856 
THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. 
[April t, 1882. 
The Calcutta Tea Syndicate have received a 
satisfactory report from their delegate, Mr. Sibthorpe, 
regarding the American and Canadian tea markets and 
the opening they present for Indian teas. The general 
conclusion drawn in Calcutta from a perusal of the 
report is that at no very remote date these countries 
will be, next to the United Kingdom, the largest 
customers, while it is not improbable :hat sooner or 
later, Ihey will surpass even the United Kingdom 
itself i'-i this respect. — Times of India. 
Beche-de-Mkr. — Batticaloa, Arali Nort'i, 13th Feb. 
— The rent of the Arali ferry is usually purchased by 
sea-faring men. Although Government have supplied 
the renters with two very neat gili boats for the comfort- 
able conveyance of passengers, the renters keep them 
in a most despicable and stinking state. On enquiry 
I found that these boats are either taken by these 
renters for fishing during the night, or let out to others 
of their own trade for the purpose. By so doing, the 
renters not only misappropriate and damage the 
public property, but create unnecessary discomforts 
and nuisance to passengers. The renters also do not 
keep a proper number of boatmen for the safe con- 
veyance of passengers to and fro, but keep only one 
for the purpose : hence hours of delay in crossing the 
ferry. It is a great pity that Government do not 
see the necessity of throwing a causeway across the 
backwater. It would, at least, be a great paliation, if 
a ferry boat to convey across carriages, horses, carts 
and bullocks were provided. Before we reach the 
village of Valani, we have to cross an open level plain, 
a distance of about three miles along a mud road. 
The extent of this open land is about 2,500 acres, all 
of which are left uncultivated, and admirably adapted 
for paddy cultivation and for opening coconut and 
palmyratopes. Should the Government but lay out 
a small sum in spanning the Valani backwater with 
a causeway, it will not only improve ignorant islanders, 
in causing an easy intercourse with those living in 
the peninsula, but will also be a source of increasing 
the public revenue, encourage and give an impetus 
to agricultural industry, and enhance the price of 
landed property. The paddy crop both in the islands 
and in Valigam West is not all that can be desired. 
The corn is in the blade, and for want of rain it is 
all dying, and if there be no rain within a week 
most of the plantations will have to be abandoned. 
However, with all these drawbacks, the farmers own- 
ing lands by the side of tanks or wells are busily 
engaged, day and night, in irrigating their lands. On 
the south-eastern side of this island, near the seashore, 
the table delicacy of the Chinese, beche-de-mer, is ex- 
tensively collected and cured. There are I under- 
stand 35 boals, and 100 fishermen, solely engaged 
daily in collecting this sea slug and chanks, and the 
capitalists pay at the rate of R15 for every 1,000 of 
the former, and keep up a regular establishment, 
trained first under a Chinese, for curing these sea- 
slugs. The curing and manipulation of these, before 
exportation, is conducted as follows : — As soon as they 
are taken from the divers, they are boiled in large 
copper caldrons. Then they are buried in the sea- 
shore for 12 hours, and then removed, and, after hav- 
ing a thorough washing in sea-water, they again 
undergo a similar process of boiling. They are sub- 
sequently dried in the sun, and lastly smoked and 
dried in fire in a closed shed. They are then made 
ready for the market. There are, I understand, some 
150 candies of this annually collected, and cured, 
and exported to Singapore and China ; besides, 5 times 
as much in collected in the backwaters up the Mannar. 
It seems this trade was first introduced and monopol- 
ized by a Chinese, but ho is now being replaced by 
Nattukotta chettiea. Do you or any of your readers 
know anything, as to the average price ranging in the 
Singapore or Chinese markets for this commodity ? — Cor. 
Samarang, 23rd Jan. — Van Maanen's method of 
artificially drying coffee will, we are informed be 
shortly adopted throughout the whole of Java, for 
Mr. Van Maanen has entered into contracts with more 
than fifty planters for that purpose, while the managers 
of several coffee estates are only awaiting the sanction 
of their principals in order likewise to join. — Indische 
Vaderland. 
How to Push the Sale or Tea. — A discussion has 
been taking place in the Friend, of India on the subject 
of how to push the sale of Indian tea at home, a corre- 
spondent suggesting a system of regular auction sales 
of small packets of tea throughout the country. This 
scheme is suggested by Col. Money as well as by the 
editor of the Friend, but is opposed by the Indian Tea 
Gazette on the ground of its expense. 
A Company to be styled the "Timor Guano Com- 
pany," with a capital amounting to one hundred thou- 
sand guilders, is about to be established at Sourabaya. 
The object of the company is to procure guano from de- 
posits on Baars island in the Residency of Timor, prepare 
it for sale, and thus enable planters in Java to become 
independent of costly imports of manure from Europe. 
The selling price will be fixed at 9 guilders per picul, 
being 6 guilders cheaper than guano imported from 
Europe.— Handehblad. 
Coffee Adulteration.— Mr. Thomas Dickson, the 
Managing Director of the Scottish Trust and Loan 
Company Limited, is doing a good work on behalf of his 
own and his brother-planters' interests in Ceylon, and 
we trust the members of the Plauters' Association will 
be roused once more to the duty incumbent on them in 
this matter. Nothing less than an annual Memorial to 
the House of Commons from the Coffee-planting In- 
terest of Ceylon, until the grievance is removed, will 
meet the necessities of the case. 
Oranges and Insects. — Old Knox mentioned the fact 
that, in Ceylon, oranges, if left on the trees until they 
turn yellow, become infested with insects. What was 
and is true of this fruit in Ceylon seems true of it 
in Fiji, as witness ihe following paragraph from a review 
of Miss Gordon Cumming's book, "At Home in Fiji" : — 
"We lay under the orange trees in the garden and 
ate ripe golden fruit." It is a delusion, then, sarcastic- 
ally remarks the reviewer, to suppose that oranges 
must be plucked in Fiji before they arrive at the 
golden stage to prevent the insects destroying them. 
The Vines in Victoria. — It is expected that the 
destruction of all vines in the Geelong district will 
be acc mplished within the next month. The Moora- 
bool, Waurn and Winchelsea divisions of the dis- 
trict are the only ones remaining to be operated upon. 
About £10,000 compensation has already been paid 
by Government for the viues destroyed and it is 
estimated that the total expenditure upon the district 
will be about £25,000. The act providing for the 
eradication of vines in the diseased district of Gee- 
long prohibits the planting of fresh vines for a period 
of four years. — Melbourne Age. [All in vain, we fear. 
—Ed] 
Agricultural Productiveness oe America. — Mr. 
Porter observes that careful estimates show that 
the United States is capable of maintaining an area 
of 200,000,000 acres of corn land, which, with the 
average yield of the past ten years, would yield 
upwards of 2,250,000,000 bushels of corn. Turning 
from corn and vvbeat to cotton, it appears that the 
whole cotton crop of the world could be raised on 
a section of Texes, less than one-twelfth of its area; 
or could be divided between any two of the other 
principal cotton States without exhausting one-half 
of their good land. The agricultural produciiveness 
of America is practically illimitable ; and when the full 
importance of the agricultural interest is realized and 
profited by, it must exercise an important influence over 
England and the European continent.— London Times. 
