July 1, 1898.] THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
TEA MACHINERY FOR CHINA. 
MR. DAVIDSON OF THE SIROCCO WORKS 
INTERVIEWED. 
Mr. S. C. Davidson lias been interviewed on 
the subject of tea macliinery for China, the fol- 
lowinor dialogue occurred : — 
" You have recently, I believe, received an 
order for large consignments of your machinery 
for China ? " 
" Yes ; for firms in Shanghai and Foochow and 
another in the neighbourhood of Hankow. I 
expect others shortly." 
" Then you have not been in the habit of 
sending your machinery there, as you do to 
India ? " 
" Oh, no ! You see the Chinese are con- 
.servative that up to the present it has been 
utterly impossible to get tliem to consider the 
advantages of the new methods of tea preparation. 
Hitherto my machinery has gone mainly to the 
Indian, Ceylon and Java tea e.states, where it has 
saved enormously in labour and produced a better 
article. Natal also is a tea-growing colony now, 
and uses my machinery, as well as Fiji, and several 
places in the West Indies." 
" And yet the Chinese retained " 
" Yes, the Chinese still retained their old 
and antiquated hand labour, with the result 
that they have been left far behind." 
" Their trade has fallen off in proportion as 
that of India has increased ? " 
" Exactly. From an export to the United 
Kingdom of, roughly speaking, 120,000,00 lb. 
in the zenith of their prosperity to 20,000,000 lb., 
which is about their annual exported quan- 
tity now." 
" Then they have bepun to see the error of 
their ways, as manifested by the orders you have 
received from China ? " 
" Well, it is the influence of British and Rus- 
sian enterprise. But for it, I suppose they 
would continue their old, painfully slow, and in 
many respects objectionable methods of manu- 
facture." 
" It does seem surprising that it should be left to 
outsiders, so to speak, to teach the Chinaman what 
he ought to do with his own tea ?'' 
"It is nevertheless a fact. Then again, these or- 
ders are not from English or Russian firms in their 
individual capacity, out from syndicates in which 
Chinamen are associated with the foreigners." 
" I should have thought the foreigner would 
rather do without a native as a partner ? " 
" So they would. But you see no foreigner 
can own a square yard of soil in China out- 
side the Treaty ports. There must be a native 
along with him, and to him it must (at least 
nominally) belong." 
Under such difficulties as you have narrated, 
the English and Russian traders deserve great 
credit for their enterprise." 
" Assuredly," said Mr. Davidson, '* and in 
my opinion there are vast possibilities before us 
in China in the near future." — Ulster Echo. 
PLANTING NOTES. 
Paddy and Weevils.— We are reminded bhat 
the subject of preserving grain against weevils 
has been fully discussed in the " Agricultural 
Magazine," in which a number of articles have 
appeared at intervals. But no better or simpler 
remedy than naptlialine has yet been suggested 
we believe. 
Bananas. — Eleven thousand bunches of Queens- 
land bananas were recently condemned in Sydney 
Owing to the presence of the fruit Hy. 
" Raw Rice."— Tiie Colombo merciiant, who 
writes elsewhere on this subject today, is very 
likely right in his surmise that in the majority of 
cases our estate coolies would make little if any 
objection to the Burma rice. We can recall a 
time when any rice save that from Southern 
India, was regarded with suspicion. 
Quinine and Local Manufacturb'.— Some 
interesting information respecting quinine and 
especially the influence whieii tlie Java manu- 
factories is having on the market, will be found 
on page 19. The Java planters have now no 
fewer than three local factories of iheir own, 
and the result is tiiey save all the iniJdle proiits 
and are therefore able to go on niakinEf the cul- 
tivation pay. Had the Ceylon— and especially 
the Uva — planters only got a local Quinine 
Factory some years ago, as we strongly advocated, 
the cultivation of Cinchona might have been pro- 
fitably continued in certain districts up to the 
present day. 
Rhea Fidre. — That cultivators are not for 
the present to have a rival in Rhea fibre pro- 
duction in Natal may be inferred from the 
following extract from the Report of the Curator 
of the Natal Botanic Cardens : — 
I may say that I have little hope of this plant 
Rhea or Ramie being a success commercially in 
the colony, as in some other couutriea three or 
even four crops may be reaped in the season ; in 
Natal I think that two are as many as we conld 
fairly expect to get, which would place us at a con- 
siderable disadvantage in competing with more favour- 
ably situated places, where heavier crops conld be 
got, and where labour is more plentiful and cheaper, 
" The Aghicultueal Gazette " of New South 
Wales, for April, 1898, has the following contents : 
— Some Food Plants of the Aborigines. J. H. Biaiden ; 
Botanical Notes ; The Weed of New South Wales' 
No. J. H. Maiden ; Sheep's Burnet. J. H. Maiden ; 
Notes on the Constitution of Wheat Gluttea i\ 
B. Guthrie ; Potato Culture— Result of Experiments 
at Ontario Agricultural t'oUege, Canada ; Vegetable 
Galls. W. W. Froggatt ; Ramie. Rhea or China- 
grass. H. V. Jackson ; Appliances Necessary in Fruit- 
packing Houses, Orange Grading, Raisin Dipping. 
W. T. Allen ; The Propagation of Plants. J. L. Leo- 
pold ; Bees, How to Manage Them, IV. Albert Gale; 
Report on Parasites of Stock. N. A. Cobb ; Bee 
Calendar. Albert Gale ; Orchard Notes for May. 
W. J. Allen; Practical Vegetable and Flower Grow- 
ing for May. W. S. Campbell ; General Notes ; 
Replies to Correspondents ; Manure List for 1898, 
F. B. Guthrie and E. H. Gurney ; List of Agricul- 
tural Societies' Shows ; Label for Specimens. 
Tea Planters in general, and those whose 
lot is cast in rainless districts in particular, 
might, says a Calcutta contemporary, do worse 
than the planters in the Doloi River Valley. 
Recently a visitor to the South Sylheb Tea district 
noted a rather ingenious method of irrigating tea 
bushes on one tea estate. All the small streams 
had been dammed ,up, and the water made to 
flow back among the bushes by the drains, 
natural and artificial. The different appearance 
of these bushes on the Hats compared with those 
on the tillahs was very marked. This garden, he 
opines, will score heavily in its outturn by this 
simple and inexpensive irrigation scheme. It was 
the oft-told tale of necessity being the mother 
of invention. Compared with last year the rain- 
fall in the Doloi Valley is two inches as against 
nine inches. Possibly this wrinkle may be worth 
something to tea planter similarly circuuistauced. 
