July t, 1S91.] 
THf^ TROPICAL AOFtlGULTURSST. 
37 
MICROPHONES. 
-EVERY OKE HIS OWS MIOBOPUONE MAKER. 
Mr. J. J. Smith, discoursing to the members o£ the 
Chemists Assistants' Association, pointed out that 
it is easy for those who are dispos-:d to amuse them- 
selves in this way to make an instrument which 
would render audible the footsteps of a fly- The 
little apparatus consists of a box with a sheet of, 
straw naper streiohed oa its upper part. Iwo 
carbons, separated by a morse of wood, and 
connected with the two circuit wires, are lastened 
to it, and a carbon pencil, placed erosswiss between 
the two, is kept hi this position by a groove made m 
the latter. A very weak battery is then, we are 
assured, sufficient to set the iiistruaient at work, 
and when the fly walks gver the sheet of paper 
it produces vibrations strong enough to react 
energetically on an ordinary telephone. No doubt 
the yourig generation will be disposed to try its 
hand.— London Dailij New.<:, April 24t)!i. [There is 
nothing to hinder those who have electric lights, tele- 
phones, &e., to mike one 01 these small m.crophones 
and turn them to practical account.— (-'dc] 
CEYLON, INDIA AND CHINA TEA. 
CFvomihe Financial Times.) 
There is now so small a quantity of Gbina tea 
left for displacement! thai; a still larger home cou- 
sumptioB or dry tea iu the future is regarded as 
inevitable. At the same lira;, ibe rate ot exobaugo 
tenda to check supplies from Chinn, as we have 
previously expiaiaeii, and the Indian crop is about 
ten mdlioDS ot pouuds below tbe origiDal ebtimate. 
These causes, combined, have pro^luced the higher 
prices recently recorded. Gtlier dingrrtms ia 
Messrs. Gow, Wilson and Stanton's circular show 
the consumption of tea in various lauds iu the 
periods 1880-4 and i865-9. From these it is 
seen that Great Britain is far ahead of all 
other countries aa a tea drinker, the United Stater; 
ootuing nrxt, thoii Kussia, then the AuetralasiaH Co- 
lonies, nud then Cunada. Of the countries of the 
Europein Ooutiuent, Holland ia the Urgest tea 
oonsamer, the quantity it disposed of beiog about 
three hundred thoueaud more pounds in the latter tivij 
years than in the five precediog. In the other Oou- 
tinental countriee the taste for this beverage miikes 
little headway. The enterpriaing brokers, from whoao 
circulars thia information is derived, seem to glow 
with a pstriotio zeal for the popularity of the Indiv 
and Ceylon teas as British produots, and what they 
show as to the superiority of the article, both in strength 
and in qaantity of supply, would almost suggest '^Bri- 
j;uiinia rules the tea market " as a future natiouid 
aijihem, 
Ocylon tea ia tae market the consumption ot tbe 
beverage .has increased, and the exte nt to which it is 
demonstrated to hiive deuoso ia nccesaarily enormous, 
on tbe principle of reasoning adopted. While iu 1890 
we got less tea from China, and luoie from India thau 
iu 1889j the displacement was not nearly so great 
as in the preceding years. Thus the increasing 
dem.iud of the p 'pulatiuu for the " cup that cheers 
wichoit inebriatiog " could not be met, as it had been, 
by mere snbstituiion of a strong tea for a weaker 
one, and the result was a lavger ajigregate u-e of the 
dry leaf. 
INDfA AND CHINA TEA. 
To the Editor of tbe Financial Times, 
Sir, — In your intere-Ttiug urticle which appeared to lay 
upon the growth of the trade iu Indmu and Ceylon 
teas a printer's error baa crept in which might cause 
injury to one of those industries. 
Our report from which you quote is said to show 
that " iu proportion as Indian has supplanted Ceylon 
tea in the mariiei, the consumption of the beverage t a-i 
increased," etc.. the word Ceylon bting inadvertently 
used instead, of China. Ohiua tea has dunog many 
years past been lirgely disphioad by thy stronger 
teas from India and Ceylon. 
We feel sure that, in justice to tbe Ceylon tea 
industry, you will kindly iu.sert this letter in jour 
valuable journal. — We are, &c., 
Gow, Wilson and Stanton. 
13, Eood-Iaue, London, E.G., 
1 0th April 1891. 
The circulars with coloured diagrams which M essrs. 
Q-ow. Wiljon and Stanton issao every now and then 
may be said to form the pictorial literature of the 
tea-trade. The charts are ingeniously contrived, and 
Bhow at a glance the nature of all important move- 
ments, In one just issued we are able to see, 
from the arraugement of blocks of varied hues, how 
the quantities of India, Ceylon, and China tea cob- 
Bumed respectively in Great Briliin hava varied, not 
only as regards the weight of dry tea from those 
countries, but also, roughly speaking, as to the num- 
bers of gallons of liquid tea drunk. A report of the 
Bpard of Customs baa shown that Indian tea goes 
half as far again as Chinese tea, so far as depth of 
colour and fulness (not delicacy) of fldvour are cou- 
cernod. Thus, while one pound of Chineee produces 
live galloug of tea, a pouad of Indian will produce 
seven and a-half gallons. Basing their calculations 
on this estimate, Messrs. Gow, Wilson and Stanton 
show that iu proportion as Indian has supplautod 
CEYLON TEA IN AMERICA: MR. ELWOOD 
xMAY AND THE LONDON CEYLON ASSO- 
CIATION: FAVOURABLE RECEPTION 
—MS. RUTHERPORD^S SCHEME- 
CEYLON AND INDIAN TEA 
COMPANIES. 
LOKDON, May Sob. 
Mr. Elwood May has had the opportunity during 
the present week of conferring with many mem- 
bers of the Ceylon Association iu London on the 
subject of those proposals of his which have begu 
so widely debated and so strongly criticized. On 
Monday last Mr. May met at the Association rooms 
the following gentlemen, and it is a matter of 
much regret to mo that it is impossible for me 
to include my own name in the list. There were 
present on the occasion mentioned : - Messrs. J. 
Hamilton, W. J. Thompson junior, T. Stretch, 
J. L. Shand, W. Haslam, W. Bentham, W. W. 
Mitchell, A. Gr. Stanton, A. L. Hutcheson, T. 
Gray, W- C. i'odhe, H. K, Rutherford, J. P. 
Churchill, J. Capper, 0. J. Soott, J. Anderson, 
S. J- Wilson (of Messrs. Wilson, Smithett & Co.), 
and R, A. Cameron. It ia not in my power to 
give you a detail of all that was said at the 
interview had by Mr. May with these gentlemen, 
whom you v?ill acknowledge to have constituted 
a very eliieient rsprosentative of the tea industry 
of Ceylon. The nett result, however, of the dis- 
cussions which took place I am fully competent 
to afford you knowledge of. 
It may at the outset be stated that Mr. 
May came to this meeting with views very 
materially modified as compared with those 
he submitted in bis letter to the Ceylon Association 
to which a previous letter of mine made reference. 
He acknowledged to the meeting that his experience 
gained since his arrival in London had made him 
recognise the fact that it must prove futile to 
endeavour to carry out that section ot his pro- 
positions to which in my previous nolioes of this 
subject the term "cornering " has been applied. 
This had been foreseen by all of us as what must 
be the conviction to be ultimately forced upon Mr, 
; though at the time of my last writing hg 
