Feb  i,  1893.] 
THE  TROPICAL  AGRICULTURIST. 
545 
. ,-„■■■.» — 
To  the  Editor. 
FRESHLY  PLUCKED  TEA  SEED— HOW 
TREATED. 
Colombo,  2nd  Jany.  1893. 
Sib,— A large  quantity  of  tea  seed  locally  grown 
is  now  bought.  Can  you  or  some  qualified  reader 
inform  me  how  best  to  treat  seed  freshly  plucked 
from  the  trees?  Should  it  be  put  into  a germi- 
nating heap  at  onoe  or  kept  for  a time  ? If  the 
latter  how  kept  and  for  how  long  ? 
Perhaps  Dr.  Trimen  may  consider  the  subjeot 
worthy  of  remark. — Yours,  &o.,  B. 
[What  does  our  correspondent  exaotly  mean  ? 
Dr.  Trimen  will  tell  him  that  tea-seed,  like  all 
other  seeds  and  especially  oily  ones;  should  be 
sown  as  soon  after  it  is  fully  ripe  and  plucked  as 
possible.  We  oannot  imagine  any  advantage  in  keep- 
ing it. — Ed.  T.A.] 
A WORD  FOR  CACAO  AND  LIBERIAN 
COFFEE. 
Jan.  11th. 
Dear  Sib, — Re  prospectus  of  the  new  Cacao,  Tea 
and  Coffee  Company  and  your  appreciative  notice 
of  the  same,  the  latter  being  in  continuation  of 
your  raoent  writings  on  the  same  subject,  you 
cannot  too  earnestly  impress  upon  your  readers 
the  advisability  of  cultivating  other  products  in 
addition  to  tea,  and  the  very  imminent  danger 
there  is  of  the  latter  being  overdone. 
That  can  never  happen  to  Cacao,  in  Ceylon  at 
least,  the  area  of  perfectly  suitable  land  being 
very  limited. 
There  is  a wider  field  for  Liberian  Coffee,  which 
in  fairly  warm  and  sheltered  districts  will  give  a 
fair  crop  up  to  2,000  ft.  above  sea  level.  It 
gets  leaf  disease,  of  course,  and  bug  but  it  is  very 
hard  to  kill. 
I have  20  aores  planted  10  years  ago  among 
oaoao,  by  which  it  is  being  slowly,  but  surely 
rubbed  out.  The  parent  trees  had  their  home  in 
Ceylon  and  suffered  from  bug  and  leaf  disease 
from  their  infancy  ; and  yet  this  coflee  gave  me 
160  bushels  dried  cherry  this  last  season,  or  7£ 
bushels,  value  R35.  to  each  sore  : the  cacao  at 
the  same  time  giving  a full  orop.  Naturally  better 
results  would  have  been  obtained  from  selected 
seed.  Arabian  coffee,  too,  will  grow  to  pay  well  in 
land  on  which  it  has  not  been  cultivated  before  ; 
but  fresh  seed  should  be  imported.  Yacanoies  in 
tea  after  second  year  should  be  filled  up  with  either 
variety  aocording  to  elevation  and  climate,  and  the 
trees  should  be  allowed  to  grow  up  at  their  own 
sweet  will. 
No  topping,  no  pruning . 
EXPERTO  CREDE. 
P.S. — Close  planting  is  advisable.  Liberian  coflee 
6 by  6;  Arabian  4 by  4,  supplemented  in  either  oase, 
where  the  olimate  suits,  by  cacao,  12  by  12. — E.C. 
Kew  Gardens. — A large  bed  of  the  Gladiola 
(Childsi)  was  seen  in  Kew  Gardens  last  summer 
and  attracted  much  attention.  At  that  time 
they  were  not  named,  but  Mr.  WatsoD,  the 
Curator,  writing  to  the  American  paper,  Garden 
and  Forest , stated  that  1 ‘ the  raisers  might  be 
congratulated  on  the  excellence  of  their  seedings; 
that  some  of  the  spikes  were  fully  six  feet  high, 
well  furnished  with  flower  larger  than  any  other 
Gladiolus  previously  seen,  and  that  the  colours 
were  brilliant,  as  well  as  variable.”  Prices  will 
be  found  in  our  Advertisement  Pages. 
STAPLE  EXPORTS  FOR  TEN  YEARS : 
DISTRIBUTION  OF  PRODUCTS  OTHER 
THAN  TEA. 
Not  much  canbe  madeout  of  our  oldstaple  “Coffee" 
and  yet  it  is  a matter  of  considerable  interest, 
as  showing  how  our  trade  with  the  Southern 
Colonies  is  growing,  to  note  that  out  of  our  small 
export  of  the  fragrant  berry,  no  less  than  9,856  owt. 
or  over  23  per  cent  of  the  whole,  went  last  year 
to  Australasia.  The  United  Kingdom  got  56  per 
cent  of  the  total  shipments  and  Austria  direot,  6,200 
cwt.  or  about  15  per  cent.  Of  our  Coooa,  Australia 
takes  scarcely  any  and  yet  if  the  product  were 
prepared  in  Colombo  as  it  is  by  Messrs.  Shand  and 
Haldane,  among  others,  in  England,  we  feel  sure 
there  would  be  a good  demand  from  Melbourne, 
Sydney  and  other  big  Southern  towns.  As  it  is 
all  our  Coooa  goes,  practically,  to  London  save 
last  year,  1,106  owt.  direct  to  America  and  1,029 
cwt,  to  “ Singapore  ” of  all  places.  In  “ Carda- 
moms, " India, — that  is  we  suppose,  Calcutta  mainly 
— is  almost  as  good  a customer  as  the  United 
Kingdom ; for,  in  1892,  as  many  as  170,503  lb. 
went  to  the  former  against  174,096  lb.  to  London; 
while  Austria,  Germany  and  America  took  small 
quantities  direot.  The  export  of  Cinnamon  is 
much  more  freely  distributed,  the  direot  shipments 
to  the  Continent  of  Europe,  especially  to  Germany, 
beiDg  very  large ; while  appreciable  quantities  go 
to  India,  Australia,  America  and  the  Far  East, 
This  is  also  true  of  the  produce  of  the  Oooonut 
Palm  and  the  following  summary  statement  is 
worth  compiling  for  these  staples  : — 
Shipped  in  1892. 
Cinnamon  lb.  Coconut  Copra 
To  bales.  chips.  Oil  cwt.  cwt. 
United  Kingdom..  936,855  97,829  123,033  30,594 
Continent  of  Europe  858,938  464,832  54,197  82,256 
America  . . 75,000  — 191,425  — 
Australia  ..  5,877  11,196  1,704  — 
India  . . 28,150  41,298  116,208  21,051 
Far  East  . . 42,718  — 64,410  114 
Other  Places  . . — — — 575 
Total  . . 1,947.538  615,155  550,977  134,590 
Of  the  new  produot,  “ Dessicated  Oooonut,”  while 
London  took  nearly  85  per  cent,  there  were  last 
year  appreciable  exports  to  Germany,  Amerioa, 
Australia  and  ‘'Afrioa."  The  latter  surely  means 
Egypt  ? And  if  so  it  may  also  have  got  the  650,000 
ooconuts  down  for  “ Africa."  Australia,  Amerioa  and 
the  Far  East  are  also  fairly  good  customers  of  ours 
for  Coir,  especially  for  “Coir  Rope,”  none  of  which 
goes  to  Europe,  though  “Yarn”  and  “Fibre"  are 
largely  sent  to  London  and  the  European  Con- 
tinent. Of  Citronella  Oil,  Amerioa  takes  direot 
nearly  as  much  as  the  London  market ; while 
India  and  Germany  last  year  got  considerable 
shipments. 
Of  the  only  mineral  in  the  Chamber’s  table,  Plum- 
bago, America  now  takes  direot  a muoh  larger 
quantity  than  is  sent  to  London  and  this  American 
trade  showed  a large  increase  last  year  over  1891, 
while  the  trade  to  London  has  gone  back.  Germany, 
Holland  and  Belguim  are  each  entered  for  direct 
shipments  on  the  whole  showing  an  increase. 
We  have  still  to  notioe  Oinohona  Bark,  the  total 
export  of  which  in  1892 — notwithstanding  all  the 
propheoiesof  the  Ceylon  trade  collapsing — was  more 
than  a million  lb.  in  excess  of  that  of  the  previous 
year.  Where  has  this  increase  come  from  ? Not, 
we  are  assured  from  Uva,  nor  from  the  Dimbula- 
Dikoya  districts  : there  has  been  no  increased 
“ harvesting”  in  our  planting  districts,  because  in 
reality  the  harvest  was  not  there  to  gather.  The 
extra  million  or  perhaps  a oouple  of  millions 
of  lb,  it  seems,  must  have  been  drawn  from 
69 
