Ltd., 
Colombo. 
Solicitors : — Messrs. Hollams, Son Coward & 
Hawksley, Mincing Lane, E.C. 
Agents in Ceylon : — Messrs. Cumberbatch & Co. 
With the exception of £2,000 reserved for issue 
in Ceylon the whole capital of £20,000 has 
been subscribed in London, and is divided into 
19,950 shares of £1 each and 10 founders' 
shares of £5 each, one shilling is payable on ap- 
plication and two on allotment; further calls will 
be made as required of which one month's, notice 
will be given. 
The Company has been formed for purchasing and 
curing tobacco in Ceylon both for local sale and 
for export and also to further develop the 
business and cultivation of tobacco commenced by 
planters and native growers in the island. The 
business will be carried on at the Ambewatte Mills, 
part of which extensive premises will be made 
available for a factory, and operations will be com- 
menced as soon as the services of European over- 
seers experienced in all the branches of tobacco 
manufacture have been secured. — We are, dear sir, 
yours faithfully, CUMBERBATCH & CO. 
[This letter was received at too late an hour last 
evening for insertion : the prospectus, when fully 
developed, will no doubt find a place in our 
advertisement columns as usual. — Ed.] 
COCONUT LEAF DISEASE :— CONTRA TO 
MESSRS. WRIGHT AND AKBAR. 
Veyangoda, 4th April 1889. 
Dear Sir — Just as I was thinking of sending you 
a few liueH on the further development of the coco- 
nut leaf disease, my attention wan arrested with the 
report of an interview Messrs. W. H Wright and 
M. 8. J. Akbar had with you on the above subject. 
You have perhaps unconsciously unmasked the real 
obj'-ct of their visit to proclaim " as lull confidence 
M ever in coconut plantations." They seem to thiuk 
that to acknowledge the presence of a disease affect- 
ing coconnts, is to depreciate the value of their 
valuable properties. 
Personally I have unbounded respect for both 
Messrs. Wright and Akbar, and I wish there were many 
more Wrights and Akbars in our varied community- 
It is for this reason that I regret to see them 
make themselves ridiculous by crediting a " certain 
quarter" — presumably me, for I have been the only 
person who has kept the subject before the public — 
with a statement I never made and characterizing it as 
" unmitigated bosh." It would not have detracted 
at all from the reputation of these estimable gen- 
tlemen had they taken the trouble to inform 
themselves of what I really did write before they 
formed a deputation to an editor to refute my state- 
ments. I have repeatedly stated that this is no new 
disease, but an aggravation of what had been noticed 
for years back. I said this more particularly when 
forwarding for publication Dr. Trimen's views that 
the affection was but an exaggeration of what is 
always noticed in palms. With these gentlemen I 
have noticed this disease before, but on isolated trees. 
In December-January when trenching a young planta- 
tion I noticed more of the disease than before, and 
thought nothing of it even then, till at the end of 
January when in Colombo, a gentleman interested 
in coconut properties asked me if my trees were affected 
with a disease which seemed to be general. That was 
what first alarmed me and induced me to draw public 
attention to it. 
Mr. Wright's statement that " there is no appearance 
of any disease throughout the Hapitigam Korale " is 
directly contradicted by your correspondent from 
that Korale. In a very recent issue of the Observer 
he said that the rain had done the trees good in that 
the young fronds are not affected, but that it was 
not safe to cry out till we were well out of the 
wood. Whose statement do you give credence to : Mr. 
Wright's or Mr. Lamom's? Perhaps Mr. Wright spoke 
only for himself and of himself. 
Before Mr. Wright's or Mr. Akbar's opinions on the 
soil of the Veyangoda district can be accepted, it will 
be interesting to know the opportunities they had 
for forming an opinion of the district as a whole. 
It was particularly unfortunate for them of all others 
to say that this district is " peculiarly liable to suffer 
from drought," for it is notorious that no region 
suffers more from droughts than the Mahaoya Valley, 
where both these gentlemen own their valuable pro- 
perties. 
My object in keeping this subject before the public 
is not to pose as an alarmist, but because having a 
lively recollection of the spread and effect of leaf 
disease on coffee, I wish those interested in coconuts 
to be on the alert. I have not forgotten that wheu 
the late Dr. Thwaites gave his opinion on leaf disease, 
it was looked upon as the utterances of an old 
croaker and was pooh-poohed. The natural 
buoyancy of the planter caused him to look at the 
disease as nothing serious. Wasn 't he acquainted 
with black bug before, and did not Dr. Gardner 
predict in the same way the extermination of 
coffee ? No ; these scientific gentlemen always look 
at these questions through darkly colored spectacles. 
We, as practical planters, know that after a disease has 
run its appointed course it must die out. I have not 
forgotten how Mr. George Wall as Chairman of the 
Planters' Association repeatedly challenged anyone to 
show him a ooffee tree killed by leaf disease, nor have 
I forgotten the attack on Sir William Gregory led 
by the Observer and sustained by the planters for 
venturing to state his opinion on leaf disease and its 
effects. And to come to more recent times, I have 
not forgotten how persistently Mr. William Mackenzie 
was attacked for saying that coffee was doomed 
and what hard names were showered on him. Why 
was all this? Because planters were buoyed up by 
"eternal hope" and tighily shut their eyes to patent 
facts. Year after year they saw their coffee becoming 
more aDd more enfeebled and yet their condition of mind 
was such that they steadily and consistently refused to 
believe that leaf disease was slowly but surely sapping 
the constitution of their coffee bushes. We onght 
not to forget that disease had done serious damage 
to coconut plantations in the West Indies, so that 
