820 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
[March t, 1882. 
ylieets of paper here and there to prevent the charcoal 
running to the bottom. In round numbers, one lnaund 
of tea seed contains, say 30,000 seeds. If you get 
8,000 to germinate with seed that has come a long 
di itance you are lucky. After a two months' journey 
3,000 is probably the outside which will be realised. 
This state or condition of the Indian tea plantations 
at the time when greater intelligence and careful study 
of climate, soil, and situation were beginning to attract 
attention, must have rendered it a difficult task to pro- 
cure really fine seeds of a pure strain from the indi- 
genous stock ; and the condition of the gardens to which 
Mr. Cruickshank turned his services affords an abundant 
corroboration of Colonel Money's deliverance. When he 
first joined the Company the seeds he gathered were 
only the size of a blackberry (currant), and they brought 
only £25 per annum to the Company; but by careful 
cultivation and experiments, extending over the short 
space of two years, he raised seeds the size of a boy's 
marble, weighing ten times heavier than those with 
which he began his task, and in three years their 
revenue from seeds alone was £1,600 per annum, with 
the prospect of a large increase upon that sum. This 
statement seems almost incredible, but what follows 
renders its acceptance quite easy and natural. The 
number of litigations arising out of sales of bad seed 
must be patent to everyone who is connected with 
India, and here is one case out of many which came 
under Mr. Cruickshank's personal observation : — 1,000 
pounds of seed were delivered, weighing 500 seeds to 
the pound, which gives the enormous number of 800,000 
separate seeds ; they were carried from Assam to Cachar, 
and were five months in transit, and after being duly 
planted, and when the time for the plants to be ap- 
pearing had come, it was discovered that not one seed 
had germinated. Mr. Cruickshank himself sa v these 
seeds planted under instructions from the agents, and 
payment was to be made upon the percentage that 
germinated. All these seeds cannot have been bad at 
first ; but such a result speaks volumes for the care- 
lessness and ignorance of probably both the seller and 
the buyer. This fact almost suggests the story of 
"wooden nutmegs." It is a noteworthy fact that many 
planters have acted on Colonel Money's advice and have 
rooted up and cleared from then gardens every bush 
grown from China seed, and have replaced them by 
sowing indigenous seed. Great difficulty having been 
experienced in packing the seeds, so that their germin- 
ating power might be preserved unimpaired, even for 
one month, or until they could be conveyed from the 
gardens to Calcutta, Mr. Cruickshank tried the experi- 
ment of having them packed in strong loamy soil which 
had been thoroughly dried in the sun and broken up 
by passing through a fine sieve and hermetically sealed, 
and found that there was no particular loss sustained 
in their germinating power by keeping for six months, 
in fact, he has kept some seeds for fourteen months 
by tins method. He recommends boxes to hold 20 
pounds of seed as being the most convenient for carriage, 
and less liable to breakage and damage to the seed. 
On the principle that one accomplished fact is better 
than a dozen theories, it is interesting to note that 
Mr. Cruickshank has asked us to exhibit in our window 
seeds and plants of his own growing, and they have 
been examined and admired by thousands. Mr. Thyne, 
of Buchanan Street, was struck with their robust, 
healthy appearance. The seeds from which this plant 
was grown were gathered by himself on the 1st of 
November, 1879, and were preserved by the abovenamed 
method and brought home, and were planted in the 
hot-house at Garsoube, near Glasgow, on the 20th of 
June, Ib80, and every one of the seeds germinated, and 
their progeny consists of a beautiful hardy plant (or 
rather six plants or stems), standing three feet high, 
i"i i bearing a vigorous foliage, many of the leaves 
u.:...auiuz nine inches long, and it is still sending out 
fresh shoots, the bright pale green of the younger 
leaves contrasting with the darker tints of the older 
growth. To the non-professional mind the questions 
arise — What are the virtue of the two methods as 
practised by Colonel Money and by Mr. Cruickshank? 
and what is the action on the seed, the one method 
contrasted with the other ? Charcoal packing cannot 
exclude the air, and Colonel Money seems to advocate 
as much ah - as possible, provided it be dry, cool, and 
in the shade. Is it possible that the charcoal absorbs 
some virtue from the seed, or absorbs the natural 
moisture from the seed, and thus renders it too dry 
to germinate when placed in soil at the end of two 
months, except to the very small extent of 10 per 
£ ent ? These gentlemen, experienced planters both, are 
agreed upon the treatment of the seed up to the point 
of packing for transport — but here they differ widely. 
Mr. Cruickshank uses strong, loamy soil that has been 
dried in the sun, and hermetically seals the box, which 
shuts out all ah - from the seeds and retains in the seed 
whatever moisture may have been left in it when the 
drying process was completed ; and the percentage of 
the seed that germinated is 100 as against 10! One 
could not look for so large a percentage from Mr. 
Cruickshank's method if his seeds has been planted in 
the open (in India) ; but he would be disappointed if 
at least 50 per cent did not germinate after a long 
journey and six months' keeping, because he has realized 
80 per cent of seedlings by his method from seed sown 
in the open after keeping them for three weeks covered 
with dry mould. It would thus seem that tea seeds 
are prone to decomposition, and the point to be over- 
come is to arrest this tendency until after the seeds 
have been sown. That excluding the ah - has this result 
is partly proved by the fact that of two seeds of equal 
virtues, one planted at the depth of a foot from the 
surface, does not germinate for a long time after the 
other, planted at the depth of one or two inches. But 
the interesting and valuable fact remains that Mr. 
Cruickshank's method has preserved the germinating 
power for six, eight, and fourteen months, while Colonel 
Money's system appears to be capable of preserving this 
germinating beyond two months, and then only to the 
extent of 10 per cent. Of course, we cannot touch on 
the vicissitudes that attend the young seedlings after 
they have germinated, for here this comparison naturally 
ends. We may, however, state that Mr. Cruickshank 
brought home orchid roots by the same method, and 
with a like success. These facts are doubly interesting 
when we read that the growth of tea is now being ex- 
perimented upon in America and many other countries.other 
than India and China, and in commencing a new in- 
dustry it is well to get the best material to work with. 
This seed has the reputation of being the finest strain 
in Assam, and the parent plant was planted by Bruce, 
" the pioneer of tea in India," on the northern di- 
vision of the great " Assam Tea Company's Gardens" at 
Jaipur, near Makkum Petroleum Springs, 550 feet 
above the sea level, and just on the British frontier. 
The Assam railways " guaranteed by the Secretary of 
State for India in Council" will have their terminus at 
Makkum — the prospectus of which was advertised in 
the Herald recently, and shows that the company was 
formed for the purpose of working coal, timber, petr- 
oleum, and iron in Assam, and for establishing a service 
of steamers on the Brahmapootra River, as well as 
the railway from the river (near Dibrugarb) to the 
Makkum coal-lields near the Dehing River. A few 
miles up the river Dehing forests of indigenous tea are 
found, so that this district may be considered the 
habitat of the plant. An acre of this class of plant 
will yield from 800 to 1,200 pounds of manufactured 
tea per annum when the plant comes to its maturity, 
and if properly manipulated will bring 3d per pound 
more than the ordinary hybrid or China varieties more 
^jOHimonly grown. The value of this seed is fifteen 
