hi THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [May ], 1903. 
To the Editor. 
THE PINEHURST "TEA" EXPERIMENT. 
March 10. 
Dear Sib,— At it again !— but this time 
from the facile pen of Mr. P O Larkin of 
Toronto! You should naturally expect a 
douceur for the advertisements given Pine- 
hurst. Alas!— I am almost bankrupt, having 
to pay .5 cts. for each clipping concerning 
Pinehurst, and so many are they that it 
keeps a paster at work transferring them to 
huge invoice-books. And then our generous 
Government, which would give me every- 
thing (except a salary), has been called on 
by me for this fiscal year to loan me some 
tea machinery and to give me some foreign 
tea seed. Aside from that, I have not received 
a,ny assistance, and it is very questionable 
whether I shall ask for anything next year. 
"A huge joke," indeed. (Different countries 
do not agree on what is witty.) But Mr. 
Larkin's information on how " to do it ' with 
the American Press may some day prove 
useful, and— with the rest of the valuable 
notices emanating from your office— have been 
duly posted under your impressive motto, 
Fiat Justitia. I have had, a few days since, 
a most agreeable visit from Mr. Robert 
Hart of India, and shall be most happy to 
see you here whenever you will honor me 
with a visit. Only do, please, not forget to 
have sent me all the kind notices Avhich 
your columns contain concerning " Pine- 
hurst." Never mind my feelings ; I am old 
and tough and the laws against duelling in 
South Carolina are vigorously enforced. — 
Yours very truly, 
CHARLES U. SHEPARD. 
COCONUT CULTIVATION IN FIJI AND 
CEYLON. 
Rajakadaluwa, March 23. 
Dear Sir, — To those of us who have been con- 
nected with the Coconut Industry for the last 
three or four decades and who have never been 
able to realise, even with the most modern and 
approved modes of culture, a higher annual average 
per tree than 50 to 60 nuts, Mr Tarte's letter 
from Fiji, dated 5uh February, comes as a startling 
revelation illustrative of the wonderfully prolific 
nature of coconut trees in the isles of the South Seas, 
We cannot do otherwise than give full credence to 
his statements, but it is strange that we have never 
heard of this sort of thing before. Coconuts have 
been cultivated in Fiji these many years, but such 
stupendous results have never reached our ears 
till nosv, He tells us "I can assure you it is a posi- 
tive fact I have often seen from 1,000 to 1,200 
nuts on a tree ; but this caps all." I should think 
ao indeed. Wliere can we produce the like of it 
or half as good? If wo had known before that 
Fiji was such a wonderful coconut country I 
warrant there wouU have been a stampede and 
a large exodus of capitalists from Ceylon would 
have testified to the attractions of the new El 
Dorado. Our coolies and artificers and mechanics 
would have fled thither pell-mell for higher wages. 
Euge Jiiaiujiwamy ?— Pcejuppuku odiuan. Ko 
Haramanis ? Peejja ratata pennalla giya. 
Oude Signior Jokong ? Ja fugi per Fiji. 
The tree referred to by Mr Tarte certainly beats 
the record hollow; but, I think, he is rather too 
sanguine about the prospective quantity of oil to 
be had of it. 
He draws attention to the unprecedented plethora 
of tender nuts in three peduncles, but the mere 
appearance of these thousands, fresh from the 
emoryonic stage, does not guarantee their un- 
interrupted progress to full maturity. I have seen 
as many as 30 tender fruit on a single peduncle, 
but, alas ! their number has eventually dwindled 
down to 8 or 10. Some dry and drop off, affected 
by changes in the weather or some secret in- 
aptitude for further development, others are 
nibbled by rats and squirrels and otherwise prove 
that "brief life is here our portion," so that no 
one could accurately predicate what his crop is 
going to be by making'the newly opened spathes 
his data for calculation, any more than he could 
count his chickens before they are hatched. Mis- 
carriages occur in every department of life, animal 
or vegetable, and in their best regulated families 
and classes— notably in the flower of the coconut 
tree. As Mrs Malaprop says "Man proposes and 
God disposes." 
On the banks of the Maha oya I have counted 
over 250 n its on a tree at a time, but this number 
was far short of what the spathes revealed on 
newly opening. Exceptionally favoured trees — 
that is to say, those benefited by the alluvial 
deposits of a river given to inundating its banks, or 
those growing on excellent loamy soil and well 
tended, or those highly manured and carefully 
looked after near dwelling houses, coolie lines, 
cattle sheds and horse stables — have borne 
wonderful bunches; but they are few and far 
between, and cannot come near the Phenomenal 
Phenomenon of Fiji. In the Keriang Kalliye 
District, north of Badulu oya, the finest specimens 
of coconut trees in this Island are to be seen 
flourishing, spite of hundreds of envious and evil 
eyes cast on theju daily by footpads and passengers 
in coaches, They are second to none but the 
Maha oya coconuts ; yet all these must hide their 
diminished heads before the awful tree which is 
the lawful property of Mr Tarte. With rare ex- 
ceptions the ordinary number of spathes produced 
by a cocount tree is twelve in a year. I know 
of some trees in Ambepusse which gave fourteen. 
The nuts on those trees were from 250 to 300; 
but every rule has its exception and those were 
exceptional trees. 
I have invariably noticed, and go have a good 
many people, that when there is a multiplicity 
of " Etties" or tender nuts (as they appear on the 
opening of the spathe) on a peduncle, the fruit is 
generally small. On the other hand those hang- 
ing in twos and threes are nearly always big 
coconuts. The Goondara or Maldivian coconuts 
appear in thicker clusters than the ordisiary kinds; 
but they are exceedingly small— in fact too small 
to be scraped for culinary purposes with a " hirra- 
maney." The Bhodi Poll is ptill smaller and more 
numerous in a bunch than the GoondarLi. I wonder 
how large the Fiji nuts in general and Mr. Tarte's 
nuts in particular, are. It would be interesting 
to have a specimen of a well-matured nut from 
Mr, Tarte's tree of trees— a photograph could not 
give us an idea of the size. It would also be interest- 
ing to have another letter from him, when the 
fulness of time ahall have come, telling us how 
