Mat i, 1889.J THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. 
755 
ence. In the present session of Parliament a 
notice of motion has been given as follows: — 
Sir Joseph Pease will move at an early day.— 
That this House is of opinion that the system by 
which a large portion of the Indian Opium Revenue 
is raised is financially unsound and morally inde- 
fensible, and would urge upon the Indian Govern- 
ment that they should cease to grant licenses for the 
cultivation of the poppy, except to supply the 
legitimate demand for opium for medical purposes. 
We would now venture to call on all good 
people in the United Kingdom who earnestly 
desire to see no Indian-grown opium imported 
into China, to remember that there is one way 
in which they can practically check such impor- 
tation. The only means by which the Chinese can 
get the money to pay for the opium imported is 
by selling their products to be exported, the greatest 
of which exports by far is tea. Let every member of 
the Anti-Opium Society then give up drinking China 
tea, and do all in his power to influence others to 
give up drinking such tea, and to take to the 
pure Ceylon or British-grown article only, and 
each one so doing may depend upon it that a 
decided step will be taken to check the opium 
traffic with China. In fact, this will be giving 
a direct blow at a trade which is considered 
accursed by so many good people in the old country. 
As regards Ceylon tea. we need scarcely say that 
while it is a thoroughly pure, wholesome article 
in itself, it is grown and prepared by free labour. 
TEA BENEFACTOES. 
Our contemporary of the local " Times " in 
taking over our list »f Ceylon tea Agencies, 
makes a regular muddle in his attempt to add 
to it by including all the " Sirocco " Agencies 
of Mr. Davidson, Belfast, although that gentle- 
man has never set himself up specially to sell 
Ceylon, but rather Indian, teas. We do not suppose 
that even Mr. Garioch in Aberdeen nor Mr. ft. B. 
Arthur in New York devote their chief attention 
to the Ceylon product. Mr. Davidson is known 
to get a great deal of the tea he sells from his 
own gardens in Assam. We attract attention to 
an extract on page 743 from the Indian 
Planters' Gazette giving an account of the New 
York Sirocco Agency. 
Our list was specially confined to Agencies 
which had been established primarily for 
Ceylon teas and the business of which was 
chiefly confined to our product. If we went 
in for Tea Agencies generally, such as the 
Sirocco, our list could be made to cover some 
columns. The only names properly added by the 
local " Times " are T. Gray & Co., London ; the 
(. eylon Teagrowers Company, Limited; Mr. N. D. 
Galbraith, Ontario (?). Since writing the above we 
have been favoured with the following additional 
and full list from a well-informed quarter : — 
CEYLON TEA FIRMS IN LONDON AND ELSEWHERE 
(ADDITIONAL.) 
The Ceylon Tea Growers, Ld., Basiughall Street, 
London. 
The Ceylon Tea and Coffee Co., Ld., (Ames's) Golden 
Lane, London. 
The Ceylon Tea Co., Mincing Lane, London. 
The Ceylon Tea Co., (Hewetson's), Mark Lane. 
The Ceylon Tea Agency, Lower Thames Street, 
London. 
The Ceylon Tea Producing Agency, (J. R. Tyer's), 
Seething Lane, London. 
The Ceylou Planters' Stores and Agency, (W. H. 
Davies & Co.), Catherine Street, London. 
The Pure Ceylon Produce Co., Seething Lane, 
Loudon (J. M. Robertson). 
West End Agenoy (Mr. Tranchell, juur.) 
William Rona'd (and brother;, King's Road.London. 
Reginald Sparkes, Goldalming. 
Do. do., W. Brcmpton, London. 
Prank Davies, (W. H. Davies <fc Co.), Wolver- 
hampton. 
T. Luker, Senr., Stroud. 
Many of the ab^ve commenced doing business in 
Ceylon tea when the exports were counted by thou- 
sands and not millions of lb. — Cor. 
A Merchant writes :— 
" The local ' Times ' gives credit to Sirocco Tea Co. 
as being exclusively sellers of Ceylon tea, but this 
is not so. Davidson has his own estates in India, 
but he does occasionally buy Ceylons. You should 
suggest that Davidson should take at least half 
and half (India and Ceylon.) TLey do a good busi- 
ness, and are very enterprising. R. B. Arthur 
will, I'm sure, have the greatest possible pleasure 
in pushing pure Ceylon teas if Davidson permits 
him to do so." 
* 
AGRICULTURE IN INDIA.* 
The globe trotter that scampers round the 
world in three months more or less, has the chance 
of picking up a great deal of knowledge of the 
lands he visits and of the customs of the people 
who inhabit them, — social, political, and commercial. 
Many of those who make the grand tour in those 
work-a-day times, condescend to enlighten the stay- 
at-home world, with the facts and fancies they 
have gathered by the way ; in newspapers, maga- 
zines, and pretentious volumes of four or five 
hundred pages. As the bare facts that have come 
under the notice of the writer would be but dry 
fodder for the reading public of Britain to make 
the article interesting or the book saleable, he 
must draw on his imagination, he must extend 
his notes into something more interesting than 
facts. "Travellers' tales" have ages ago passed 
into a proverb, so that intelligent readers take 
tbeir fare with a grain of salt, but they often 
salt the wrong mouthful and swallow unseasoned 
the least wholesome morsels. The power of dis- 
seminating crude and hastily formed opinions 
among the untravelling public is in proportion 
to the social standing and the literary ability of 
the writer. Not the least misleading of those 
travelling story-tellers is the man who has en- 
quired some reputation as a specialist, who has 
on scanty evidence formulated certain opinions 
on subjects in bis own department connected with 
a foreign land, and goes abroad to collect evidence 
in support of them. 
Robert Wallace, Professor of Agriculture in the 
University of Edinburgh, seems to be one of this 
latter olass, a man of amazing energy and bound- 
less self-confidence, who came out two years ago 
to study Indian Agriculture on the spot. Dur- 
ing the 126 days of his visit, he travelled at the 
average rate of over 100 miles a day, exclusive of 
a sea voyage to Ceylon. One would imagine that it 
was hardly possible for even the most powerful and 
voracious intellect to master the details of a subject 
so large and complicated as Indian Agriculture 
under such circumstances, especially as he seems not 
to have gone always to the most trustworthy souroes 
of information. With such facts as he collected in 
the course of his rapid movements, he pro- 
ceeded on reaching home to promulgate very 
deoided views in his lecture room in agricultural 
journals, and finally in a volume of some considerable 
dimensions. 
Mr. Benson of the Madras Agricultural Depart- 
ment, has just published in pamphlet form a 
review of this work, which is well worthy of pe- 
* "india in 1887 as seen by Robert Wallace:" A 
Brief Reply by C. Benson, m.u.a.o., Assistant Direc- 
tor of the Department of Land ttecords and Agri- 
culture, Madras. [Addison & Co., Madras, 1889.] 
