July 1, 1898.] 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
15 
LOW-PP^ICED TEA. 
The people of the Uui'.ed Kingdom are among the 
greatest tea-driakers ou the continent ot i^uroye, 
consuming live pounds per capita, agp.rast one and one- 
half ponods per capita cousumeci m the United 
Sta,te= The tea trade, therefore, means more to the 
grocers of the United Kingdom than those here, 
and yet intere=;t in the article is iiu'.te as great in 
this conntrv as abroad. Cheap tea and compeution 
have diminished the profit on the article, and not 
tended to increase the consumptiOD. bomo very 
pertinent comments on the tea tr.i,de are ^ made by 
the Grocers' Gazette, of London, Bug, as ic.lows :— 
"The extraordinarily low range that tea goneraliy 
has now got down to make) those who look ahead 
wonder what is going to he the end of it all. it is 
wise educate the public to lower and lower-priced 
tea Who reaps the benefit? We venture to say 
nobody. It cannot be argued that beoaiise a. tea 
costs 'the household Is per pound, instead ot Is dd 
per pound, more cups will be drank, or more spoon- 
fuls put in the pot. No; all we are domg at present 
is (to use vulgarism) 'queering everybody s pUcn. 
Tea is now what may almost be called a disreputaoly 
low ranee of price," and the morale or tone of the 
trade is certainly not improving. Cutting is tlis mm 
every decent bus'iness ; it always has been ana always 
will be. That forcing low-priced tea ou the public 
will not appreciably irorease consumption can be 
seen in the falling off-or, if not exactly falhng-otl, 
at any rale the standstill-in deliveries for mouths 
past; from which it would almost oppear that tea 
drinking has, for the time being, at any rate reached 
its limit. We cannot bat think that some of the 
tricks and ruses .adopted to sell tea are a discredit 
to a time-honored business, and are undoubtedly 
tending to lower the prestige of the trade. A good 
tea, at a fair price is all that any reasonable person 
wants. Cutting prices cannot tend to a healthy 
state of things. They spoil the trade, benefit nobody, 
and are decidedly detrhiiental to sound business.— 
American Grocer, April 20. 
May we ask you what price per ton for the Eibbons 
vour committee consider would be adequate to pay for 
Its cultivation in Ceylon, as for the first few years, 
and with the desire to assist in the promotion of 
the cultiv.-itiou, we would not objact to pay a slightly 
higher price than the above-mentioned ^10 per ton, 
although we are advised by Planters and others com- 
petent of forming a reliable opinion that the planta- 
tions once established, and assuming only four 
cuttings a year, the price v.e have offered, viz., i'lO 
a ton would leave a considerable margin of profit to 
the cultivator. 
We send you under separate cover a copy of " The 
Rochdale Observer"* of April 2iid, 1898, in which you 
will find an account of the New Plant for Degumming, 
which has just been erected at our Spinning Mill at 
Castletou, near Rochdale, and it may interest^ you to 
know that Captain Wiitley was present at the trial 
and has promised us to write out to Ceylon, giving 
his impressions as to the future of the Khea Industry 
with oar Gome'as Process, which we believe are of au 
extremely satisfactory character. — Yours faithfully, 
Sgd. ERNEST A. COLLIN, 
Secretary and Manager. 
PLANTERS' ASSOCL\TION OF CEYLON. 
We have received the following for publi- 
cation : — 
NEW PKODUCTS: KHEA FIBRE- ^ 
Kandy, May 26. 
Sir —I enclose for publication copy of a letter 
received from the Rhea Fibre Treatment Company, 
Limited, London, with refeience to that por ion 
of the Annual iieport under the above lieadui- 
and asking what price per ton or the lubbons 
would be considered adequate to pay_ for the 
cuiavationof Khea in Ceylon.-I j;^^-- 
Secretary to the Planters' Association of 
Ceylon. 
Piccadilly Mansions, I'^^l-^-'^-^ A^-fig. 
The Secretary, of the Planters' Association of 
^De°r S,-Oiu- attention has been arawn to the 
Si^plement'to the "Times of Ceylon" of Feb_ lb h 
1898 which contains a reprint of the Forty-foiuth 
innuaT report of the Planters' Association of Ceylon, 
for the vear ending the IV lb February lb9>. 
lu this report, under the heading of " ^^w Products 
Forest Reserves, Rhea Fibre," occurs the following 
^''•'Youi-'committee having i-e=eived an ofe'er from a_ 
London Company for the treatment of Rhea Fibre of 
£10 a ton fo^'^the Ribbons, felt bound to state m reply 
that the price offered was inadequate to pay for its 
cuUivaUon in Ceylon and that the difierence between 
the price offered for the Ribbons and the value of the 
prepared article appeared to be out of proportion. 
THE GUATEMALA COFFEE DISEASE. 
[It is curious that our coffee planting friends 
in Guatemala and Hawaii should not unJer- 
stand that the disease in the coffee of tlie former 
is nothing more or less tliaii the dread fungus 
hcmilcia vastatrix which wrought liavoc all through 
our Ceylon coffee. We see a different name 
given to it in Washington ; but from the de.^cri|). 
tion we should take it to be our old enemy. — 
Ed. I. a.} 
Frequent reference has been made in onr exchanges 
to a new and very dangerous disease which has at- 
tacked the coffee plantations of Guatemala and other 
parts of Central America and the West Indies. In 
last year's volume of the Planters' Monthly (page 
230, May, 1897), will be found a letter referring to 
this disease from Mr. W. J. Forsyth, f who visited 
these islands some ten years ago, and wrote a full 
report for the government regarding coffee planting 
in Hawaii. His last year's letter did not furnish a 
full description of the Guatemala disease, but it 
contained the opinion of the government eutomolo- 
gist at Washington that it was wh it is called Stilbum 
Fiavidum, a disease that is well known in Costa 
Rica, Jaraaca and Venezuela, for which he could 
suggest no remedy. Owing to this disease, Mr. For- 
syte was compelled to abandon his plantation in 
Guatemala, and went to Mexico, where no disease to 
the coffee has yet appeared. His letter referred to 
above should be read by those engaged in coffee 
culture. 
In the Advertiser of a recent date, Mr. Marsden, 
Commissioner of Agriculture and Forestry, publishes 
a communication, ia wbich a more detailed account 
of this dangerous disease is given, from information 
received from Washington. We insert the whole of 
his article, and would caution cofiee planters to ba 
on their guard and note its first appearance, should 
it by any mea s reach these islands. If introduced 
by the seeds, the seat of the disease will probably 
be found lo:;ated ia the roots, and every plant found 
diseased with it should be dug up by the roots and 
burned, root and branch, as a surest remedy, till 
something better is found. 
I would respectfully call the attention of coffee 
planters to a fungus disease that is seriously affecting 
the collee plantations in Guatemala. The following 
account of this disease has been sent to this bureau 
from Washington: '-It is a vegetable fungus which 
* Not received. 
t Published in the Ceylon Observer and Tropical 
Ayricultiirist. 
