8o6 
THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST. [June f, 1895. 
if the Agents of Government and their Head- 
men made experiments with the raw material 
in their several districts, and sent on resulting 
samples to London for report. Meantime we 
quote as follows : — 
"London, I5tb March 1895. 
" We venture to address you (as one of the 
Honorary Corresponding Secretaries of the Koyal 
Colonial Institute) to ask you whether you can 
assist us in obtaining new materials similar to the 
enclosed specimens— or any similar materials that 
may appear likely to suit manufacturers for same 
purposes. 
It is novelties rather than exact copies that 
are desired : 
Specimen No. 1. 'Bamboo', obtained by cutting 
stems when green ; split pipe open and flatten ; then 
Bplit into thin sheets as broad and as long as possible ; 
pack in wooden boxes, The sheets must not be bent or 
creased in any way but kept perfectly flat ; good white 
colour preferred. 
No. 2. 'Via', probably from a Banana or Musa. 
Arum Esculentum or similar plants; stems opened 
and split as above, must not be less than 10 millimetres 
wide. 
No. 3, Shin of a 1'alin Leaf. This may possibly 
also be obtained from the wild Pine Apple, 
' Pandanus ' or screw-pine, and similar plants ; the 
outer cuticle should be carefully stripped off and 
dried ; kept flat, not curled or twisted and packed as 
above. The colour should be uniform not necessarily 
white. 
An important business, say thousands of pounds 
sterling, may be done in suitable materials of 
this class, and we shall be much obliged to you, 
if you can influence one or more good ship- 
ping firms to send us specimens of as many varieties 
of suitable materials as possible, each specimen to 
have a code word attached ; so that orders may be 
telegraphed, and some indication of quantity ob- 
tainable, and price, should also be given and time 
required for execution of orders. 
We must, however, stipulate that any novelties 
ordered by us, shall be sent to us only ; the value 
to the manufacturer depends upon his having the 
sole supply for a season or two. 
Being officially connected with the Imperial In- 
stitute we are in the forefront of the trade spe- 
cialties in fibrous materials. We shall also be 
glad to receive and report upon any samples 
of fibres or fibrous materials that you may cause to 
be sent, and to take charge of any consignments for 
sale on this market, the writer having been a 
Fibre Broker for many years, and used formerly to 
do a good deal for Ur. Forbes Watson when the 
latter was at the India office." 
OUR LABOUR SUPPLY AND THE 
INDO-OEYLON RAILWAY. 
A correspondent in Southern India who has had 
much experience of coolies writes to us as follows, 
and we direct the special attention of Mr. C. 
Youno-, Mr. A. E. Wright and other planters — 
indeed' that of the Planters' Association generally 
— to what he says : — 
" In re coolies, a fair number are going over to you 
now, and from what the kauganies say, more will follow. 
If the railway were made (even to Paumben, much 
more to Ceylon) many more would go to you. You will 
say, 'there is a railway to Tuticorin.' True, but for 
some reason most coolies north of Tinnevelly do not 
care to go that way unless they have money. One 
thing coolies dread very much is the journey from 
Tuticorin to Colombo which they say is very rough 
and the boatmen treat them rather roughly, in 
some cases extorting bucksheesh. When we have a 
railway to Mannar on the Ceylon side, and Thonitarai 
on the Indian side you are bound to get a larger 
number of Arcot, Trichinopoly and Tanjore coolies. 
" If planters would register each cooly's debt to the 
kangany when he reaches the estate, it seems to 
me it would be a boon to the cooly ; for I know of 
cases where a cooly has told me when he came over 
he owed a certain sum to the kangany and some time 
after, over a year, he was still heavily in debt and 
the amount he was told he owed when he came to 
estate was very much larger than the sum he had told 
me at first ; and when asked again about what he had 
told me he said. " I can't write and can t keep 
kanack so long, and I am confused. Kanakkapillai 
says there was so much advanced at home, so much 
for rice and expenses and for cloth Arc, and if I say 
it's wrong, kangani will beat me and charge me very 
high interest." Your kangani system is the best you 
can get for getting coolies over, I am convinced since 
I came to Southern India : but there is not sufficient 
check on kanganies after they reach Ceylon. I know 
I w ill be asked, 4 Please tell us how that check is 
to be exercised f ' That is more than I can say in 
a note like this, and there are wiser heads among 
you which can, no noubt, devise some plan. If not, 
the poor cooly will continue to be mulcted and, through 
bad kangames, give some Ceylon estates a bad name. 
"One tiling, I think, should be altered, and that is the 
hrad l.amjam system. He has too much control over 
the labour of estates. Never should a head kangani 
be permitted to keep a pocket check-roll for estate, 
unless lie ha* a fixed salary and not paid per number of 
days work of gang. But I must not pretend to teach 
better men than myself what to do. Your district 
P.A.'s should all tackle the matter and decide on a 
course to be followed by all members, not taking 
into account actions of non-members. Some incon- 
venience and loss of labour in a few cases would, 
no doubt, have to be faced ; but any member who 
was put in a hole through such action of non -members 
should be helped by members from a fund to be put 
aside for that purpose, and time would wear the op- 
position out. 
" Mr. 15. J. Young did good service to Ceylon in 
letting planters know a great deal about the vill- 
ages and habits in Southern India." 
TEA COMPANIES. 
The paper in the Investors' Review tor April 
begins with extracts from our latest " Handbook 
and Directory" for total production and exports 
of tea. It then goes on to shew how .stable an 
industry tea may be considered, compared with 
coffee from the planting point of view. Acreage 
and crop figures for India and Ceylon are given, 
and the risk of overproduction is considered ; 
but the way in which new fields for consumption 
at the expense of China, are being found, is 
pointed out. Then the condition of Tea Com- 
panies as a whole is considered and the larger 
Indian concerns are much praised for the full- 
ness of the information they supply and their 
good management in the face or falling prices. 
A table is given for three Companies, shewing 
average price, cost per lb. and profit on tea. First, 
Joreliaut Co. which had highest profit of 5 - 51d 
in 1886, against 362d per lb. in 1893; Jokai, 
highest profit 314d in 1890 and in 1893 only 1 Tld : 
and Darjeeling Co. highest 5d in 1886 against 
2 52d per lb. in 1893. We quote the conclusion 
of the paper : — 
The reports of Indian tea companies are excellently 
drawn up as a rule, and a shareholder altogether ig- 
norant of the business would gather much informa- 
tion from the perusal of these documents. From 
an examination of the reports of the three com- 
panies given above, it is clear that expenditure in 
the past upon machinery and other improvements 
has been chiefly met out of revenue, and these 
concerns are now gaining the benefit of this pru- 
dence and true economy. The net profit per pound 
in the case of the Jorehaut and Jokai companies 
is earned upon a very much larger outturn, so that 
profits have been more than maintained despite the 
fall in price. Unfortunately the reports of the 
Ceylon companies give very few details, but there 
