468 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
[Jan. i, 189$. 
coffee districts, Mlangi, Choloe and Zomba shortly. 
They lie in different directions forty to fifty miles 
away. Rupees are the coinage of the country ; so 
I would recommend any one coming from Ceylon 
not to purchase sovereigns as I did at R19 each. 
VARIOUS PLANTING NOTES. 
"The Romance of Plant Life."— We give 
a summary of an extremely interesting lecture 
on the above subject delivered by Dr. D. Morris, 
C.M.G., of Kew at " Richmond Athenajum" in 
opening the winter session. It will well repay 
perusal. 
" Strange Tropical Plants."— We give in 
this issue, a short notice of what must have 
been an exceptionally interesting lecture delivered 
before the London Institution by our old friend 
Dr. D. Morris, C.M.G., of Kew, on the above 
subject. Dr. Morris is fast becoming one of the 
most popular of living scientific lecturers before 
metropolitan audiences. 
Coffee Prospects. — Opinion grows (say- 
Messrs. I. A. Kucker & Bencraft in their latest 
report), — that current Brazil crops will not turn 
out up to the larger estimates, and presuming 
that up to the end of December this year we 
get receipts in Santos of 2,750,000 bags, it is a 
question worthy of study, how much good average 
coffee outside and beyond this quantity, will i.e 
available for the trade from January 1st to October 
1st, i.e., when the following crop will probably 
first begin to arrive in quantity. 
The " Ceylon Tea Fund."— Proceedings sent 
us by Mr. A. Philip and which we reproduce else- 
where indicate the closing chapter in the life 
of this very useful body whose work we have 
most strenuously supported from the first day of 
its inception. That inception was chiefly due to 
Mr. H. K. Rutherford ; but in the working out 
of the idea and in carrying on the Tea Fund no 
two members deserve more credit than the Hon. 
Giles Walker and Mr. A. Philip, while the 
present Chairman of the P. A. has also extended 
cordial support. The Tea Fund has done much 
good in its day ; but the time had obviously 
come for closing its voluntary levy and conse- 
quently its operations. 
" Tea Sweepings". — We learn from London 
that the Tea Dealers' Association are likely to 
make a claim in the Dock Companies for the 
"tea sweepings" — to prevent their sale to Ham- 
burg houses, &c — and to assert that they do not 
belong to the Dock Company, and further, that 
they either belong to the dealers or else they 
belong to the importers of the tea. A gentleman 
interested in the matter writes to us that sales of 
" Hamburg" tea have been traced in the North of 
England and he adds : — 
" Can you not suggest that each chest ought to 
have a brand on it by burning and this ought to be 
defaced before it is sent out by the dock warehouse 
with their brand to prevent the chests being used 
over and over again." 
" The Agricultural Ledger," is the title 
of a series of Agricultural, Mineral and other 
Economic leaflets, a set of which from the begin- 
ning of the issue in 1892, has just reached us from 
the Government of India. They are issued under 
the direction of Sir Edward Buck, and edited by Dr. 
Geo. Watt, the Reporter on Economic Products 
and Compiler of the admirable Dictionary. 
The object of the present issue of pamphlets is 
to provide information connected with agriculture 
or economic products in a form which will admit of 
its ready transfer to ledgers ; to secure the main- 
tenance of uniform ledgers (on the plan of the 
Economic Dictionary) in all otlices concerned in 
agricultural subjects throughout India ; to admit 
ot the circulation in convenient form oi information 
on any subject connected with agriculture or eco- 
nomic products to ofhciaU or other persons in- 
terested therein ; and to secure a connection l>e- 
tween all papers of interest published on subjects 
relating to economic prod net* ami the otiicial Dic- 
tionary of Economic Products. It is, in short — 
says an Indian contemporary - a medium lor col- 
lecting and sifting informal/ion against the time 
when the Government may feel called upon to 
issue a revised edition of the great Economic Dic- 
tionary. As Dr. Watt puts it, the *' Ledgers " 
will become as it were annotated copies ol the 
Dictionary up to date. 
P\ddy Cultivation. — A reliable native au- 
thority — one well acquainted \\ ilh the whole Wes- 
tern province and holding a neutral position in po- 
litical matters — assures us he can see no evid- 
ence whatever of the Paddy Rents abolition 
leading to any extension ol cultivation by the 
natives. Even the much-talked-of Muturaja- 
vvela fields taken up by native capitalists, do 
] not appear to be put under paddy. J 11 any ca*e 
the mass oi the people and proprietors do not seem 
to have added an acre to cultivation. Now, 
if this be the case, in the most advanced pro- 
: vince where the people are best educated and 
keenest in money matters and with markets 
for surplus paddy at their very doors, we 
leave any readers acquainted with the coun- 
try to say how it will be in the more dis- 
tant and backward districts, where the people 
have had to be treated very much as children 
and more or less forced to go to work in their 
fields in the interests of the Government rent 
as well as in their own? The Kandyau mem- 
ber in Council on Wednesday was loud about the 
blessing to the people ; but we are more and more 
convinced that the lion's share — perhaps 73 to 80 
per cent of the R900.000 ol rents remitted, have 
gone into the pockets of native capitalists and 
nione3'-leuders— headmen (like Mr. Panabokke 
himself) and Moormen. The men who deal in 
the paddy that is sold to the bazaars and through 
them to the people, of the West and South es- 
pecially benefit, and no less do the dealers in East- 
ern Province surplus rice which is shipped to 
Jaffna to compete with Indian rice. 
The N. and S. Sylhet Tea Company. — The 
London correspondent of an evening paper writes : — 
The North and South Sylhet Company have issued 
a confidential and private circular stating their 
intention to add to the volume of their investments 
in tea, consequent no doubt on their acquisition 
of land for planting in Ceylon and Travancore ; 
indeed, this is broadly stated in the printed docu- 
ment, of which I have been favoured with a peru- 
sal. It goes to state that the Company's investments 
are at present mainly in Sylhet, tne Dooars, Assam, 
and Ceylon, representing an area of 7y,647 acres, of 
which about 26,000 have been planted with tea aged 
from one to eleven years. The planted acreage nas 
cost ±'1,172,417, and last year's crop amounted to 
7,877,940 lb of tea. With reference to the call for 
additional capital, Sir John Muir has set an example 
by subscribing for new shares to the extent of 
±'300,000, i. e. ±150,000 for each Company. The cost 
of production in all their estates averaged last year 
5Jd, which includes all charges on tne tea. The 
Company had acquired in Ceylon 6,131 acres, of 
which 1,916 acres are in bearing, the balance being fine 
forest land. Sir John Muir is on his way to Ceylon 
while Mr. P. R. Buchanan is now there, giving per- 
sonal attention to the development of the Company's 
interests, with probably a brief visit to their property 
in Travancore, 
