426 
THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. [November i, 1881. 
Dr. King has recommended a trial shipment to the 
London market to make its value known to English 
manufacturers. The wild plaintain, and for the mat- 
ter of that the cultivated sort, the fruit of which, 
both ripe and unripe, is consumed by the masses in 
this country, grows luxuriantly on the hill slopes, 
and the fibre might be a source of additional profit, 
for the tree annually dies down, and the fibre is 
simply thrown away. The plantain, according to 
Laborie, is largely culiivated on coffee plantations in 
Domingo as a shade just in the manner that cinchona 
is now put among tea and coffee trees. — South of In- 
dia Observer. 
Colonial Fisheries. — Your recent Dotice of Mr. 
Musgrave's work on the " Fishes of Jamaica '' should 
induce circulus being sent to all the Colonies to 
contribute information on local fisheries, in readiness 
for the International Fisheries Exhibition, which is to 
be held in London in 1833. Dr. Day will, no doubt, 
take a lively interest in this matter. The author of 
the ' Fishes of India" should be able to exercise great 
influence among our many Indian friends ; and it is to 
be hoped that., through the exertion of Sir J. MacDonald 
and Sir VV. V. Whiteway, our great fish-producing 
Colonies, Canada and Newfoundland, will make a 
better show than they did at Berlin two years ago. 
Australia, too, ought to be able to illustrate the wealth 
of her fisheries there. New South Wales sent a com- 
missioner lo Berlin to report upon any features in the 
fisheries exhibition there which might help her 
Government in parsing regulations for the development 
of her fisheries, and an exhibition in Loudon, ought to 
be the medium not only for affording similar instruc- 
tion to all our Colonies, but for making the public 
better acquainted with the marine wealth of Britain 
beyond the seas. — Colonies and India. 
Calcutta to the Nilghiris. — The journey by road 
from Met'.polliam to Ootacamand is expensive by ex- 
press tonga, much more expensive than that from Um- 
balla to Simla ; for while the fare for the latter jour- 
ney is R40 (80 c 90 miles) ; the charge for the for- 
mer is B30 or B36 for 32 miles ; and this notwith- 
standing there is supposed to be opposition between 
two or three companies. The road for the first few 
miles to Kullar, the foot of the "Ghaut," is not very 
good ; but the ascent is smooth, much smoother than 
the ascent to Simla ; and the scenery is very pretty 
indeed as one mounts the face of the hills, and the 
varying foliage, tropical at first, but gradually dis- 
playing more and more of the European type. Here 
and there tea and coffee gardens are noticed, and fur- 
ther up cinchona is being planted in profusion. Indeed, 
planters here seem to look upon tea and coffee with a 
feeling expressed in the word Ichabod, and they are now 
going in for gold or cinchona. Practical men, these 
planters ! They make diligent search over their es- 
tates, and they discover quartz, auriferous quartz, of 
course, at all events the specimen shown is generally 
valuable. Do they set to work at once and crush it ? 
Oh, dear no ! they sell or try to sell the estate or the 
right of working it, to a capitalist if they can find 
one, or a company if they cannot. By this means the 
planter saves a modest pittance, while he poses as a 
benefactor to the community. And we will wish them 
all well. May everybody who buys an interest in a 
mine, find that interest at least 50 per cent. As re- 
gards cinchona, it is a fair speculation. I am informed 
that digging " pits" costs about R17 per thousand. 
It will take five or six years before any return comes 
in, and there is the risk that the price of bark will 
have lessened owing to the quantity which will then 
bo produced, hut a glance at a share list, which shows 
that the dividend of a Cinchona Company was 100 per 
cent iu 1880, engenders a natural expectation that 
there will still be a margin for profit. — Pioneer. 
Sulphuric Acid as a Cure for Coffkk Leaf 
Disease. — We learned from Mr. Geo. Wall before his 
departure that some experiments he made on coffee 
leaf disease with very weak dilutions of sulphuric acid- 
watering the soil around affected trees— were emin-ntly 
satisfactory. We believe Mr. Marshall Ward has been 
trying the same application, and no doubt the result 
will shortly be made known. Sulphuric acid diluted 
with water to the extent mentioned by Mr. Wall 
would be a very cheap application, if it prove ! efficaci- 
ous in checking the leaf fungus. 
The Bain-Tree.— At a meeting of the Committee 
of the Agri-Horticultural Society of Madras, held on 
the 3rd ultimo, it was stated that the Biiu-tree 
(Pithrcolobium saman) in the Gardens, which is be- 
lieved to be under nine years, from the seed, continues, 
in spite of its having been necessary to amputate some 
of its largest limbs, to grow enormously. Measured 
on 30th July last, it gave in girth 9 feet 4 inches at 
the ground, G feet 3 inches at the height, 3 leet and 
5 feet 9 inches at the height, 5 feet had spread 
about 85 feet, from north to south ; and a total height 
of about 46 feet. A reference to the former measure- 
ments shows that the girth at 3 feet from the ground 
has increased in the last three years 2 feet 2 inches. 
The age of the tree is, if anything, over-estimated ; 
but search is being made for traces of the receipt of 
the seed, which it is believed came from C ylon about 
1872. A casuarina tree standing alongside, which was 
the specimen of its order when that part of the ground 
was laid out as the Botanical Garden, and is therefore 
known to be about ten years old, now measures at 
five feet from the ground only 2 feet 8£ inches, though 
it is about S2 feet high. — Madras Mail. 
The Kalutara Liberian Coffee Estates. — The 
Liberian coffee enterprise in the district continues to 
flourish, and give every promise of assured success. A 
large clearing has been planted in Gikiyanakanda estate, 
and the plants are thriving beyond expectation. Cocoa is, 
I fear, not so successful : the soil is not rich enough 
for it, and the white ants attack the tree. Tea and 
India rubber both succeed admirably. The Ranwala- 
galakanda lots have not yet been put up for sale, as 
it was important to ascertain what line the proposed 
new road would take with regard to them. I have 
suggested that a road should be traced from the 
bridge at Tabuwana, the termination of the present 
i-oad, to the foot of the estate Arapolakanda through 
Crurie and Torwood to Nebada, and thence to join , 
the present minor road at Matugama, passing along 
the foot of the Ranwalagakanda lands. A connecting 
road from Nebada to Warakagoda will afford an outlet 
to the river for those estates on the Ranwalagala- 
kanda range, and relieve the District Road Committee 
of the extremely heavy upkeep of the hilly road 
through Gikiyanakanda. The great advantage to be 
secured by estate owners in the district is I con- 1 
ceive, the extreme facility of transport to Colombo 
by water. Coffee can be transported from the store 
On the river side to the store at Colombo without 
any further handling. The present estates are ati 
some distance from the river, but there are large 
tracts of forest land adjoining the Kuda and Maguru- 
ganga which will, I doubt not some day, and I trust 
before very long, be taken for the cultivation of 
Liberian coffee and other low-country products. It 
is a great mistake to think that Sinhalese labour is 
unsuited for the purpose. I have found as many as 
200 Sinhalese coolies at work cheerfully under Mr. 
Foulkes at Gikiyanakanda in the new Liberian coffee 
clearing, and he finds no difficulty it securing as 
much labour as he requires. The appearance of the 
estate is sufficient testimony to the quality of the 
labour.— Mr. Wace's Administration Report on the Kalu- 
tara district for 1880. 
