4i8 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
[Dec. i, 1894 
present time amounts to £18,950, all of which we 
have taken out of profits. This year we had to take 
£1 HW out of the profits, or more than 1 per coat., 
and really it becomes very burdensome. vVe have 
consulted the auditor, who represents you, as to some 
mode of mitigating this burden. There are two ways 
of doing so: one is by starting with our present 
balance of £10,000, and spreading that over a period 
of ten years, and the other is by reducing tiie 
capital of the company according to the present value 
of the assets, by which we should nominally get a 
better dividend, though practically it would be the 
same thing. But we should not then be strangled 
by yearly writing off these large sums. Unless we 
do something we shall have to deduct this 
sum of nearly .£2,000 a year from our profits for the 
next three years, and I think the time has come 
when we should avoid that if possible, and the board 
is now considering which is the better plan. We 
shall be very glad to have your views on the question, 
in order that our hands may be strengthened. Per- 
sonally, I am in favour of reducing the capital by 
converting the £10 shares into £6 or £7 shares. I 
now beg to move that the report and accounts be 
received and adopted. 
Mr. E. Pettitt seconded. 
Mr. Collings supported the reduction of the capital, 
as he saw no advantage in having the shares taken at 
a fictitious value. 
Mr W. Austin was of opinion that the suspense 
account could be got rid of by a simple vote of the 
shareholders. Nothing was to be gamed by reducing 
the capital. 
Mr E. Ford North said that if they closed the 
suspense account they would have to open a depreci- 
ation account. 
Mr Hf.nry Bois explained that the company have 
estates which stood in the balance-sheet at double 
their value. They had also a suspense account, and 
altogether the sum of £174,000 was supposed to re- 
present the value of the estates, when their actual 
value was something like half the amount, and the 
directors proposed to have the estates valued, 
and make the valuation the capital of the company. 
When it was once put on the basis, all the company 
earned would be available for dividend, and they 
would compare favourably with other tea companies. 
The Chairman said, in reply to Mr. North, that 
all the machinery and tools were kept in a high 
state of efficiency, and were worth the value re- 
presented in the accounts. The cost of reducing the 
capital would be very small, as it was not necessary 
to reconstruct the company. 
After some further discussion the motion was 
carried unanimously, and dividends were de- 
clared at the rate of 6 per cent, on the 
Preference, and 2 per cent on the Ordinary shares. 
On the motion of the Chairman, seconded by Mr. 
Collings, Mr. Bois was re-elected a director. 
Mr North moved the re-election of Mr. Austin as 
a director, which was seconded by Mr. C. Berge- 
man, and carried unanimously. 
Mr Austin, responding, advocated a liberal expen- 
diture on improvement in machinery, with the object 
of obtaining a better price for the Company's Tea 
On the motion of Mr. C. White, seconded by 
Mr. North, the auditor, Mr. John Smith, was re- 
""^he 1 meeting closed with a cordial vote of thanks 
to the Chiarman and Directors. 
INDIAN TEA COMPANIES. 
Among the Industrial securities to which investors 
have of late turned their attention are those of the 
Indian Tea Planting Companies In the earlier 
B+ntrea of the life of this remarkable enterprise there 
was a very limited number of Companies having the 
bead-auarters of their administration in London. The 
larger portion of the, estates were owned either by 
private planters, small syndicates of capitalists, or 
by small Companies having their headquarters in 
Calcutta, and were managed and supervised 
by one or other of the large and powerful 
agency houses of Calcutta. During the hurt ten 
or twenty years, however, this has been greatly 
changed. Companies have been formed in London 
with sterling capital, and many of these — stinting 
with comparatively small possession*, as did Com- 
panies like t/ie Jokai, Dooars, Doonidooma. Majuli 
(old Luckiuipore Company], Chargola, and others — 
have, by the successive acquisition of other gardens, 
and by increasing their producing area by new plant- 
ing now become large and powerful Corporations, 
some of them with individual capitals amounting to 
as much as a quarter of a million, producing annual 
crops worth about £150, (XH). Nenrly one-half of the 
cultivated area under lea in Assam, Darjeeliug and 
the Western Dooars (the three largest producing dis- 
tricts) belongs to English registered Companies with 
limited liability, while their united capital amounts 
roundly to abo'ut £6,000,000, and the value of their 
united produce to about £2,500,000 or, say, one- 
half of that of the total anuual tea produce of 
British India, exclusive of Ceylon. 
A few years ago, while the shares of many of 
these Companies were a sufficiently desirable invest- 
ment, so far as returns were concerned, there was 
this disability attaching to them, that they were 
frequently very difficult to negotiate, either in the 
way of buying or selling, and the market for the shares 
was in consequence limited, and their attraction 
for investors not very great. Nowadays this is greatly 
changed, and — resulting in a large measure from 
the increased publicity of late given to them — a large 
number of the Tea Companies have now a freedom 
of market perhaps greater than the shares of almost 
any other single class of Industrial undertakings. 
Only a limited number of these, including the 
old Assam, Darjeeling, Jorehaut and Lebong Com- 
panies, are officially quoted, although the list of 
publicly quoted ones steadily increases : but 
there are something like a dozen other Companies in 
the shares of which there are very considerable and 
frequent dealings, and whose stability is quite as 
good in every respect as that of the round dozen 
which are officially quoted. 
The position of Indian Tea is at present exceptionally 
strong. Notwithstanding an unprecedented increase 
in the produce from Ceylon (which has almost 
doubled in the last five years), consumption has 
been so much stimulated by the lower range of 
price at which tea can now be produced, and the 
China product has been to that extent supplanted 
by Indian (and Ceylon) produce, that consumption 
tends fairly to outrun production; while for the 
current season, o.ving to a curtailed production, r. - 
suiting from somewnat unfavourable climatic con- 
ditions, prices tend to rule very high indeed. The 
low value of the ru^cj, too, is in the main in 
favour' of the Tea Companies, as their expense- 01 e 
mainly incurred in Indian currency, while their pro- 
duce is sold for gold in London. The China- Japan War, 
moreover, is another factor which is in favour of 
Indian and Ceylon planters. Two other points may 
here be referred to as having a favourable bearing on the 
future prospects of Tea Companies, the one local and 
the other distant. The first is that the Coolie labour 
question is now on a footing much more auspicious to 
planters, owing to the favour with which immigration 
into the tea districts is now regarded by the agri- 
cultural labourer of Bengal, on account of the high 
wages and comfortable, and well-sanitated quarters in 
which he is housed there. The second is the favour- 
able outlook for the opening up of fresh markets all 
over the world, especially in the American Continent 
and in Russia, which, owing to the vigorous action 
of the Planting Committees, both of India and of 
Ceylon, now exists. British investors, who are hold- 
ing back alike from Home securities, which hardly 
return a yield adequate to the risks attended on 
labour difficulties, et id genus omne, and from 
"Foreigners," from which they have received so much 
disappointment, may with advantage, we believe, turn 
their attention to this British Indian Industry. — 
London Financial Times. 
