Jan. 1, 1901.J THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
459 
separates the film from the pulp. The hemp is then 
dried in the sun, and sold to the owner of the Late. 
On average days woi k for a gang of three persons 
is about 25 lbs. of cleaned hemp. The cleaning of 
the fibre from the pulp is very severe labor, and a 
man can only work at it for 3 days in ihe week, 
the eai-nings" are very small and the. life of a 
hemp cleaner is a short one, as a rule. These un- 
educated natives go into the nearest hemp Late, clean 
up the hemp and deliver half to the owner as his 
share, then sell to him the other half as their share. 
The owner of a hemp Estate has no sinecure, if 
he starts a new plantation and sets out his " ponoa " 
he will have the monkeys and wild hogs to contend 
with : the former pulling them up to see if they are 
all growing and the latter rooting them up for food, 
what is left over requires from two to three yf ars to 
mature, and durini; this period the " Late" must be 
kept clean from the rank growth of a tropical jungle 
in order that tho young trees may receive their 
proper nourivhment," then comes the tussle with the 
men, and if there is anything a native detests it is 
clearing a hemp estate from weeds. Up to the present 
time no appliance has been invented to cleanse the 
fibre from the pulp, and it remains to be seen if some 
cute Yankee " can get up such a labor saving 
machine. Fully 60 @ 75 % of the hemp finds its way 
eventually to the States where it is in great demand 
for "binder twine " for the wheat fields as well as for 
the boring of artesian and oil weils, to say nothing 
of the demand for cordage. The principal competition 
it encountf-rs as a " binder twine " factor is the " sisal " 
grown in Yu' atan, but a wheat farmer will readily 
pay double the price for Manila twine in preference 
to sisal, although the implement company may assure 
him that the latter is " just as good," but a smart 
wheat raiser knows better." When the railroad 
through Siberia is completed, and the rich " steppes " 
along the line are converted into wheat fields, a new 
market may result for Manila hemp. — Manila Times. 
DATE >PALM PLANTATIONS. 
In his annual report the Conservator of Forests, 
writes as follows in reference to the date palm plan- 
taions in the interior ; — I am glad to report that the 
date palms in the far north continue to develop in a 
most satisfactory manner. Progress has been especially 
marked in the seedling plantation at Lake Humy, aa 
well as aniong the A-lgerian pa'ms planted there. The 
seedlings are now fiom 3 ft. to 5 ft, high, and their 
general growth has been so uniform that a person work- 
ing amoi g them can only partly be seen. Many plants 
ot either sex have also flowered. The Algerian palms 
have made great progress ; some are quite 10 ft. high. 
They have developed numerous suckers, and is anti- 
cipa.ted that some of these will soon be strong enough 
to transplant, and thus increase the existing number. 
Sufficient fruit was borne by one or two this year to 
show that a fine sample of superior quality may be 
ultimately expected when they get into full bearing. 
Unfi rtunately the only one remaining of the two 
received from Algeria, which were marked as being 
m«le palms, has irow turned out to be a female, and 
it produced a few dates this season. This is to be re- 
gretted, has had there been a male of exactly the 
same kind of date, the use of its blossoms as a 
meams of fertilising the others would have rendered 
it highly probable that the fruit subsequenely yielded 
by seedlings raised from the dates these palms pro- 
duced would have shown little if any departure 
from the original excellent type of date. Fortunate- 
ly, however, a parcel of fruit was obtained from Tunis 
last year through the courtesy of Professor Perkins, 
the dates from which are very similar in ch.aracter 
to the " Deglet N^ur " date from Algeria, and as seed- 
linjis are being raised from this seed the loss sus- 
tained will be somewlrht modified. 
The palms at Hergott continue to thrive and dates 
have again been ripened there, this being the eighth 
season that this fruit hag been produced in the north. 
The occurrence of light rains, however, during the 
ripening period rather affected the quality of the 
dates this year, as the unbroken continuance of a 
dry arid heat is indispensable to the thorough perfec- 
tion of the dates : but as this is a very exceptional 
experience at that time of the year it may be a long 
time ere it occurs again. A further efi'ort has been 
made during the year to increase the number of seed- 
lings in the experimental plot at Oodnadatta. On 
November 27, 1899, 236 seeds, which were obtained 
from Tunis, as already indicated, were sown there by 
the foreman [Mr. N. W. Wilson.] and most of them 
germinated, but only 24 were found to be living when 
he again visited the block on April 30, 1900. Thia 
number, however, with those that were alive the 
preceding year total 36, and with a little more atten- 
tion it is expected that the area will be stocked quite 
fall enough. 
As the train goes up from Hergott and back only 
once a fortnight it will readily be understood 
that the intermittent nature of the rail service renders 
operations here very difficult, and ueceasitatea leav- 
ing the plants to take their chance, as under present 
circumstances a resident officer cannot be maintained 
v.'ithout incurring too heavy an expenditure. But while 
this retards the ultimate completion of the plantation 
it affords valuable evidence as to what may be ex- 
pected when the seed are simply sown and left to 
themselves, which it was the object of the experiment 
to sow. 
The number of palms at Hergott and Lake Harry 
on June .30, 1899, was 3,013. Tire total increase from 
seed at Heigott for the year er-^ding June 30, 1900 was 
9 ; and at Oodnadatta 36. The total alive at Hergott 
on June 30 last was 277; at Lake Harry, 2,475 ; and 
at Oodnadatta, 36. — Adelaide Advertiser. 
BANDA 1*.UTMEGS. 
An Indian specialist, describing Nutmeg gardens 
in Banda, says : "The agreeable scent which is wafted 
from the wood invites us irresistibly. The hi^h can- 
ary, warringin, and teak trees act as a protection 
against heavy showers and ga,les for th,^ conical Nut. 
meg trees whose foliage is formed by pointed leaves 
hanging down from the branches, shooting out regularly 
Between the shiny foliage sparkles the ripe open fruit 
of which the dark brown nut is the kernel, while the 
bright red mace envelops the nut as an elegant net- 
work. Occasionally we meet in the wood with bamboo 
bu&hes and other vegetation. Sweetly blows the cool 
air, invigorating and bracing is the scent of the Nut- 
meg, while the wood echoes with the merry voices of 
men and women gathering Nutmegs, and children 
picking canary nuts, mingled with the various sounds 
of the cooing nut-pigeons (manoek faloer,) parrots, the 
Indian nightingale (baikohe), the canary-yellow 
karajamoe." 
A peculiarity of the nut-pigeons inhabiting the 
Archipelago is that they swallow the fruit bodily and 
discharge the nut whole and undigested. This curio- 
sity, which no doubt leads to the distribution of the 
plant, was formerly connected even with its sex as 
shown in Vogel's remarkable passage ; " If the bird 
that drops the nut is a male, the tree growing from 
it will b« male too ; if the bird is a female, the tree 
will be a female as well, whilst if the bird happens 
to be still a virgin, the tree that grows from the 
swallowed nut will be one of the best in the woods." 
Whilst nature produces 100 male against 100 to 200 
female trees, it is a fact that only the female yield 
fruit. On the whole the latter bear fruit when ten 
years old, but their produce at that age is still small. 
Ih the year immediately following, the produce in- 
creases rapidly, graiiually again more slowly, until 
the highest point of production is reached between 
the twentieth and twenty-fifth year continuing undirni- 
nished during twenty-five years. Only then, about it? 
