8o4 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
[March i, 1882 . 
Crop 450 ac. wheat=900 at 80 c. 
Fourth year, third crop. 
Implements - - 
Wages and harvest expenses &c. 
1,250 365 70 
3rd instalment, aDd interest and 
Crop 600 ac. wheat 12,000 bus. at 80 c. 
Fifth year, fourth crop 
Wages, harvest expenses &o. 
1,250 185 70 
4th instalment, interest and taxes 
7,200 
8,040 
400 
4,200 
Crop as last year 
Sixth year, fifth crop. 
Wages harvest expenses &c. 
Last instalment 1,400 int. 100 taxes 70 
Crop 
ac. as last year 
6,510 
9,000 
Profit 3,000 
Recapitulation. 
At the end of fifth crop (casualties excepted) you have 
640 acres of land which originally cost you ... 6400 
Buildings cost - - 2700 
Implements and stock cost - 5,660 
14,760 
Also the original capital of £2,000 which has not been 
taken at all into the calculation, but used as working 
capital, say equal to - - 9,000 
Profits at end of last year - 3,000 
26,760 
Shewing bow £2,000 may in six years be increased to 
$26,000. The property would readily sell at the valuation 
i have put on it, viz. $14,000. 
N<>w you eee what a man may do buying the farm 
at $10 per acre. You can see what a settler on Govern- 
ment land may do, getting 320 acres for next to 
nothing, if he has only a little capital. 1 do not 
think I need say any more, as figures shew better 
than any explanation I can give you. 
There is a great exodus from the Eastern States 
and Canada, both to Dakota and to Manitoba. 
The land in the latter place is just as good, and 
chances would be equally good there but for 
the fact that the railways there have fallen into 
the hands of a monopoly that take the thick of the 
eream off, and a Tory Government we have in power 
here do all they can to . help them. But for that I 
should have gone to Manitoba, which is under the 
British flag. 
This winter in Canada promises to be a very mild 
one. Here we are within a week of Christmas, and 
not a particle of snow on the ground. We had a 
few ria,\s sleighing a month ago, but it has been mild 
weather ever since, and plou. hing was going on till 
a week ago, wh n wo had just frost enough to stop 
it. I feel such a difference this winter in being able 
to stand the cold. Last winter I felt it very much, 
but that was in being run down so before I came. 
THE POSITION OF THE COFFEE TRADE AND 
ITS PROSPECTS. 
Amongst a perfect avalanche of Price Currents 
which lust mail has brought u", are Patry & Pasteur's, 
Backer & Bencraft's, and von Glehn & Sons' annual 
te i of the trade in colonial (perhaps we should 
say tropical) produce, in which coffee takes a prominent 
place. The figures confirm what has already reached 
us as to accumulated stocks in European markets, 
and the enormous increase in the quantity of coffee 
Brazil is able to send into the markets of the world. 
The latter, however, is the great factor in the severe 
depression which is likely to affect us so seriously. 
Whether we take the actual figures for the calendar 
year 1^81, or those estimated for the season which 
began with 1st July 1881 and will end with 30th 
June 1882, the result is much the same: an ex- 
port of seven millions of hundredweights, besides the 
local consumption of, say, 600,000 cwt , the latter 
being equal to the total of our estimated crop. The 
exports in 1881, in round numbers, were:— 
From Rio 5,200,000 cwt. 
,, Santoe 1,660,000 „ 
Tog-ther 6,860,000 cwt. 
Ceara and other places making up the round seven 
millions. The estimate for season 1881-82 is even 
worse, in consequence of Santos being expected to 
export two million cwt. of coffee, much of which 
competes with our Ceylon plantation. We scarcely 
see why Rio, which exported 254, Of 0 tons last season, 
should be estimated at only 235,000 for the present, 
but, even so, the figures are : — 
Rio 4,700,000 cwt. 
Santos 2,000,000 ,, 
6,700,000 cwt. 
Other ports would make up the 7 millions. But 
Rucker & Bencraft, whose estimate the, above i t addj — 
At the present time the 1882/1883 crops in Rio and 
Santos promise to be enormous, some saying that Santos 
alone will give 2,000,000 bags. It is estimated that the 
crops together will total not less than 6,000,000 bags, or say 
353,000 tons. 
The equivalent in cwt. of 353,000 tons is 7,060,000. 
Messrs. Robert von Glehn & Sons, who have recently 
had a passage-at-arms wilh Kern, Hayn & Co, of Rio, 
take a more hopeful view of the prospects of the 
coffee trade, because they doubt the capability of 
Brazil to export - the large quantities estimated in 
other quarters. We quote as follows: — 
The stocks of Coffee in Europe have increased during 
the past month about 11,000 tons, and prices have still 
further declined :— middling Plantation Ceylon Coffee, which 
we then quoted 77s to 82s, is now barely worth 72s to 77s ; 
and good average Santos, which was then worth 60 fr. 
in Havre, is now quoted 56 fr. per 50 Ko. It cannot be 
denied that some failures in Bordeaux, of firms but slightly 
interested in coffee, have contributed largely to accentuate 
the decline in prices. Our opinion is that the alarm which 
appears to be felt as to the financial position in Havre is 
excessively exaggerated, if not entirely unfounded, as, owing 
to the admirable system for advances on produce carried 
out by the Bank of France, no large losses are likely to 
remain long unpaid, and no large quantities of coffee are 
likely to be forced for sale at one time, the future course 
of the article must therefore be studied on its own merits. 
On the other hand we hear that two gentlemen 
who recently visited Ceylon en route from Rotterdam 
to Java stated that dealers in Havre bad speculated 
for a rise and had stocks of Brazil coffee equal to 
1,300,000 cwt. The Dutch gentlemen added, as their 
opinion, that coffee would not again touch 70s. fo r 
three years to come. Our readers can judge for them- ! 
selves. Messrs. von Glehn make a long statement i 
