Oct. 1, 1901.] THE TROPICAL AGRICULTUPJST. 
273 
ber, we can only conclude that the Board is not 
over-anxious to reveal the result of working in 
1899 1900, because it compares badly with pre- 
vious terms. Of the Anglo-American Direct Tea 
Trading Company we have no details, but the 
dividend records of the otlier three concerns since 
they were formed are as follows : — 
1898-9. 1897-8. 1896-7. 1895-6. 
per 
per 
per 
per 
cent. 
cent. 
cent. 
cent. 
7 
10 
10 
10 
10 
12* 
10 
10 
5 
13 
38 
Consolidated 
Amalgamated 
Eanau Eevan 
This is not such a bad showing, and no wonder 
Sir John Muir is anxious to delay spoiling the 
picture, it it is unpleasant news he is keeping back. 
The passing of the June Preference dividend of 
the Consolidated Tea and Lands does not make us 
very hopeful. 
As to Mr. Buchanan's presence in India, it may 
be well to point out that he can exercise very 
little influence on the current season's operations. 
Planting was all over before he left these shores, 
and the most he can have done is to supervise 
the plucking, which one would have thought the 
local managers should have been regarded as quite 
competent to look after. Mr. Buchanan is, how- 
ever, in ample time to initiate drastic reforms 
for the coming year— that is to say, for the period 
the account of which the shareholders may expect 
in the summer of 1903! If the circular had said 
this plainly, it might not have been supposed 
that an attempt was being made to use this visit 
to blind the eyes of proprietors to real issues. It 
is satisfactory to find that Sir John Muir is 
willing to stand in with the scheme of restricting 
production. It is also easy to understand why. 
His companies are responsible for much of the 
over-cultivation in the past, and as they were 
in the first to feel the effects of glutted markets 
owing to their lavish expenditure on exten- 
sions, it was to be expected they would readily 
grasp at any solution of the problem they 
had themselves created. But even now 
th^s adhesion seems to be only a qualified 
one. It is true the Muir concerns are restrict- 
ing planting schemes in Assam, but what of 
the policy that is being pursued in Southern India ? 
The exports from the North will probably show a 
fair decline this season, but it is also pretty certain 
that from Madras the shipments will be nearly 
doubled. This is due almost entirely to the large 
developments in Travancore, where the Kanan De- 
van has huge estates. According to its own reports, 
it brought into cultivation under tea there in I89S 9 
over two thousand six hundred acres and in 1899- 
1900 proposed to plant nearly three thousand 
acres more. During those same periods the 
additions in Assam were reckoned at only 
one hundred and thirty- four acres. The tea 
grown in Travancore is of a low grade quality, 
and must neces'-arily help more to depress prices 
than even an excess of better class descrip- 
tions. 
To sum up the whole matter, then, there is no 
valid reason why the reports and accounts of 
these four Companies should not be immediately 
published, and the shareholders ought to bring 
pressure to bear on the Directors to produce 
them,— Fincincia Times, August 10. 
PEAtRL AND PEARL SHELL FISHERIES. 
IN CEYLON AND AUSTRALIAN WATERS. 
[To the Editor of " iVafiwe,") 
In connection with Sir West Ridgeway's anxiety, 
as Governor of Ceylon, to revive the pearl fishery 
off the north-west coast of the island, and the 
appointment by the Secretary of State for the 
Colonies of so able a zoologist as Prof. Herdman 
to repott on the subject — so classic to zoologists 
since Dr. Kelaart's paper and the display of tine 
exainples of the pearl shells by the Indian 
Government in the London Fisheries Exhibition 
of 1?<83 — it may be interesting to mention the 
activity of the Queensland Government in this 
and allied subjects. Besides the work of Mr. 
Saville Kent and the recent (private) investiga- 
tions of Mr. Lyster Jameson, the Queensland 
Government early last year appointed an able 
young zoologist, Mr, James K Tosh, to make 
investigations on the life- history of the species 
which produces the pearl-shells of commerce, the 
formation and growth of pearls, and other ques- 
tions bearing on the pearl fishery. He is now 
busy on Thursday Island. Moreover Mr. Tosh 
informs me that the Queensland Government has 
just sanctioned a grant of £1,500 for the erection 
of a marine laboratory on a small island about 
two miles distant (from Thursday Island), and 
in the centre of the pearl-fishing grounds, though 
at some distance from the coral area. This 
laboratory will have, besides the work-room and 
quarters for Mr. Tosh and his staff, three con- 
crete tanks for experimental work. 
W. C. McIntosh. 
Barham, Springfield, Fife. 
— Nature, Aug. 15. 
PROGRESS AND PLANTING IN THE 
FEDERATED MALAY STATES. 
(Fr'om the Resident-General's Report 
for 1900.) 
The fortunate possession of extraordinarily 
large alluvial deposits of tin-ore, easily 
worked by Chinese miners, whose luxuries 
and vices are taxable, has been the basis 
of the financial prosperity of the States, 
and the development of this source of 
wealth has been rendered possibe by British 
methods of administration. To take, as an 
instance, the case of Perak, the most im- 
portant and, at present, the wealthiest of 
the four States, the amount of duty collected 
on tin exported in 1877 was $140,292, while 
during the past year the collections amounted 
to $3,570,631. From the first days of pro- 
tection the Government has kept in view 
the desirability, or rather the necessity, of 
encouraging agriculture, and slow but steady 
progress has been and is being made in this 
direction. The first year for which reliable 
figures of trade values (imports and exports) 
for Perak, Selangor and Negri Sembilan 
are available is 188i. The value of iniportsand 
exports for that year was $11, '.'07,719. For 
1900 the figures for the four States are- 
Imports 
Exports 
Total trade 1900 
$38,402,581 
60,361,045 
$98,763,626 
