936 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
[May i, 1882. 
which go on maturing and absorb all the vitality of the 
bush, and keep back the young flush until they are 
satisfied, and as hard as leather. 
The difference of the two systems is very marked at 
the beginning of the season, when the bush is recover- 
ing from its pruning. I have known five weeks to 
elapse between a first plucking and the second, when 
bushes plucked two and a half leaves have gone on 
growing without a check. 
If a whole leaf is left, this maturing process goes 
on repeating itself after each plucking, always delaying 
the new flush and retarding the growth of the plant. 
The only argument I have ever heard brought for- 
ward in favor of leaving the whole leaf is, that it strength- 
ens the bush. This may apply to young gardens being 
plucked for the first time, but cannot to old established 
bushes. Even the most bigoted upholder of this theory 
ought to be satisfied with the four or five leaves always 
left 011 the first shoots after the pruning, and those 
usually left after each plucking, for the good of the 
plant. 
Reasons two and three are also important, but I will 
not encroach further upon your space, 
EXPEEIENTIA D0CET. 
TEA DRYING-MACHINERY VS. CHARCOAL. 
Dear Sir, — Tea drying by machinery versus tea 
drying by charcoal fires over choolahs, is, I believe, 
still discussed as to the relative merits'of each. 1 will 
try and give you a fair estimate of cost, and speak 
from experience as far as I know relative to the merits, 
ills, &c., &c, of b nth modes of firing. 
1st. — Charcoal firing and its merits. — Except for those 
who persist that the fumes of charcoal are necessary 
to make good tea, I can see no merit whatever in 
charcoal drying, either in cost, quality, rapidity, 
saving of labour, " or anything else, over machine- 
dried tea. 
Cost per maund tea of lea dried over choolahs by charcoal. 
As. P. 
Charcoal at 8 annas per nid. ijmds. = 12 0 
1 Barti wallah at ans. 4-6, kutcha firing = 4 6 
Do. do. pucka firing say — 0 6 
Cost of firing by charcoal R 1 10 
N. B — Notice the labour staff required for 3 months 
in the year to make charcoal. The immense space 
(and beat) taken up by choolahs. Cost of timber 
used for charcoal. The number of trays, gnuz% iron,. 
&c, &c. required. The masonry and carpenter's work 
always more or less out of repair. Loss of small tea 
falling through trays, &c, &c. 
Now let us take 
Cost of machine-dried tea per maund. 
As. P. 
1st. Those machines which dry by 
coke, say cost of coke =80 
3 men at as. 4-6 per 5 mds. tea =about 2 8 
Cost of drying per maund tea for a 
machine, drying by coke 5 mds. in 
10 hours ... 10 8 
I now give an estimate of cost of 1 md. tea dried 
by a machine of similar capabilities, but drying with 
any sort of fuel— coal, wood, grass, bamboo, &c, say 
2 mds. of firewood at 6 pie per md. = 1 anna per 
1 md. tea 
2V. Ii. — Pi ice of firewood at 3 pie per mauud should 
be nearer tiie mark. 
3 mens' paj as. 4-6 for 5 md.'. in iO hours= aa. 2-8 
per maund. The analysis of the above comes to this— 
R. A. P. 
Charcoal drying ... =1 1 0 
Coke ,, ... = 0 10 8* 
Wood fire „ ... =038 
We read of machines drying with any fuel, and doing 
double the tea of what I have estimated above, and 
how people can still stick to charcoal, beats me. 
Again we generally see large gardens furnished with 
drying machines : surely it is the small gardens that 
want them must.— Yours faiihfully, A. C. J. 
P. S. — Price of the "Sirocco ' is £85 f. o. b. in 
Liverpool, which means R 1,020— at 1*. 8d. exchange, 
and thH cost of carriage out to India extra to pay ; still 
the machine, if it does 5 mds. tea in 10 hours, should 
pay itself in one year, always considering it turns out 
well fired and no burnt tea. But there are better 
(or anyway cheaper) machines then the "Sircocco," 
I see, advertized, in the Englishman of the 8th instant, 
viz., a description of Robert-ou's "Typhoon," doing 
i md. tea per hour, and probable cost to be E300. 
And in your issue of 3rd instant a machine (Allen's 
patent), but, the cost is not given, doing one maund 
per hour, and burning any fuel, 
Raising Seedlings. — Mr. Peter Henderson's method 
is thus described in the American Agriculturist : — "Mr. 
Peter Henderson having hit upon a method wliich greatly 
increased the certainty with which he could raise seed- 
ling plants, not only of such rapidly growing things as 
Cabbages, but of slower starting greenhouse plants and 
of shrubs, employed it in his own establishment to his 
great advantage. It is very simple, as most valuable 
things are. In his seed-beds or seed-boxes — 1st, he 
puts down a layer of good loam, run through a half- 
inch sieve, and patted down moderately firm. Over 
■this about one-fourth of an inch of dried spaghnum — 
common peat moss, such as is used for packing, tho- 
roughly dried-, and run through a wire sieve about as 
fine as a mosquito-wire gauze — this powdered moss, 
about in the condition of fine sawdust, being evenly 
spread. Upon this moss is placed a coating of loam 
about three-fourths of an inch thick, and well levelled. 
The seed is sown thickly on the loam, pressed down 
by a smooth board, and fine moss sifted on sufficient 
to cover the seed, and the whole watered with a fine 
rose. The top layer of moss keeps the surface always 
moist, preventing all drying and barking, and allows 
the young plants to easily reach the light. The layer 
of soil below it affords nourishment to the seedlings, 
which, as soon as their roots reach the layer of fine 
moss below, form a mass of fibrous roots. No one 
familiar with raising seedlings need to have the advant- 
ages of the method pointed out." — Gardeners' Chronicle. 
Mexican Coffee. — Much has been published of late 
in regard to the prabability of Mexican coffee becom- 
ing a dangerous competitor of Brazilian coffee in the 
United States, the greatest consumer of the Brazilian 
product, and that there is serious basis for the grave* 
fears expressed is proved by the following extract 
from a letter received by one of our leading export 
houses, and dated New Orleans. 1st June, 1881 : — "The 
receipts of Mexican coffee at this port since the 1st 
January are in excess of previous seasons ; and one 
firm alone expects to receive 100,000 bags of 100 lb. 
each out of rhe preseut crop. The same firm has 
had cargoes of 5,000 to 6,000 bags arrived to them 
tnis spring. The demand for this coffee is mostly 
from Chicago and St. Louis, but a fair quautity is 
sold here < o grocers at 1 to 1£ cents above the price 
of Rio coffee !" — Anglo- Brazilian Times. % 
* I should be glad to be set right if I have not 
rightly calculated the price of coke. — A. C. J. 
