August  j,  1892. | 
<HF  TROPICAL  AGRICULTURIST, 
95 
to  the  Island  this  was  a singular  instance  of  fore- 
sight. (Hear,  hear.)  He  cordially  endorsed  all  that 
bad  been  said  that  day  as  to  the  relations  of  Sir 
William  Gregory  with  the  Association.  Sir  William 
was  pre  eminently  fitted  to  preside  over  such  an 
institution  and  by  his  help  it  was  enabled  to  achieve 
at  once  a position  which  without  him  it  might 
havo  taken  very  loDg  to  reach.  The  influence  of 
the  Association  with  the  authorities  on  this  side 
was  altogether  due,  as  was  stated  in  the  report,  to 
the  tact  and  judgment  of  its  late  President.  He 
hoped  he  might  be  excused  fcr  making  this  long 
digression.  (Cheers.) 
Mr.  J.  Ferguson  : — In  one  word  I would  like  to 
explain  that  Governor  Gregory  arrived  in  Ceylon 
in  1872  ; and  in  that  year  there  was  only  one  man 
in  the  island — and  to  his  honour  be  it  said — who 
had  any  doubt  as  to  our  coffee-planting  enterprise 
surviving  the  fungus  attack,  and  that  was  the  iate 
Dr.  Thwaites,  of  the  Peradeniya  Botanical  Gardens. 
No  doubt  Governor  Gregory  paid  attention  to  Dr. 
Thwaites’s  opinion,  and  deserves  great  credit  for  so 
doing  ; but  much  more  for  being  the  first  Governor 
who  took  special  interest  in  the  culture  of 
new  planting  products  as  to  introduce  them  by 
special  paragraphs  in  his  annual  opening  speech 
to  Counoil.  Thus  tea,  cinchona,  cacao  and  carda- 
mom culture  were  kept  before  the  publio  and 
rresged  upon  planting  attention.  In  respect  of 
Railway  Extension  we  (of  the  Observer)  always  gave 
prominenee  to  our  firm  belief  that  new  products 
would  make  up  for  any  deficiency  in  coffee,  though 
in  Sir  Wm.  Gregory’s  day  none  of  us,  and  no  one 
in  the  island,  expected  to  see  coffee  so  completely 
superceded  by  tea.  (Hear,  bear.) 
Mr.  J.  Whittall  moved  the  re-election  of  the 
Executive  Committee,  with  the  addition  of  the  name 
of  Sir  G.  W.  R.  Campbell,  k.c.m.g.,  and  of  the  Tea 
Committee. 
Mr.  Thos.  Dickson  seconded,  and  the  motion 
was  carried. 
A vote  of  thanks  to  the  directors  of  the  New 
Oriental  Bank  Corporation  for  granting  their  board- 
room  for  the  meeting  was  unanimously  passed, 
and  the  proceedings  closed  with  the  usual  compli- 
ment to  the  Chairman. 
« 
NEWS  FROM  BRITISH  NORTH  BORNEO. 
Kandy,  June  18th. 
A first  class  manager  has  been  appointed  to  take 
charge  of  the  estates  of  the  company  in  which 
Messrs.  Shand  and  Henry  Walker  are  interested. 
Mr.  Pryer’s  company  are  going  in  for  planting 
200  aores  of  Liberian  coffee.  There  is  some  splendid 
soil  in  their  holding. 
The  North  Borneo  holders  of  shares  in  tobacco 
companies  are  much  encouraged  by  the  following 
intelligence  received  from  home : — 
Greatly  improved  prices  ruled  at  the  Sumatra 
tobacco  sales'  held  in  Amsterdam  on  Friday.  The 
bearing  of  the  advance  on  the  position  of  the  lead- 
ing English  company,  the  British  Deli-Langkat,  is 
the  most  interesting  feature  of  the  sales,  and  share- 
holders will  be  pleased  to  hear  that  the  prices  ob- 
tained were  well  ahead  of  the  valuations  and  nearly 
double  tbe  average  prices  of  last  year.  The  greater 
part  of  the  British  Deli-Langkat  tobacco  sold  on 
Friday  was  valued  at  118  cents  and  sold  for  155, 
while  the  remainder  was  valued  at  91  cents  and  sold 
at  101.  The  average  of  128  cents  is  equivalent  to 
two  shillings  a pound,  whereas  75  cents,  or  one  and 
threepence,  was  with  difficulty  obtained  last  year. 
Two  causes  have  combined  to  produce  this  advance — 
the  exhaustion  of  the  large  stocks  laid  up  by  American 
cigar  makers  before  the  M'Kinley  Tariff  came  into 
operation,  and  the  diminution  in  the  area  under 
tobacco  in  Sumatra.  The  weaker  companies  have 
gone  to  the  wall,  and  about  half  of  the  tobacco  land 
has  gone  out  of  cultivation.  The  well-managed  com- 
panies which  survived  the  crisis  will  benefit  still 
more  in  the  next  financial  year  ; meanwhile  the 
prospects  of  the  British  Deli-Langkat  have  undergone 
a wonderful  change  since  the  issue  of  debentures  in 
January.  Then  the  Directors  counted  on  little  more 
than  £50,000  as  the  revenue  for  this  year,  but  if 
Friday’s  prices  be  realised  for  the  entire  crop  of 
1,4000,000  lb.  the  revenue  will  be  at  least  £135,000. 
The  surplus  supply  of  coolie  labour  in  Sumatra,  owing 
to  the  reduction  of  the  cultivated  area,  has  enormously 
brought  down  the  working  expenditure,  and  alto- 
gether it  is  not  surprising  to  find  that  British  Deli- 
Langkat  shares  have  risen  from  the  miserable  prices 
at  which  they  were  quoted  some  time  ago.  The 
changed  prospects  make  the  debentures  a very  tempt- 
ing holding,  but  they  are  nearly  all  in  the  hands 
of  the  shareholders,  who  are  not  likely  to  part  with 
them. 
It  is  a pity  such  a boom  in  tobacco  did  not 
come  earlier,  so  that  the  Ceylon  Tobacco  Company 
might  have  shared  in  it.  I fancy  however  the 
holders  of  the  land  sold  by  the  local  company 
will  do  better  with  oaoao,  cooonuts  and  tea  than 
in  tobacco.  W.  D.  G. 
NOTES  ON  PRODUCE  AND  FINANCE. 
Tea  Shares  as  an  Investment. — In  last  week’s  Grocer 
Mr.  James  Llewellyn-Hughes,  once  a tea  planter,  and 
still  kindly  remembered  in  the  tea  districts  of  India, 
points  out  that  from  an  analysis  of  the  accounts  of 
eighty  joint  stock  companies  registered  in  Calcutta, 
and  representing  an  aggregate  invested  capital  of 
R2, 54,58,150,  a total  net  profit  for  the  year  1891  was 
made  of  Rl, 252,605  or  4'88  per  cent  on  the  capital. 
“ Tbis,”  be  says,  “compares  with  2‘54  per  cent,  or 
barely  2§  per  cent  paid  in  1890,  and  4T8  per  cent  in 
1889.’'  We  believe  it  is  no  secret  that  Mr.  Llewellyn- 
Hughes  is  not  enamoured  of  tea  planting  as  a re- 
munerative occupation,  and  he  points  out  with  some- 
thing like  truimph  that  there  were  eighteen  companies 
that  made  an  actual  loss  of  from  2 per  cent  to  3’62  per 
cent.  Mr.  Llewellyn-Hughes,  in  his  reference  to  the  poor 
return  paid  by  many  of  these  Calcutta  companies, 
omits  to  mention  certain  gardens,  like  the  Bargang 
Company,  Assam,  the  Ne.deem,  Western  Dooars,  which 
have,  according  to  the  Pioneer, paid  steady  dividend  of 
2 0 per  cent,  and  the  Matelli  Company,  which  has  paid 
as  much  as  40  per  cent  to  its  shareholders.  But  Mr. 
Llewellyn  Hughes  might  with  advantage  turn  his  at- 
tention to  the  London  Tea  Companies  for  the  other 
side  of  the  picture.  A table  supplied  by  Mr.  Ernest 
Tye,  giving  the  results  of  working  in  1891,  shows  that 
tbe  fifteen  companies  who-have  published  their  reports, 
with  an  agsregate  capital  of  £1,094,057  and  a plmted 
area  of  22,814,  acres  of  tea  have  realised  net  profits 
which  amount  to  £89,204,  or  equivalent  to  a dividend 
of  8T5  percent  on  the  whole  capital  invested.  This  in- 
dicates conclusively,  Mr.  Hughes  notwithstanding,  that, 
by  economy  of  working  and  careful  manufacture  of 
really  good  teas,  tea  planting  in  India  as  an  industry 
can  hold  its  own  against  any  country,  and  is  not  to  be 
despised  as  a remunerative  investment. 
A Big  Cheque  for  Tea  Duty. — It  seems  rather 
hard  on  Mr.  Lipton  that,  because  he  hob-nobbed 
with  Arabi  in  Ceylon,  he  should  be  referred  to  in  the 
House  of  Commons  as  a “vulgar  advertiser.”  He  has, 
by  the  way,  just  paid  Her  Majesty’sOustoms  a cheque 
for  £15,359  8s.  for  tea  duty.  This  is  said  to  be  the 
largest  amount  ever  paid  by  any  one  tea  dealer,  and 
um'er  the  old  rule  of  duty  it  would  have  amounted  to 
upwards  of  £23,000.  Anyway  the  Government  have 
nothing  to  complain  about  his  love  of  advertising.  A 
man  who  desires  to  open  tea  shops  all  over  the  world 
cannot  be  expected  to  go  about  incognito,  or  speak  in 
whispers. — H.  and  C.  Mail,  June  3. 
