Feb. 1, 1894.J THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
527 
TEA PROSPECTS : 
HA8 HIGHWATtU MAEK BF.EN ATTAINED IN CE\LOI{ ? 
EHORX SHIPMENia IN J4NUARY. 
BALANGODA TO BE A GREAT TEA DliTEICI. 
There 13 a feeling abroad in some quarters, that, 
whatever may be the cace for excrpiional pro- 
perties, taking the (ea industry as a whole, the 
top of the licio of prosperity has bfen attained in 
Ceylon. Whether this be the case or not, it oannot 
be Esid that the present year opens very favcur- 
ably for our staple product. A i-dcent Speaial Tfle- 
gram to us records a fall of a tatf-penry in the 
weekly average, and we have just mad ■ one Of the 
heaviest monthly returns of shipment?, namely 
about eight million lb. in Deot ruber, whi'e 
the Colombo sale his also seen one of the 
largest oft'eriegs on record. Al this may not 
be oonsidfrecl very enoouraping (or tin phnt^r, 
and there are those amongst us — Inainess men— 
who prophesy an even lower range of price?, for 
common teas especially, during the current year. 
No doubt this reckoning is to tome extent based 
on the fxpeotation that China expoiti to the 
United Kingdom are to increase as well as on 
an iocreaEod production in India and Oeylon. 
But all this, it may be ssid, 13 lool^iag ten far ahead. 
Short views are safer from a business point of 
view, and it ia well to remember that the fact 
of the range of prices being lower now than pre- 
vailed at the opening of lBi)3, is regarded as 
placing Ceylon teas on a sounder basis; while as 
regardri quaniity, the immediate prospect is by no 
means of htavy shipments. IniJeod, as against 
eight million lb. in Decembsr, the totil shipments 
for January are not expected to exceed six milhon 
lb. Our ob ervation upcountry goes to shew that 
the colder and drier weather has given adicified 
check to flushing, and unless there 13 improvement, 
despatches to Colombo may be so short as to aSect 
even the above estimate for shipments during 
January. 
On the other hand, we can see little abatement 
in the inclinttiou to plant up reserves and extend 
cultivation ; and while the total additional acre- 
age in most districts with no new land availabl-j, 
may not be very great, yet the aggregate for the 
island will be coneiderable— quiie enough we should 
Bay to justify us in asking British investors who 
may be intending to place capital in opening up 
new tea gardens in India, to pause, and a<^k 
themselves Is it safe to count on America bud 
Russia coming to the rescue of Bntith grown 
teas as the Directors of the North and South 
Sjlhet Tea Compatji^s anticipate ? What these 
Companies are ticiug to do in Ce^lon alone will 
mean no incoosiderable addition to our crops after 
a few jeavs. Thu'e is not much room lor them 
to davelope in Dinibuta ; but in Now Gulw-.y, the 
tine Gl-nshte block of forest is bea^idto be lurmd 
to account ; while in Balnngoda we learn of 
very active operations being underiaken to 
extend the planted area. Balangoda ia ind ed 
fast rising in;o icnportance and promisjs a few 
years h^nce to btcoiiie quite a leading tea district. 
There IS as fiae tea for growth to be seen within 
its hounds— notably on Mr. Bastard's property 
of Keenagaha Ella, on Agar's Land and Chetnole — 
as in almost any district in the island ; and 
Mr. E. M. Leaf is at, pr sent opening con-id rable 
c'earings on the laud he has leased from native 
owntra, some of which is de8cril)ei as very 
Builable for tea, in lay, quality of soil, Ao. The 
purchases of Meeare. Finlay. Muir & Co for the 
Sylhet Companies in this district, have not yet 
been publicly rfcported ; but it sterna they have 
07 
obtained large blocks of land in (he Hopewell 
and some other properties, apgregaling perhaps 
1, .500 aeies, and are ready to open up to the full 
enpaoity of the a'«ilable labour eupply and 
other conveniences. Work has already commenced, 
f u t there is at least no lack of capital or enter- 
prise to get all pushed on. The benefit to the 
d.'Strict rf the incoming of influential capitalists 
as proprietors is undoubted. It will put Balan- 
goda on a new footing of importance and a'ready 
read improvements arc in banl, or under con- 
sideration. Indeed, for the first time in the history 
cf one oi the oldest tea plantations in the district 
a horse was seen upon it the other day, to the 
astonishm'^nt of some of the native residents who 
had never seen such an animal before ! The ad- 
vent of the horse and rider was rendered possible 
through thu opening of a bridle-road on behalf 
cf the Sylhet Companies' new properties. 
Further improvements are sure to follow; 
and in all future estimates of the maxi- 
mum excoit to which tea production 
in Ceylon ia to attain, due allowance 
must be made for the once despised ccttae, 
but now popular and rapidly expanding tea, 
district of Balangoda, This expansion, however, 
has not to ba allowed for in the current 
year's tei crop estima'es nor in those of 
1895 ; and public interest upoountry for the 
time, is chiidy oonceritrated on the District 
returns now being compiled by the various Asso- 
ciations for the Crops of It is evident that the 
Pknteis' Assojiation Committee in making up the 
total will do well to arrange for a revision abnit the 
middle of the irear after the pattern set them by tha 
Indinn Tea Districts Aesociation in Calcutta. The 
considorable f'iscrepaney between the Ceylon 
official estimate and the actual result, in the 
present year, shows the necessity for this revision, 
and it is quite evident that for a crop dependent 
so greatly all the year through, on the weather, 
I it is useless to adhere to estimates framed in the 
: first two or three months without subjecting the 
I same to l evisicn. six months later on. 
^ . 
COFFEE PLANTING AND PROGRhSS 
L\ EAST AFRICA : 
A FiUi.wAY Pro.iEciEn in the Shire Di;ti:ict. 
We are gl-.d to learn from our Blantyre Cer- 
respondent by a recent mail thatcffee plamirg 
prospects ooutioue so good. He writes :— 
" All excel en f crop has been gathered this yenr, 
it ,''i^ my ho ro good t i .seethe young c3t»tos Rliout 
Blantyre in June last quite rod with ch rry— far 
; toi' hes,vy a crop f r ihree gears' o'.d coffte Tie 
j lower Sbire ('lur river) is uear'y dry sgaiu and nolhii g 
to be bad in the 6t'>ree." 
Ho includes the following notice which is of 
special interest as showing the lapli development 
likely to take place in ibis part of Afiioa. The 
c-.se of the Blantyre planters would ssem to be 
par.Uel alter a fashion to that of their brethren 
in the Kelaui Valley — uncfrtain water comccunica- 
tion neoessitaiiog a railway. The notice is as 
follows : — 
A MELIINC; OF LANDED PROPBIETOKS, .MERCHAXTS AXD 
OTHERS 
Willbnholdin H. i\I. Vice Conculalc. Blantyre, on 
Friday Evei ing the 13th iust. at 8 o'clock, to obtsia 
»u expression of opinion with a view to supporting a 
j roposed scbeme of railway cciiinmnication between 
the Lower ard Upper Sb'rc ( Lake ^yix'-ea.). 
As the aksolulo necessity of railway oommuniculion 
i.i daily beoomiuK more apparen', the whole fninre of 
the coumry dei-endiug upon cheap »n(l speedy com- 
munic&tiou with the outside world it io hop«d til 
