September i, 1881.] THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
301 
APHIS BLIGHT ON PEACH TREES. 
TO THE EDITOR OF THE "AUSTRALASIAN. " 
Sir,— Could you kindly give a remedy for peach 
blight? My trees are covered with aphis, which, I 
believe, prevented them from bearing last year.— N. M. 
Corryong, June 27. 
[Syringe the trees with an infusion of quassia chips. 
A pound of chips, which may be got for a trifle 
of the chemist, wiil serve for a long time. They may 
be infused again and again. Let the infusion be just 
unpleasantly bitter. In the event of quassia not being 
obtainable, employ soapsuds. — Ed. "Australasian."] 
COST OP MANUFACTURING TEA IN A 
HILL DISTRICT. 
TO THE EDITOR OF THE " INDIAN TEA GAZETTE. " 
Sir, — In reply to your request for figures showing 
the actual cost of manufacturing tea, I am able to 
supply you with the following as a sample of a Hill 
District. 
The figures include only the cost of (1) Fuel and 
bamboo work ; (2) Plucking ; (3) Pvolling ; (4) Firing ; 
(5) Assorting and packing. 
They apply to a garden where labor is cheap, but 
this advantage would be balanced by the better and 
thicker flushes and smaller cost of plucking in a 
Regulation District. The plucking average here was 
about 3 seers per cooly per diem last year, and 5 
seers per cooly per diem this year to 30th June. 
It only remains to add that 1880 was an unusually 
good one. 
1880- As. P. 
Fuel and Bamboo work ... ... 0 2 30 
Plucking ... ... ... ... 1 3-10 
Rolling , 0 3-80 
Firing ... ... ... ... 0 120 
Assorting and packing ... ... 0 3"20 
Cost of manufacture per lb. 1881- 
Fuel and Bamboo work 
Plucking ... 
Rolling ... 
Firing 
Assorting and packing 
1-60 
0 
1-50 
0 
10 
0 
3 
0 
0 75 
0 
1-50 
Cost of manufacture per lb. 
... 1 4-' 
Yours faithfully, 
Twice Two. 
DUAL SAP. 
TO THE EDITOR OF THE "INDIAN AGRICULTURIST." 
The treatment of coffee is what I will first take 
up. While accompanying a friend in charge of a 
coffee estate on the Neilgherries, I observed him 
plucking up the young shoots on which there were 
no flowers ; and was told by him that, by so doing 
the sap which went to their nourishment would tend 
to increase the size of the berries. This first led me 
to draw the distinction between the' fruit and leaf- 
sap. It appears to me that as with the human being 
and animals so with plants ; Nature changes its con- 
dition at the time for propagating its specie. The 
same nouiishment tends to support blood and milk; 
yet no one would, I suppose, be so bold as to say 
they were synonymous. Good milch cattle will never 
be found to carry much flesh, hence the inference 
that the greater portion of nourishment taken is con- 
verted into milk instead of blood. Now I hold that 
with the change of seasons plants always take their 
turn, and that this period to them is like the sea- 
sons for propagation to human life, the same sustenance 
undergoes a different process by which fruit-sap is 
create I, and so long as it exists, it performs its 
76 
functions towards supporting the fruit ; but so soon 
as no longer required, ceases to flow as in the case 
of milk, and changes its nature into leaf-sap as milk 
does to blood. There could not be a better illus- 
tration than the mango tree, of a year when the 
pollen is destroyed. On examination, the leaves will 
be found covered with a coating of sugar-sap ejected 
from the flower. If Nature could utilise this sap 
in the support of leaf, is it likely that it would 
exhaust itself in the manner it does ? You remarked 
that if this theory were correct, what would be the 
advantage to tea planters, in their removing the flower 
of the tea plant ? This can easily be shown, the 
flower being removed which to the plant is like the 
young to the animal, the necessity for its nourish- 
ment ceases, thus the space occupied by the fruit- 
sap is taken up by that of the leaf, and a consider- 
able portion of the time which would be spent in 
the fruit is devoted to producing leaf. 
I have a theory of my own with regard to the 
cultivation of vine, which I should like much to have 
discussed. 
E. A. C. 
Hardoi, 26th June 1881. 
TEA : HINTS CONCERNING THE INTERESTS 
OF PROPRIETORS AND PLANTERS. 
TO THE EDITOR OF THE "INDIAN TEA GAZETTE. " 
Dear Sir,' — I will try to shew proprietors of tea 
gardens, and those men who have not had any really 
practical experience in tea manufacture, what fools 
they make of themselves in the eyes of planters, by 
giving the said planters strict orders as to how they 
should manufacture their leaf (hoping that I may be 
of service to the said proprietors, and so open their 
eyes to see what a hole they are likely to fall into 
by doing so). I will also give them a few hints 
about management. 
First, I ask any reasonable being — How can a 
man, who has never made tea, know what produces 
the various stages, such as colour of infusion, darkness, 
of liquor, thin liquor, flat, soft, pungent, good or bad 
flavour, sourness, &c, dir., except from hearsay, and 
hearsay is what other people with the same inex- 
perience as himself say. Now planters will not be 
astonished, but unpractical men will lie probably, when 
I saj that each of the above stages I have mentioned 
may each be produced from as many causes nearly. 
Unpractical men will say dark infusion is over-fermenta- 
tion, oractical men will say — "yes, it may be." 
Unpractical men will say darkness of liquor is again 
over-fermentation, and the same answer will come 
from the experienced planter ; and so on with thin 
liquor, flatness, soft, pungent, flaoory <Lc, &c. 
I now beg to say that dark colour of infusion may 
be produced, as far as I know, from six distinctly 
different causes, and without attending to aud counter- 
acting, &c, every one of them, a perfect outturn 
can never be obtained. 
Darkness of liejuor may be produced from 4 distinctly 
different causes. 
Thin liejuor ,>>, ,, >, 5 ,, 
Flat and soft „ „ ,, „ 3 
Pungency ,, ,, ,, ,, 5 ,, 
and many lesser and trivial causes. 
Flavor ,, „ ,, ,, 2 great cau- 
ses and many trival ones. 
Then again we have appearance of tea to keep in 
mind, and the following terms are applied : Much 
tip, black, irregular, curly, welt twist'd, open, showy, 
have/some, lea/'y, chaffy, brown, common, etc., &o. 
All these can again be divided into as many other 
particulars. 
Much tip the unpractical man will say is fine 
plucking. But planters know that this may be one 
