5*8 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [Feb. i, 1895. 
I showed Sarrell some Tea growing in the grass, 
(which he immediately wanted to prune) and he has 
seen it growing at Kudat also, Doth doing well. 
When Ceylon tea goes out of favour (!) your planters 
ban come here and they will find a better and more 
forcing climate for the shrub. Sarrell thinks that 
the yield would be so much above the Ceylon yield 
it would meet the extra cost of Malay, &c. labour. 
I spoke to a Japanese Emigration Agent lately, 
who brought some Japanese labourers to Sandakan, 
and he said he could get the tea pluckers of Japan 
to come here without difficulty. As to price of 
labour, I believe, there would not be much difference ; 
the Malays, Chinese or Japanese are so far superior 
to the Tamil and we do not pay head money as in 
Ceylon. At present we can bring Liberian coffee 
into bearing for less than £20 per acre and coco- 
nuts can be planted and upkept by Malays better 
than by Sinhalese. The higher class of labour here 
renders constant supervision unnecessary in cases 
such as ooconut planting, and we can, therefore, 
Elant and upkeep coconuts at a figure that is impossi- 
le in Ceylon even if you paid half the price you now pay 
for the land. 
The Bame>ill apply to cacao planting when once 
we get a start, but the difficulty of seed has not 
yet been overcome. I have pafd for some thousands 
of pods from Singapore and the islands near us, 
but before they reached the estate they were 
rotten. The fact that they grow freely at Looloo 
(18 hours from Sandakan) is an additional proof (if 
any is wanting) of the suitability of our position, 
and the soil at Taritipan is equal to that of the 
famed island of Looloo where an extinct volcano is 
the most prominent feature. Now that we have the 
telegraph cable to Labuan we are much better in 
touch with the rest of the world and as soon as 
we have any coffee in quantity to add to our 
tobacco exports we shall get the ocean steamers to 
call here. 
North Borneo is bound to go ahead ; we are on 
the high road of commerce to China from Europe, 
and from China to Australia. Of course, it takes 
time, but things move more quickly now-a-days and 
measures from the past are not "applicable today. 
Tell your surplus young men to come here. I do 
not think they will be disappointed. We have no 
worn as yet for assistants and you cannot be too 
careful in dissuading anyone from coming on the 
chance of getting employment. Men who come must 
have money to open land for themselves. 
Henry Walker. 
THE AGRICULTURAL SCHOOL: 
PALM, FRUIT AND TEA CULTURE FOR THE 
CEYLONESE. 
It may certainly be regarded as a feather in 
the cap of Governor Havelock, that his " happy 
thought " of forming a Government Dairy and 
attaching it to the Agricultural School, should 
have resulted not only in supplying the hos- 
pitals with thoroughly good milk, and in doing 
much towards improving local "stock"; but 
should also yield such a profit as to make the 
whole School self-supporting. This is going a 
long way beyond answering Sir Hercules Robin- 
son^ "Will it pay?" test; for, the advantages 
of technical instruction are so great that no 
taxpaying community grudges payment for the 
same ; while here we have the. best of object 
lessons resulting in a large profit ! It now re- 
mains for a similar profitable as well as bene- 
ficial adjunct to be applied to Mr. Human's 
industrial establishment, in order to place it on 
a par with Mr. Drieberg's agricultural branch. 
It is possible that this may be found in the di- 
rection pointed out by His Excellency as the 
result of his observations in India, namely, in 
improved art-work. There is scJ>"e for the es- 
tablishment of certain descriptions of artistic work 
in brass and silver, as well as in carvings and 
furniture, out of our finest woods, for which there 
would certainly be a profitable demand ; and we 
hope to see something of the kind realized. 
But, meantime to return to the Agricultural 
School, and yesterday's meeting, it will be seen 
what an immense scope therein for the graduates 
of this Institution influencing their countrymen and 
local industries for good, when it is understood 
that tlte raising of the average yield of coco- 
nuts per existing tree in the island by only five 
nuts per annum would mean an addition of 
about ten million rupees to the income of the 
owners. The gross income already aggregates 
in all probability a sum in excess of the value 
of the total tea crop, or about 50 million rupees, 
and that an increaseu crop of nuts by 200 million 
is by no means an impossibility through better 
cultivation over the existing acreage, is shown by 
the fact that a very ordinary average for a 
plantation is 40 nuts, while this is reduced by 
one-half for the island in consequence of the utter 
neglect and mismanagement of their gardens by 
the natives. Still more can the need and feasi- 
ableness of improvement be shown by the recent 
experience of Mr. J. D. Vanderstraaten, the 
well-known coconut estate agent and inspector. 
Mr. Vanderstraaten has made a business for 
some years of leasing native gardens at rents 
generally in excess of what the owners derived 
as tenants on their own account and then by 
setting to work and cultivating and manuring, 
with the material immediately within his reach, 
Mr. Vanderstraaten has doubled, perhaps trebled, 
the net income, to his well-deserved advantage. 
This Mr. Vanderstraaten has done so freely in one 
district that we hear on good authority that 
his example has begun to tell — his object-lesson 
lias taken effect — and the owners of neighbour- 
ing unlet gardens have begun to cultivate on 
their own account, with the best possible results. 
Here then is a Ceylonese gentleman who not 
only deserves special mention in Administration 
Reports with an account of his operations and 
the out-springing results ; but who deserves to 
be recognised with an honour or medal at 
the hands of the Government. Then as regards 
the great Tea Enterprise of the country, 
it is very encouraging to learn from Mr. 
Drieberg's Report that many of his lads find 
openings in connection with Tea plantations and 
factories, and that they are well approved of. A 
planter lately sent us copy of a ridiculous "soil 
report" by an Agricultural School boy as a re- 
flection on the teaching ; but this was absurd 
and we meant to say so at the time. For it is 
surely a great matter to get it into the ordin- 
ary Sinhalese boy's head that there are good 
and bad soils — soils suited for tea, palms, 
pasture, paddy, &c. To make him think at all 
is an achievement ; and the teaching is not to 
blame if youngsters attempt to go beyond their 
scope and pose as scientists. As the Report 
explains, the raw material on which the Director 
has to work, is often very unpromising. But we 
wish to point out the great future that is 
before native agriculture in the direction of tea 
growing and making in the lowcountry as well 
as from palm and fruit culture. In this con- 
nection we may quote from our impromptu 
address before the Royal Colonial Institute 
in May 188-i when we ventured in their 
presence to combat the over-sanguine views of 
Sir Win, Gregory, Sir John Douglas and Mr. 
Mosse as to the probable great spread of paddy 
culture and the all-importance of that industry. 
