Dec. 1, 1898.] 
THE TROPICAL AGEICULTURIST. 
425 
CEYLON BPJCK AND TILE COMPANY. 
(Investors' Guardian Oct. 22.) 
Ceylon Bkick and Tile Co., Ld. 59,113.— Regis- 
tered October l'2th, with capital i'20,000, in fl snares 
to adopt an agreement with Walker, Sons & Co., 
and to carry on in Ceylon and < Isewhere the busi- 
ness of brick, tile, and pipe manufactures, builders, 
contractors, masons, engineers, fee. The subscribers 
are : — 
Shares. 
E. Walker, 36, Basinghall Street, E.G., merchant 1 
W. J. Walker, 30, Baainghall Street, E.G., merchant 1 
R. A. Ziederburg. 3(5, B .siuhall Street, E.C., merchant 1 
J. Walker, SB, Basinghall Street, E.G., merchant 1 
D. S. Pace, 36, Basiughall Street, E.G., merchant 1. 
A. Armstrong, 3l>, 13asiu,hall Street, K.C., clerk 1 
A. H. Martin, 3(5, Basiughall Street, E.G., clerk 1 
Table A mainly applies. Registersd by Sandom & 
Co., ,52, Grace-church Street, E.G. 
One half the authorised capital of £20,000 is, 
say.s the local " Times," to be is.sueil at pre- 
.sent ; and of the 10,000 £1 siiares, 7.s 6d per 
share is all that is wanted ju.st now. Tlie shares 
are being ofl'ered (irst to the shareholders and 
employees of Messrs. Walker, Sons & Co., and it 
is not known yet wliether any will be avail- 
able to the general public. Suitable clay land 
has already been jirocured between seven and 
eight miles from Colombo, on the Avissawella 
road, not far from the Kelani river ; and the 
building of tiie kilns is just about to commence. 
There is already a pug mill and small machine 
on the spot. The heavy machinery is coming out 
later from home; and the whole plant and build- 
ing will cost about £4,000 sterling. The capa- 
city of the manufactory is to be 3,000,000 hard 
pressed bricks and 1,000,000 Calicut tiles per an- 
num ; and as there is both Government and pri- 
vate demand lor good materials, and bringing 
them from India adds 50 per cent to the cost, 
the concern, under the excellent management 
which it is to have, should prove a hishly pros- 
perous one. The Manager is to be Mr. H. Wild- 
ing, who has already been in tie island some 
time, engaged in preliminaries. Samples of the 
clay have been sent home and been most favour- 
ably reported on, and there is nothing to prevent 
the Company going straight ahead with its work. 
Careful calculations show that a profit of 10 per 
cent can be made on the called up capital, al- 
lowing a substantial marc'in for contingencies. 
The hrst Directors are Messrs. W. J. Walker, 
Edmund Walker (who is also Secretary pro tern), 
Walter Lamont, David S. Pace, and E. Barkley 
110 e, (Messrs. Walker, Sons & Co.'s local engi- 
neer). The London offices are the same as those 
of the promoting Company — 36, Basiughall Street, 
E. C. 
« 
PRODUCE AND PLANTING. 
Tex Problems. — While all those who are interested 
in the tea industry are endeavouring to discover the 
cause of the present depression the problem has 
been settled for them. Planters, as a rule, we know 
are of opinion that dear silver has a great deal to 
do with their troubles, and this opinion finds sup- 
port in London where members of the tea community 
meet. It is admitted readily enough that cheap silver 
stimulated production, and that too much tea was 
111 consequence rushed upon the market, but few tea 
propriotora would attribute the present state of 
things entirely to over-production. The Calcutta 
Eiujliahman does not hesitate to do so, however. lu 
one of its articles on the subject, after giving 
an array of figures in support of its contention, it 
52 
says : — " A careful examina.tion of these figures showa 
to any student of the Currency Question that the 
fall in the price of tea has unquestionably through- 
out been entirely due to excessive production," and 
that this cause has had the same eifect since the 
mints were closed as before, and that the reduced 
China, export has played no part in the fall. There 
is 1)0 eomprimiise here. Over-production and this 
alone has c-iused all the trouble, and dear silver is 
merely an incident of the position. The view taken 
by the Eiujlishnan is built upon facts and tiguies, 
but theories based even upon this apparently solia 
foundation have sometimes gone wrong. No one, so 
far as we are aware, wishes to minimise the evil of 
over-production, but it is possible to make a fetish 
of figuv-es. As a writer in Capital points out : "The 
planters must know where the exchange shoe pinches 
them, and as tep„ i= practicallj' all export, and foreign 
markets other than the existing ones are still to be 
captured, surely it is easy enough to understand that 
planters should chafe a little under this talk of 
'over-production,' when they know that an artificially 
raised standard allov<'s them little chance of meetirg 
outside competitors on anything like equal terms." 
AmjLTEK.iTED Tea. — Before the days of Indian and 
Ceylon teas the lower grades of Chinese tea were 
sometimes manipulated in a manner that did credit to 
the ingenuity of the Celestial, but did not promote a 
feeling of confidence in him. The dodges resorted to 
were so numerous that .a book might have been pub- 
lished on the subject. The Custom authorities, slack 
at first about the matter, began to wake up just about 
the time wheuChiua was losing her hold of the London 
market. When pure British-grown teas began to take 
the place of Chinese tea there was lesi occasion for 
watchfulness on the part of the Customs, for the 
Chineae, finding their tea trade departing, neglected 
the art of adulteration for a while, but do not seem to 
have entirely abandoned it. The latest Customs re- 
port points to the fact that more bogus tea finds its 
waj' here than there was a year or two ago. There is 
nothing very alarming in the report. Of 701 samples 
tested, 629 samples were considered satisfactory. The 
remaining 72 samples represented teas of a doubtful 
character, the results of analysis of which were re- 
ported to the Board for their decision, with thef illow- 
iug results : — 71 samples, representing 1,085 packages, 
were refu.sed admission to home consumption and re- 
stricted to exportation as being exhausted within th* 
meaning of the Act, or as being mixed with other 
substances. One sample, representing 64 packages, 
was found to be unfit for human food and destroyed. 
Of the 403 samples of tea examined by public 
analysts in 1897 only one was found to be adulterated. 
As to this sample, which contained small stones and 
sand, the analyst for Derbyshire reports that at one 
time this method of increasing the weight of tea was 
not uucommon, but that since the Custom House 
authorities have undertalcen the examination of tea 
when imported it is extremely rare to meet with an 
adulterated sample. We should be sorry, iti the 
absence of clear evidence on the point, to attribute' 
these artistic efforts entirely to the Chinese. But 
this rubbish certainly does not come from India or 
Ceylon, and as there are previous convictions against 
the Chinese, on this account it is but reasonable to 
assume that the Celestial grower or dealer is the 
offender. We notice that these teas which are not 
considered fit for consumption here may be "exported." 
While this generously permits the foreigner to indulge 
in the luxury of "exhausted" tea leaves we trust 
that the nationality of the culprit who seuds this 
stuff to market is made clear. 
Jav.\ Goffek Plantino Interest. — From a circular 
issued by the Netherlands India Agricultural Company 
to the Cj- per cent, bond-holders it would appear that 
the Dutch India coffee growing industry is not so 
prosperous as might be desired. The directors say 
that the April interest could not be paid to the bond- 
holders referred to owing to the necessity of keeping 
the available cash to maintain the good coodiiiou 
of the undertakings and to pay interest and redemp- 
tion of the mortgage debt. If tho cultivation is uot 
