Sept. 1, 1903.] THE TROPICAL 
AGRICULTURIST, 
381 
FIBRES GALORE : 
CEYLON READY TO GROW RHEA OR 
RAMIE; BOW-STRING HEMP ; ALOES, 
PLANTAIN OR CALOTROPIS : 
IF ONLY A PROFITABLE REIURN 
IS GUARANTEED. 
We are rather tired of hearing the praises 
of this or that fibre sung by amateurs, and 
to read the earnest exhortations of stay-at- 
home Englishmen to their brethren in the 
East to go in for the cultivation of Rhea, or 
Sanseviera, or Plantain, if they wish to make 
a fortune. We think the better and pro- 
per way would be for the said writers 
to shew some practical interest by sending 
out capital to invest on their own ac- 
count, or by their investing in the indis- 
pensable fibre-cleaning machine in which 
they have most faith, and coming out to 
show how it will answer the need of the 
Planter. We have a right to speak with 
some authority ; for, when the guest of 
" Old Colonist " at Newport near Dundee, 
so far back as 1879, we went into the 
matter of " Fibre yielding plants" very 
thoroughly, wrote largely in Sir John 
Leng's paper, the '• Dundee Advertiser "; 
interviewed and were interviewed by •' Jute 
Kings" or their Agents, to whom we made 
clear that Ceylon was a paradise for the 
growth of fibre-yielding plants ; but that the 
successful, that is the profitable, application of 
machinery was the difficulty, and that it was 
for manufacturing capitalists to lead the 
way in this direction. We were at the time 
assured by experienced members of the Brad- 
ford and Dundee jute and silk trades, that 
there was an undoubted fortune ready 
for the men who could supply a fibre be- 
tween jute and silk, something in fact to 
mix with the former, and that the fibre of 
the Rhea plant seemed best to answer the 
requirement. But there was the difficulty 
about the cleaning machinery and although 
the "Faure" and several other patents have 
been much talked of, for many years back, 
we have yet to see indubitable proof of a 
practical success. Our Tropical Agriculturist 
for 22 years has been full of information 
respecting different plants yielding good, 
marketable fibres ; and we really hoped 
we were near a solution, when Mr, 
Macdonald some years ago, visited Bombay 
Ceylon and the Straits as Agent for a 
Machine Syndicate. He was much pleased 
with Mr. Man ley Power's 8 acres of 
rhea on his Kurunegala estate, only he 
■wished it were 800 acres, and so he 
passed on to the Straits where it was 
understood he was to remain until his 
machine shewed what it could do on a con- 
siderable scale, as he was said to be interested 
in an extensive plantation of rhea. But 
death suddenly took Mr. Macdonald away ; 
and we have never quite understood what 
became of his machine or the garden of rhea 
Next there turned up in Colombo a visitor 
from NattU, with a Patent for a Machine 
which would make a fortune out of aloe 
libre, as yielding a far higher percentage thau 
?3 
the machine of the Mauritius planters, 
and he so worked on the judgment (or 
feelings) of several hardheaded men of 
business in Colombo that, as the visitor had 
no capital of his own, they agreed to provide 
the wherewithal to have one of the Patent 
Machines built and tried at the Colombo 
Iron Works, and the Editor of the 
Observe'-, on being asked, readily agreed 
to become one of the Syndicate. The 
machine was built, was carefully and fully 
tried (aloe leaves or branches being carried 
down free by railway from Dimbula and 
Dikoya) but finally pronounced not to be, and 
that it never could be, a success commercially 
and so the Syndicate paid up the money 
outlay, though it would take a great deal 
besides to make up the loss of time to 
the chief promoter who kindly took all 
the trouble of arranging for the due 
testing. The patentee went off to India, 
Before this time, in the early "eighties" 
when coffee was at its lowest, a long series 
of practical experiments in Colombo showed 
that the plant which gave the largest per- 
centage of fibre was the " Sanseviera Zey- 
lanica " (one of the bowstring hemps) ; but 
profitable results even here could not then be 
shown. Now, we see that Sir Joseph Hooker 
has lately been drawing the attention of 
Sir Daniel Morris (as he is now) to the 
existence in Cuba of a wonderful fibre 
plant, belonging to these bowstring hemps, 
with leaves three to four feet long and 
six inches broad— supposed to be the 
" Sanseviera grandis." The Cuba fibre some- 
times reaches London and fetches up to £So 
and £10 a ton. In regard to rhea some interest- 
ing information has lately appeared in the 
Indian press (see extracts elsewhere) and it 
would really seem as if a Bengal Syndi- 
cate were at last to thoroughly exploit the 
" Faure " Machine, — the results so far in the 
fibre and cloth sent home being regarded 
as very satisfactory. Incidentally it is 
mentioned that the price of rhea fibre is at 
present about the same as that of American 
cotton. The Bengal Syndicate have 5,000 acres 
under cultivation ; but they are stingy 
about giving outside planters the use of 
Faure's machines, and so Mr. W. W. John- 
son of Malda reports to the "Englishman" 
that he has corresponded with a responsible 
English firm with the following result :-- 
" We can supply you with an etficienC machine 
for decorticating rhea, sisal, lienip, and other agave 
fibres. The machine has jasb been patented in 
India, We Lave satisfied ouri-elves that the machine 
will do its work and will deliver its fibre in a good 
saleable condition. We can take up the fibre at 
full current market rates, and planters may have 
confidence that their produce will be saleable at 
full market rates. We have made it a condition 
of our undertaking the sale of this machine, that 
it shall be supplied at a moderate cost free from 
the control of any syndicate. The machine de- 
corticates the fibre in a good merchantable condi- 
tion suitable for the further process it has to un- 
dergo, and we are told by practical men that the 
product is just what they want. The machine costs 
£25 nett, plus £2 IO3, packing and shipping 
charges, total £27^) and weighs about 100 lb." 
