206 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. [Sept. 1, 1898. 
NILGIKI PLANTERS' ASSOCIATION, 
The bi-weekly meeting of the Nilpiri Planters' 
Association that was held on .July .30, was very 
poorly attended, for besides the Honorary Secre- 
tary and the Chairman (Mr. W. L. Edniistoiie) only 
two members were present, viz., Messrs Groves and 
Cockhurn. 
I.ADV BIRD. 
The Collector, Mr. Allan Butlerworth, attended, 
and Mr. Newport was present to explain matters 
connected with the consignment of lady birds that 
perished in transit. 
The Association resolved to express their sym- 
pathy with Mr. Newport, whom they exonerated 
from all blame, resolving to refei' the fjue-stion of 
farther experiments in the same direction to the 
United Planters' Association, which will consider 
it at its forthcoming meeting at IJangalore. 
AGRICULTUUAI, CHEMIST. 
The Association resolved not to join in the ]ito- 
posed scheme ot the Mysore Uo\ ernment to get a 
man tor the Planters of Mysore, wlio.se services 
should also be available for the whole of Southern 
India. Another circumstance referred to was the 
importation of an Agricultural Cliemi-st by Messrs. 
Stanes and Co., at Coimbatorc. This gentleman, 
however, had ])ieccded his apparatus. Messrs. 
Stanes and Co. proiiiise that as ^oon as the latter 
arrives he will be able to undertake the analysis of 
soils and chemical investigations for the public at 
charges to be notilied later on. The sense of the 
meeting was in favour of an essentially i'/onters' 
Chemist, and it accoriiingly resolved to refer this 
subject also to the consideration and discretion of 
the U. P. A. at Bangalore. 
Satisfaction was reconlcd with the proceed i.igs of 
the Director of Cinchona Plantations in Ootaca- 
mnnd in respect to what Government is doing in 
the purchase of bark and manufacture ot (piinine. 
TlCA. 
The Chairman, at the conclusion of the meeting, 
made allusion to his experience as an exporterof 
tea with the P. & O. Agents at Bombay ; owing, he 
said, to a chest of tea )uit on board tliat was mil- 
dewed and damaged belonging to someone else, the 
agent refused to receive a shipment from himself 
and others. He considered this a most high-handed 
proceeding on the Company's otticers, and stated 
that he would lay the matter before the U.P.A. at 
its next meeting. Meantime he hoped this Associ- 
ation would give him their good-will. 
from tobacco. Subsequent!}, when the Bud- 
get proposals were being considered in Com- 
mittee Sir William Harcourt urged that as 
nearly nine-tenths of the tea consumed in 
England was grown in India and Ceylon, 
and was therefore nearly all British -grown, 
there is good reason for a diminution 
of the duty on this article to lh« extent of 
two-pence — in other words he asked that lialf 
the existing duty should be taken off. It was 
evident from this that the f)uestion of the re- 
duction and the entire abolition of the tea duty 
was well within the range of jiracticil politico, 
and, assuming that the next Budget showed a 
corresponding buoyant state ot the Revenue 
the matter would no doubt come up for con- 
sideration again, and if the duty was taken 
oft' tea it would be another move in the direc- 
tion of the free breakfast table they liad lieard 
so much about. In support of this Mr. Buis 
quoted some interesting figures that were given 
in the Oli.ieri-cr some days ago, as follows : — 
"In the year 18.37 — when Queen Victoria came 
to the throne— the Customs Duty on tea ini» 
ported into the United Kingdom of Great Bri- 
tain and Ireland, was two shillings-and-one-penny 
per pound avoirdupois ; the total consumpiion 
for that year was 30,025,206 lb. (or le^s than 
1:^ lb. per head of the population per annum) and 
the total of revenue collected from the duty wat 
£3,190,12.') and then between 1852 and 18t>5 we 
find the Customs Duty at one-shilling-and-ten- 
pence per pormd in 1854 ; at otie-sliilling-and-tive- 
peiice in 1858 ; at one shilling in lSti3 ; and 
then it was reduced to six pence per itound, to 
take ellect from 1st June 1805. 
The progress in Consumption and Itevenue may 
be indicated as follows : — 

ABOLITION OF THE IMPERIAL 
TEA DUTY. 
At the half-yearly meeting of the Colombo 
Chamber of Commerce, on July 22Dd, 
Mr. Stanley Bols moved his motion that it 
was desirable that action should be taken with a 
view to secure the abolition of Import Duty on Tea 
in the United Kingilom. .Just befi re he began 
his remarks on the subject fully two-thirds of 
tho.se present left the room tliey having been 
chiefly concerned in the foregoing business, and 
Mr. Bois began by saying that in rising to support 
his motion he did not think he need detain the 
other members long. It would be fresh in the 
memory of them all that in the Budget presented 
on the 21st April last by Sir Michael Hicks-Beach 
he disclosed a satisfactory statement of Imperial 
Revenue, showing a surplus of three an J a half 
niillions of which £75,000 was due to the in- 
creased returns from tea and he also showed an 
increase to the revenue which had been derived 
Year. 
1837 
1879 
1887 
S.2 
'o 5 
ii 
2 = 
<a 
O. 
S 
.5 3 
O 01 
— a! 
u 
1-1 a 
V a. 
Duty 
lb. 
lb. 
8. 
d. 
30,62.'>,20C 
li 
2 
1 
111,061,160 
3i 
0 
G 
160,432,000 
44 
0 
6 
183,035,880 
5 
0 
C 
£ 
3,190.125 
2,776.529 
4,010,800 
4.590,897 
The next reduction was on 1st May 1 890 
when the Tea Duty was reduced from six-pence 
to four-pence per lb., and the result is thuB 
shown for last year : — 
Tear. 
O tD 
O P3 
lb. lb. 3. d. £ 
1897 . . 231,399,778 5| to 6 0 4 3,856,662 
It was evident, he argued, that these 
periodical reductions of the tea duty had in 
all instances had the effect of stimulating eon- 
sumption and, therefore, he thought they could 
not do better than press it on tlie.se grounds 
alone for the abolition, or at all events tne re- 
duction meanwhile ot the duty on tea as affect- 
ing their staple. But it had been urged in 
some quarteis that this leduction in the 
price of tea to the consumer might stimulate 
tlie consumption of low grade China tea. 
which would displace a corresponding quantity of 
Ceylon and Indian tea. That was, of course, a matter 
of opinion, and he would like to hear what anyone 
