40 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST, 
IJrLv 1, 1900. 
— sav two-thirds amoogst the producers of sugar and 
the remaining one-third amongst the producers of 
cocoa and coconuts and that would come to a fair 
distribution. Some time ago when they called atten- 
tion to the necessity of helping to put down 
THE ADULTEKATION OF COCOA, 
the West India Committee in London wrote 
back and told them that they had better keep 
quiet and leave people as they were, because in 
Enf'land people were accustomed to dnnK a certain 
mixture which they called cocoa or chocolate and were 
altogether in favour of that description of beverage 
and consequently if they tried to force people to 
consume pure and unadulterated cocoa probably we 
would find that we would be losing our best customers. 
He (Mr de Verteuil) did not kuow how far that was 
correct ' He did not himself see why, if some persons 
nreferred to take cocoa mixed with arrowroot and 
sugar they should not be shown some other substance 
iu which there was no arrowroot and sugar and in 
which there was simply cocoa and sugar— he did not 
see any haim iu it, and he thought they would 
remember that some years ago when the beet pro- 
ducers brought into the English market an imitation 
of Demerara crystals, the West India Committee very 
keenly exacted that the composition called " Demerara 
Crvstals" had no right to be so called and could not 
be sold as such, and he believed an action was brought 
in the Courts and it was held that the beet sugar so 
sold should be labelled as an imitation of Demerara 
Crvstals That was the result of a prosecution 
instituted, he believed by the West India Committee. 
Mr Aspinall said he thought the prosecution was 
due to private initiative, but he remembered the 
circumstance. .-, ,, ^ , t -f 
Mr B de Verteuil said that at any rate if the 
West" India Committee took up their interest a 
great deal could be done. He preferred chocolate 
to pure cocoa, but those who had a taste for pure 
cocoa ought to have the pure article and not the 
adulterated article which was being sold m a great 
manv instances now. 
Mr A Warner said he hid proposed to say a few words 
at this meeting but Mr. de Verteuil had left him little 
to sav He fully endorsed everything said by Mr. de 
Verteuil, and thought it would be a very happy thing it 
thev could get the A¥est India Committee to help them, 
esoeciallv in the question of roads and railways in 
developing the island. The particuhxr point he pro- 
nosed to refer to was known to all of them-that there was 
a nennv a wound import duty levied in England, which 
was 14s or 1.5s a bag. There was also a similar tax on 
tea The two taxes were, he believed, the survival of a 
verv long time ago and had remained on because no one 
had had the energy to try and get rid of them, and he 
believed if they made representations to the West 
India Committee it would not be long before these 
taxes were removed. He had been told the removal 
would principally benefit the consumer, but it seemed 
to him that as cocoa was bought in bond into England 
the removal of a tax which had to be paid by the pur- 
chaser before he could get what he houghc out of bond 
would go almost exclusively lo benefit the producer, 
becaupethepurchaser by bidding so much w-^ouldhave a 
margin of 15s a bag to buy on, and therefore a very 
large proportion of the tax would go into the planters 
nockets, but even if it went into the consumers pocket 
so much the betterfor the industry, as it would mak^ 
the consumption of cocoa larger than it was, and it 
seemed to him that in a country hke England which 
boasted of a free breakfast table such a lax ought not to 
exist He did not believe any senous effort had been 
ma.ie to get rid of this tax; it had been mentioned to 
the West India (^-ommittee but never had been worked 
out or brought to the knowledge of Her Majesty's Go- 
vernment, and that, he thought, was one of those things 
in vvhich the West Indian Committee could very well 
"^^Mr ^ ir'de Verteuil said he believed the estimated 
acreage in cacao cnltiviUion last year was only 102,000. 
Mr Leotaud said he had spoken of the laud held by 
cacao proprietcrB. There was 100,000 acres belong- 
ing to the sugar proprietors, but there was only 57,000 
acres in sugar ciltivation. His cacao cultivation at 
Maracas did not cover the whole area, but he was pay- 
ing the tax for it. 
MEXICAN COFFEE. 
The Brazilian Review remarks : — " Tlie Dos Kios 
Coffee planting Company of Mexico, which describes 
itself as the model plantation of Mexico and 
the largest in the world outside of Brazil (it has 
2,0*10,000 coffee trees and \k million of rubber) has 
issued the following prospectus on which comments 
seem unnecessary. How long prices are likely to 
remain at VA cent.s, if only half what is promised can 
be substantiated, or why the company should be so 
anxious to give away such valuable properties at 
such a sacrifice instead of sticking to them itself, are 
two of the points that in our opinion seem to want ex- 
planation before rushing to invest. 
"Each tract of one hundred acres, when turned over 
to the purchaser at the end of the fifth year, shall 
have forty acres improved and under cnkivation, 
upon which there shall be 30,000 Coffee Trees live 
years old and 1,000 Rubber Trees 5 years old, 
all to be in perfect and well cared for con- 
dition. On a conservative basis the income from 
this property during the sixth, seventh and eight 
years can be estimated at ^4,80ij'00 per annum, being 
the crop of :-iO,000 coffee-trees yielding two pounds 
each and worth 13 cents per pound less .0 cents for 
cave of plantation, picking, milling, sacking, freight, 
insurance and brokerage, leaving a net profit of 8 cents 
per pound on the annual yield of 60,000 pounds. The 
ninth year this income will be increased $10,000 per 
annum by the net profit from the product of the 10,000 
rubber-trees, making a total aiinual net income ot 
f 1.5,OOO"O0 whfch can be relied upon without any fear 
ot diminution for at least twenty-live years there- 
after. This income can be still further increased by 
tiie owner diverting a portion of his profits to the 
planting of additional coffee and rubber in the por- 
tion of his land remaining undeveloped. At the 
present time the lowest cash value of such a plan- 
tation is f50,000'00 and one could readily be sold at 
tliafc price, and this ve offer for a cash outlaii on the 
part at the purchaser of onlif fioe thousand dollnrs ex- 
tended over a period, of five years,'" 
Eucalyptus Globulus in the Open.— 1 re- 
gret to report that trees here after attaining the 
lieighb 20 feet, and in spite of the steins having 
been wholly protected with hay-bands, have been 
killed to the ground during the past winter. 
We have registered frosts of 25 degrees and 
upwards. — A. R- Pearce Bray mead Gardens. 
Berkshire. — Gardeners Chronicle, May 26. 
Tkk BenGzVL Tobacco Trade. — lb will come 
as a surprise to many to know that for several 
years past the imports into Calcutta ot tobacco 
o-rown in Bengal Proper have averaged nearly 
Five lakhs of mauuds per annum. About a lakii 
of niaunds also arrives from Behar, while the 
average from Madras during the three years 
1896 97, 1897-98, and 1898-99, for which statistics 
are now published, was under four thousand 
inaunds per annum. Calcutta's largest customer 
in the matter of tobacco is Burma, which in 
1898-99 took fourteen million pounds, part of 
which no doubt comes back in theformof Burma 
cheroots, Madras took 800,000 lb., the United 
Kingdom 2.^000 lb. and France 19,000 lb. The 
amount exported, however, accounts for only 
about half the total. The otlier haif, apparently, 
is consumed in Calcutta, where the hubble-bubble 
presumably accounts for the annual disappearance 
of some two lakhs of wwuiAa.^ Friend of India, 
May 24. 
