232 
THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. fOcT. 2, 1893. 
minor importaace, do though the planter is taxed, 
he ia cro )urffed ; rai wayB hvA the teit roa'is in the 
worid are mode tor Imn ; he reprtrseute'l iu the 
LcgisUtive Gonneil, and his grievuuccs and ueHcis 
attended to. He forms A-aociaiions, and the w'lole 
planiiiifi community being comparatively cioi-e to 
each otlier, the Assooiations are of real good, and are 
oonducted on a bueinesa system utterly free from 
the aojateurish element vfhich thongh less now by 
f»r than it was 20 years ago, ftill permeates the 
whole of Southern India from Government to in- 
dividuals. 
Ceylou exports now 80,000,000 lb. of tea a year 
Travancore 3,000,000 lb. at the most, and yet there 
is nothing to prevent Travancoie petidioK 40,000,000, 
and at a oheoper rate than CoyloD. But the Government 
of Travaneore, though it tolerates the European plant- 
er, dops not hanker after his presence. It has a nice 
comfortable litllo eurpluB yearly, Bnd itoes not at all eee 
to opening up its masses of \inpqu>i>led forest, which are 
now practically valueless to Burope»n enterprise. It has 
grand opportunities of a Cue harbour at Quilou, and, 
railways to benefit the whole country, and it likes to 
talk of these things, but it does not do much more. So 
the planter who comes is treated well, but not en- 
couraged. He can get land, but It is troublesome, lie ia 
given reads but grudgingly, and the munificent sums of 
11150 and KlOO a mile are allowed for upkeep. Per 
contra and on the same lines he is not tiixed, or hardly 
at all, and be is hampered by no meJioal or other ex- 
penses ; but fancy, if Travanoore were opened up to the 
Europeiu with its miles of forest, if shipping arrange- 
ments were facilitated and good roads cat through the 
old and new districts, and railways touching the feet 
of the hills constructed, but not only tea ttit cocoa and 
Liberian coflFee would be cultivated alont; tbe whole 
chain, as would tbe other tropical prodacta, all ii( 
which thrive in that little State far more lururiantly 
than elsewhere. Planters would of course be taxed, 
but il this were done fairly, none but the most short- 
sighted could object, and Travaneore would find itself 
iu very truth the richest of Native States. But the 
present syttem prevents this. Twenty yeara ago in 
coffee planting it was far worse, but even now the 
good done by associations is trifling compared with 
what it might be. The head branch is tbe South, 
though that section turns out less tea than the Central. 
Still it does hold an annual meeting and publish an 
annual report of its proceedings. But of the others, 
what can be said ? A meeting every year or 18 months, 
a unanimous carrying of two or three petty motions, 
and a good breaKfast ia about all it means, and all 
this could be altered if Government set the example 
and offered inducements for new men. New blood is a 
sine qua non in everything, and if the new blood is set 
going, why it will probably have a dash and go on it, 
that can but do good and atir up the older members. 
Another drawback which, however, is vanishing was 
the large number of small proprietors, who quite 
overbalanced the firms who held estatea. At one time 
everyone indulged in his own fads, tbe distance from 
estate to estate kept opinions from being ventilated, 
and so on ten places at least five different systems 
would be pursued. But hard times and low prices 
have done much to alter this, and in many places 
there ia as much system aa on a Ceylon plantation, 
and as much care ia taken to keep up the average 
prices and keep down the expenditure, so far at leaat 
as is compatible with good cultivation. 
Now, among the advantages a Travancoie planter 
reaps over a Ceylon one are, first, the soil, which ia 
far richer everywhere. Than there is a superabundance 
of firewood, the grass-land grows excellent tea, and 
is practically unlimited and is broken up everywhere 
with pieces of forest, and beaides this gmss-land 
givts wondertul conveniencea for manuring, and herds 
of cattle can be ke^^t at a nominal cost, and in the 
spring months when they come up from the plains 
in thousands to graze, they can be induced with 
little trouble to camp close to the land whioh requires 
manuring, in this matter the Government helps, 
and it remita the grazing tax for cattle 
which come up and oamp on or near an estate. 
the cost of manurlag vfitt) TKaTan* 
jOre planters is reduced to a mi iimam, which ia f ar 
rom being tbe case iu Cejion. LubO'ir i* clieap. av>-r- 
aging 4 nnas a ht a I nU rouuil, ai.o bbandaut tapcciaily 
iu rmaid. In that cittrict ih-.rc i» m t oii e-tKie 
which iiaft not motv than it Wiiii" almo t, many pla^t-a 
I aviug to iiui.d away 2b per cent o( tboee who cume 
ii|>; this, of cuuriii', oicaiiK Ibai i>dv.>Lic<:B are praciicady 
nU. Mor' over labour can be got up and atjot dowu very 
much as IS r< quired ! We hel.evo that ihis is bbt 
the cabe iu the sooth, but probably the difficulty there 
is temporary. Tiie average yitlJ fur Teermaad was 
just 400 lb. an acre, nhicb beat Ceylon we fancy. 
Kice ibctieip, tta caa Le put f. o. b. at Alleppey ior 
4 l-6anna8 allowing lor maauriog tbe whole pUce every 
three yeara i. e. one-ti>ird a year, and whfn macbiuery 
i« prop rly ttriited au<) going this will be reduced. 
'J'ravancore backwa'er', which ruu miles inland give 
cheap trai sport and if railways run from the foot o( 
the bills this woulri hi? cheaper etill. CK)lon will 
always have the pull in sbippi<i,{ and probably iu 
cajutal. But it rests with the ciovommeLit is thu first 
place and with planters themftelvea la tbe aecoud to 
bring tbe exports of Travaneore- as much to the front 
as those of Ce)lon are at tbe present time. — Madrat 
Times, Aug. '<iO. 
TEA ^OTJiS AKD NEWS. 
vVritiug on the progress of Ceylon tea« in the 
United bi^ates, a corre-spondeul says some of the 
orders received cannot be excuied owing to scarcity 
of the teas required m the market. "1 buw," be 
says, " some parcels of Broken Pekoe wuich had 
realised only bi^d., whilst ir'ekoes ol ilie same mark 
had brought b^d. and Pekoe bouctiungs 7^d. On 
casting my eye down the broker's catalogue 1 noticed 
that the grades were in these proportions : — Broken 
Pekoes 45 per cent.; Pekoes 30 pei cent.; and Pekoe 
Souchongs 25 per cent. Now it the proportionn of 
these had been reversed they would iu all probability 
have been properly graded, as it was, it precisely 
bore out what had been said by Mr. Liptun s A^ent, 
that teas are being overgraded. The worst ot ttus 
practice is that country dealers, seeing sales of Broken 
Pekoe effected at SJd , fail to see why they should pay 
Is. which is frequently asked for what is really a fine 
tea worth all the motey. 1 mean fine in jiaior, not 
fine in make merely, for a tea may be made any- 
thing."— iiirft an Planter's Gazette, Sept. 2. 
NETHERLANDS INDIA. 
COFlfEE IN EAST BOBNEO AND JAVA — TOBACCO IN EAST 
BOBNEO. — PEAEL SHELL FISHING. 
The Sultan of Cotie in Neiheriands East Borneo 
has goae heavily into cofifee-growing there, tie baa 
been enterprising enough to lay out a plantation of 
the Liberian variety wLich now btgini to bear. The 
Siiltau has since ordered machinery for his own use 
to facilitate preparing the berry lor market. 
In Java, ttie estimates of the Government coffee 
crop this year show every prospect of the outturn 
proving shorter thun had been expected. iSucceseive 
estimates point to steady diminution. 
Tbe Sourabaya Courant calls attention to eucceaeive 
failures in tobacco cultivation in Netherlands Kaot 
Borneo owing to the aoil pruving unsuitable for that 
line of enterprise. 
Arrangements lor despatching a man-of-war to the 
Aru islands to check contrabaud fishing by pearling 
parties from Australia will, iu all iike.ibood, be 
hastened by news of alleged high-handed piooeeuings 
by them in that group. For iueiance, one of them 
threatened to shoot dowu a dibtrict officer who bad 
objected to bis fishing for pearl shell without a license 
from Netherlands Inaia Government. At Batavia, a 
pearl-shelling venture was being promoted at tne date 
of last advices under the style of the Netherlands 
India Pearl Fishery Company with a capital ot a 
quarter of a million of guilders. It has not been 
started yet, but the promoters hold out prospects of 
a dividend of 58 per cent yearly on the capital. The 
waters around Banka are to bs its field of operations, 
—Straits Tims, 
