THE  TROPICAL  AGRICULTURIST. 
[May  i,  1893. 
*14 
As  to  manuring  deteriorating  the  quality  of  tea 
We  are  very  sceptical.  We  have  yet  to  hear  of  any 
experiment  being  carried  out  with  breaks  of  tea  from 
similar  jats  of  tea,  at  similar  elevations  and  made 
in  the  same  factory,  and  put  up  at  the  same  auction. 
It  is  impossible  to  see  what  case  there  is  for  non- 
manuring on  these  grounds.  Has  anyone  ever  noticed 
he  got  better  prices  the  year  before  he  manured  than 
the  year  after  ? Allowing  for  any  difference  there 
might  be  in  the  price  of  tea  generally,  as  shown  by 
the  Broker’s  account,  do  not  people  manure  for  fruit, 
and  does  not  fruit  take  more  out  of  trees  than  leaf  ? 
Are  there  not  chemical  properties  required  to  make  it  ? 
Do  not  people  manure  their  grass  fields  in  England  for 
bay,  and  did  ever  anyone  hear  of  the  hay  from  manured 
fields  being  less  nutritious  than  the  hay  from  unman- 
ured land  ? Yet  hay  is  made  ui>  from  innumerable 
leaves  of  plants  and  grasses.  The  very  fact  of  the  tree 
throwing  out  a superabundance  of  leaves  seems  to  point 
out  that  it  has  extra  vitality,  and  extra  vitality 
ought  not  to  mean  diminution  of  strength  in  the 
leaf.  Leaf  from  newly-pruned  tea  is  inferior,  but 
that  is  no  reason  that  manured  tea  should  be  so. 
The  young  shoots  from  the  pruned  tea  are  left  to 
grow  up  ; if  not,  the  plant  would  die,  from  being 
unable  to  breathe,  and  the  first  pluckings  are  in- 
variably coarser  than  the  later  ones,  as  the  tree 
itself  is  struggling  to  get  over  the  shock  it  has  sus- 
tained from  the  knife.  As  we  said  before,  there  is 
probably  much  more  assertion  than  proof  in  this 
theory,  and  we  quite  fail  to  understand  why  tea 
alone,  amongst  agricultural  products  should  not  be 
benefited  by  high  cultivation.  We  give  on  another 
page  an  account  of  experiments  in  tea  manuring 
which  may  be  of  interest.  It  tells  of  what  has 
been  done  in  South  Travancore,  and  the  corre- 
spondent to  whom  we  are  indebted  for  the  account 
states  that  leaving  out  the  part  manured  with 
ashes,  the  value  of  the  tea  is  increased  £5  an  acre, 
as  the  trees  have  spread  and  thickened  very  greatly. 
He  gives  details  as  to  the  result  of  application  of 
various  kinds  of  manure,  and  what  he  says  strongly 
supports  his  conclusion  that  it  will  pay  proprietors 
over  and  over  again  to  go  in  for  a thorough 
system  of  manuring.  It  must  be  borne  in  mind 
that  the  bulk  added  to  an  acre  putting  in  J cwt. 
to  a tree  is  very  great,  equalling  with  trees  planted 
4 m 4 35  tons  of  bulk.  For  our  part  we  feel  sure 
that  manuring  must  soon  be  recognised  as  one  of 
the  necessities  of  tea  cultivation,  and  we  feel  equally 
sure  that  those  who  take  time  by  the  forelock  and 
apply  it  whilst  their  trees  are  still  in  good  heart, 
will  be  amply  repaid.  To  starve  land  has  always 
been  recognised  as  the  most  shortsighted  policy, 
and  has  probably  ruined  more  English  farmers  than 
anything  else;  and  to  our  mind  this  principle  applies 
here  with  equal  force.— Madras  Times. 
We  have  heard  it  said  that  if  planters  begin  to 
discuss  manuring  their  tea  fields,  capitalists  will  be- 
gin to  think  the  end  is  at  hand.  The  effect  of  a 
movement  in  favour  of  systematic  manuring  might, 
some  planters  fear,  be  to  create  distrust  of  the  Tea 
enterprise.  On  the  contrary,  sensible  capitalists  would 
recognise  in  such  a movement  the  best  guarantee  for 
the  permanence  of  the  industry. 
The  first  step  towards  scientific  cultivation  is  to 
keep  the  surface  soil  from  waste  and  wash,  by  tho- 
roughly efficient  surface  drainage,  and  the  next  is 
to  maintain  the  fertility  of  the  soil  by  suitable  feed- 
ing. The  two  principal  sources  of  waste  and  exhaus- 
tion will  thus  be  eliminated  and  all  practicable  per- 
manence may  be  secured.  Inasmuch  as  the  soils  of 
different  district,  and  even  in  parts  of  the  same 
district,  vary  in  character  and  composition,  the 
manures  required  for  each  may,  and  almost,  certainly 
will  differ,  perhaps  considerably.  Hence,  a course  of 
experiments  should  be  pursued,  and  the  effect  of  avail- 
able manures  should  be  undertaken  in  all  localities 
to  test  the  effect  of  each  in  different  situations. 
Scientific  aid  would  be  of  great  value  in  directing  ex- 
periments, and  would  probably  save  expense  and 
disappointment,  by  proceeding  more  directly  and 
certainly  to  the  attainment  of  the  object  by  the  light 
of  science.  The  proposal  recently  suggested,  to  obtain 
the  services  of  an  agricultural  chemist,  is  deserving 
of  serious  consideration,  and  as  all  planters  would 
be  ultimately  benefited  by  the  services  of  an  expert, 
the  cost  of  them  should  be  borne  by  the  planting 
community  as  generally  as  possible' 
In  the  meantime,  much  may  be  done  by 
judiciously  conducted  experiments,’  based  on  the 
knowledge  which  most  planters  possess  of  the  general 
nature  of  soils  and  manures.  We  have  alluded  al- 
ready to  waste,  and  it  is  needless  to  point  out  that 
the  prunings  should  be  assiduously  preserved  in  every 
case.  They  contain  the  very  essence  of  the  bushes, 
and  their  preservation,  therefore,  is  essential  wher- 
ever any  pretension  is  made  to  regular  economic 
cultivation.  It  is  an  open  question,  and  one  of  great 
importance,  to  determine  whether  the  function  they 
may  fulfil  in  protecting  the  soil  from  the  sun, 
or  that  of  their  decomposition  by  gradual  decay  by 
being  buried  fresh  in  the  soil  yields  the  best  results. 
The  difference  is  considerable.  When  exposed  on  the 
ground  they  speedily  shrivel  up  and  are  reduced 
to  little  more  than  their  ash.  They  are  thus  liable 
to  be  washed  or  blown  away  and  wasted.  If  buried, 
on  the  other  hand,  their  decomposition  results  in 
the  production  of  ulmic  and  humic  acids,  that  have 
a powerful  and  beneficial  effect  on  subsoils.  Where- 
ever  these  are  clayey,  these  acids  tend  to  mellow 
them,  and  to  break  them  up. 
We  have  more  than  once  alluded  to  the  action 
of  decaying  vegetable  matter  in  breaking  up  and 
fertilising  obdurate  subsoils,  as  the  writer  witness- 
ed the  process  systematically  pursued  in  Italy, 
where  soils  that  were  utterly  barren  in  their  natural 
state  were  brought  into  a fertile  condition,  by  means 
of  vegetable  matter  buried  in  holes  dug  to  receive  it. 
Prunings  of  lea  may  be  employed  in  either  of  the 
w-ys  mentioned,  and  we  should  conceive  that  the 
latter  is  much  the  better,  both  in  point  of  economy 
and  fertilising  effect.  For  the  same  reason,  we  should 
think  that  vegetable  matter  from  the  jungles,  espe- 
cially if  buried  green  and  fresh,  with  a slight  admix- 
ture of  manure  to  aid  in  their  decomposition,  would 
prove  a valuable  resource.  A common  chena  shrub, 
kepitiya,  (croton  laccifera)  has  highly  fertilising  pro- 
perties, being  rich  in  potash,  and  is  extensively  used 
in  some  parts  of  the  country  by  the  Sinhalese. 
It  is  a common  mistake  to  suppose  that  leaf  pro- 
duce is  necessarily  less  exhaustive  than  fruit. 
Whatever  part  of  a plant  constitutes  the  value  of  its 
produce  is  the  part  which,  when  harvested,  takes 
most  out  of  the  soil.  Tobacco  leaf,  for  instance,  is 
extremely  exhausting,  far  more  so  than  coffee  and 
many  other  fruits.  The  fact  that  tea  is  a leaf  does 
not,  therefore,  prevent  its  being  an  exhaustive  crop. 
The  theine  contained  in  the  tea  leaf  is  closely  allied 
to  the  caffeine  which  gives  its  chief  value  to  the  coffee 
bean.  For  this,  and  other  reasons  it  is  unreasonable 
to  expect  tea  bushes  to  go  on  yielding  leaf  for  an 
indefinite  length  of  time  without  receiving  artificial 
aid.  The  form  in  which  the  necessary  support  may 
be  most  economically  given  is  therefore  a principal 
part  of  a tea  planter’s  duty  and  interest  to  discover, 
either  by  experiments,  suggested  by  his  own  obser- 
vation and  experience,  or  by  the  light  of  science, 
under  the  guidance  of  an  expert. 
The  objection  frequently  urged  against  the  manur- 
ing of  Tea  fields,  that  once  begun,  it  must  be  pur- 
sued, is  generally  based  on  a mistake  of  practice. 
When  economic  plants  have  become  weak  and  in 
want  of  support,  they  are  generally  overdosed  with 
manure,  which  has  the  effect  of  stimulating  them 
to  an  unnatural  degree,  and  hence  they  collapse  un- 
less the  action  be  kept  up.  This  is  a main  objec- 
tion against  allowing  the  bushes  to  run  down  and 
become  exhausted  before  giving  them  artificial  aid. 
To  avoid  that  violent  oscillation  between  extremes 
of  excitement  and  relapse,  the  proper  course  is  to 
give  the  necessary  support  betimes  in  small  measure, 
such  that  the  b shes  may  receive  the  requisite  sup- 
port without  being  stimulated  into  such  unnatural 
effrr.t,  as  cannot  be  sustained  without  the  repeated 
use  of  stimulants.  We  regard  this  objection  as  con- 
ia:niug  its  own  refutation.  The  fact  that  a stim-ul. 
ating  as  distinguished  from  a feeding  system  Gf 
