THE XBOPICAJ;^ AGRICULTURIST. [Sept. 1, 1900. 
m 
very high. Thus it arises that their trade is 
both coniprclieiisive anrl divei'silied. The report 
enters into every item of export and import, 
with some adequate remark upon each. 
Some special facts or considerations may, liow- 
ever, here be noted. Tlie dominant factor in tlie 
Aniazonas trade is tlie indiarubber. Indeed, of 
the production of the world, 57, .500 tons, about 
half, or 25,000 tons, comes from the Amazon 
district ; of the other half, the greater portion, 
or 24,000 tons, comes from the East and West 
Africa. 
The crying want will not be capital or com- 
munication—that by water being peculiarly 
abundant — but labour, which is, as yet, too 
scarce. Richard Temple. 
— Journal of the Society of Arts, Aug. 10th. 
MAGALIESBEKG TOBACCO INDUSTRY. 
Mr. P H Hartley Intbkviewed. 
adventures and experiences. 
An iateresting interview appears in the carrent 
number of the Natal Agricultural Journal, iu the 
course of which Mr. F H Hai'tley, of Magaliesberg 
whose bi'and is so well-known to lovera of Boer 
tobacco, offers some remarks anent the early days 
of SoutVi African colonisation, and the present posi- 
tion of the tobacco industry in this country. Inter 
alia, he said : — " Magalie is the name of the chief 
who held the district when the Boers took the coun- 
try. I bought my land there Vaalbauk — in 1869; 
opened a store and soon afterwards started a mill, 
getting my power from the Magalie Biver. Since 
then I have spent at least i:20,000 on improvements 
of one sort and the other. When my first mill be- 
came too small for the work I built another, and a 
short time ago I built the third, the best and most 
modern in the Transvaal at any rate. The machinery 
is driven by a tuibine, and I can turn out really 
tirst-class flour. The Magaliesberg wheat is splendid. 
Everything except mealies is irrigated. The culti- 
vation is limited to t)ie water available on the farms. 
The south side of the range is much better than 
the north which is too hot. There they get weevil 
and moth into the grain much more than we do, 
and the rust is worse. So far as my observation 
goes, rust is bad according to the warmth of the 
nights. The Australian wheat was not up to ours 
in quality. The times for planting are oats iu April, 
•wheat in May, and as soon as oats are off the to- 
bacco goes in. 
Magaliesberg has had its reputation for tobncco 
for a long time. My father in his hunting days 
nsed to send presents of it to bis Cape friends. The 
Voortrukkers soon discovered the suitability of the 
looahty, and they took much intelligent care in 
the preparation. Nearly all the farmers in the dis- 
trict now cultivate it. On many of the farms Boer 
men, women and children work at the cultivation. 
Yes, the Boern, like other races, work if they can't 
help it. In debt ? Yes nearly all. The continual 
subdivision of the land on the death of the parents 
is producing a class of Boer quite different to the 
original type. To convey an impression of the soil 
and climate to a Natal man it might be described 
as somewhat like the Tugela district near Oolenso. 
The light red soil is best. Exhausted? Yes; ma- 
nure is necessary everywhere. For tobacco cattle 
manure only is used — horse and sheep would spoil 
the tobacco. I cultivate about 40 acres, and there 
are very few, if any, who do more. In most in- 
etaiices the quantity is very small. 
I Btarte i cutting and selling in bags 'in 1874 on 
a small scale. There was a iot of prejudice to over- 
come in introiucing cut 'hocr.' After the retro- 
ceSHiou of the country, the Cape clapp( d on a duty 
of 2a per lb, ko that limited no pr i,cl ic illy to the 
Transvital, the then Free S at'! and Ni.tal. For a 
long time only Europeans who had be ni accustomed 
t9 vut toba,uco, woulU buy it, She ifcVt^ State t09fe 
hardly any ; there they had never seen or heard 
of tobacco other than roll. They are an ultra con- 
servative lot. You will remember what a struggle 
there was among farmers before the sulphur matches 
gave away to the safety kinds. In the Natal papers 
I advertised largely, and the brand became so popular 
among the Biitish generally that I had to increase 
my plant and give up advertising. But it was annoy- 
ing to be limited — I could not get the tobacco for 
the demand. I had to keep up the quality and com- 
petition regulated the price." The goldlields brought 
a big rush for cut tobacco- At first I bought fi-om 
the farmers in the roll at 6d per lb, but there was 
such endless trouble about ihe moisture — nearly 
every farmer trying to impoje upon me more water 
than his neighbours -- that I resolved to end the 
oonstvmt \vi-anf<!ing by buying only in the leaf, and 
now I buy at from bd to 9d per lb. It is necessary 
from business motives to buy the bad as well as 
the good. The good is solJ in my bags under my 
name ; the bad is cut up and sold on the Johan- 
nesberg m?^rketin bulk — with no guarantee — for what 
it will fetch. When ripe the plant is cut down and 
bung in shells or under trees. There is not enough 
labour tor a be ter way. By-the-bye, I might men- 
tion thai during the British occupation the 
troops gained a liking tor " boer " and for several 
years I got orders from all parts of the worlc", in- 
cluding Hongkong. 
In dry seasons insects of course, are troublesome 
especially cut-worms. In a good seasoa we look to 
get \ lb. per plant, and an acre should carry about 
5,000 plants — that's 1,2.50 lb. to the acre. And rattoon 
or second CJ ops produce about half as much. For, 
merly wlien the land was richer and more manured 
there was often a third crop. On the northern — 
the hotter side of the range — they still go in for 
third crops. The seconicrop was preferred by many 
Boers for smoking, and the first, the strongest for 
chewing. All genuine Boers are chewera as well aa 
smokers. The habit, however, is growing out of 
fashion especially — among those who come into touch 
with civilisation. It might be worth mentioning that I 
am interested in a tobacco-grcwing experiment in Ga- 
zaland. I believe the country is splendid there for 
tobacco, coffee and other things. Tobacco will grow 
all the year round. There is no fever there : on the 
high land there the frost began this year in the middle 
of iV'ay. 
" As to the proposals in England to settle time- 
expired soldiers in the Orange River Colony and 
the Transvaal, it is a difficult question to answer 
off-hand. The desirability in some respects is ob- 
vious, but to succeed in farming in any part of 
South Africa — putting aside racial and similar 
considerations — requires above all, local experience — 
which fact new-comers will rarely believe — and, 
secondly considerable capital. Farming except on 
the large scale of the old Boers must be mixed and 
to avoid disaster much and varied local knowledge 
is necessary. Again it must be remembered that aa 
a farming country the Transvaal is extremely patchy, 
as patchy as Natal," — Natal Mercurt/. 
* 
RUBBER PLANTING COMPANIES, 
ENTERPRISE IN AMERICA. 
The Mexican Coffee and Rubber Growers' Asso- 
ciation (Philadelphia), incorporated in Delaware 
to acquire the property and conces,<3ions of the 
Grijalva Land and Ooflee Co., Limited. The 
Grijalva properties include 100,000 acres in the 
districts of Mescalapa and Piohucaloo, in the 
state of Chiapas, Mexico ; about 60 miles south- 
west of San Juan Bautista, capital of the state of 
Tabasco : and front for twelve miles on the 
Grijalva river, navi.gable by the company's steam- 
boats to Frontera, on the gulf coast. 
The Palma Real Co., with a paid up capital of 
500,000, have been incorporated under the laws 
of West Virginia, to acquire 88,000 acres in th^ 
