102 
THF TROPJOAL AGRICULTURIST. [August i, 1891. 
PLANTING PROGRESS IN WEST HAPUTALE, 
CEYLON. 
We have the following news of a little known 
district whioh is yet to hold up its head with tea 
Rtid railway communication close by. Our corres- 
pondent writes : — 
"A ooneiderable change has taken plac3 ia the 
Kalapahana Valley within the last 18 months, Mr, 
Mayow has about 100 acres in tea on Bray estate ; 
Mr. Orchard has a iair acreage now on Udaveria, and 
has just sold a half share to Mr. F. Bateson of 
Broughtou. Mr. Mills (West Haputale'> has the largest 
acreage; hut I am not- sure what it is. He also 
has a factory ; Mr. Anderson on Moneratenne too has 
some acreage in tea. Our tea is giving us at the rate 
of 400 lb. of made tea an acre, aud as our land was 
good virgin soil bought from QovernmeDt at ab; ut 
B,40 per acre, we may reasonably expect a better 
yield still when our tr^es are oMer. Most of us went 
in at firrtt for cinchona officinalis (our elevation 
bring high) which soon died out ! One good thing 
about it was it took little or nothing out of the 
soil ! There is wind in the Valley, but w6 find we 
can "dodge" it vert successfully with belts. The 
Obiya Valley, whore there is to be a railway Btation 
(or siding), is quite close to the Kalupahana Valley, 
and we hope Government will cut a road for us 
which will not be an expensive one." 
♦ 
Varied Uses of Rhea or Ramie. — We were 
lately surprised to learn that rhea was a good food 
for silkworms. Now we are told that "steam pipes 
are now made of ramie fibre, and the material is 
pressed so closely together by means of hydraulic 
macbinery, that it has a tensile strength two and one- 
half times that of steel" 
Coffee IN Brazil, — The Jornal do Commercio 'pab- 
lishod on the 6ih a letter estimating the Rio and 
Santos coffee crops at 4,000,000 bags each. The writer 
says that this coffee will be sold for over 1,000,- 
000,000 francs or 350,000,0001 in gold, equivalent 
to 560,000,0001 in papar money at its present value. 
— Rio News, 
Gemming in Rakwana. — Mr. Baddeley, the gemming 
expert from Ratnapnra left today (16t.h,) for Europe 
in the "MyrLpiton" his services being no longer required 
in connection with gemming operations in Rakwana. 
Mr. Baddeley confirms what our Rnkwana correspon 
dent reported — namely, that the pits are being all 
closed there, good stones not being forthcomiug. And 
yet good stones are on sale each week in Colombo. 
Where do they come from and how are they obtained ? 
Until this question is settled and proper steps are 
taken to prevent theft at the gem-pits, it need not be 
expected thafcgemmiug will be found a profitable en- 
terprise for Europeans in Ceylon. — Local "Times." 
A Planter on Touk. — Mr. W, G. Sandison, of tea- 
geed fame, is down in Colombo again, awaitiBg the 
" Salazie " which is to convey him to Java, where he 
means to spend about six weeks and then return to 
the island. Mr. Sandison is essentially a peripatetic 
planter, and is continually on his travels. He has 
been to Java before, on which occasion, he says, ho 
went on pleasure, and he adds that " Ceylon chappies 
may take the hint that Java is the place to go 
to enjoy oaestlf ; " bat this time, as we stated re- 
cently, he proceeds there on business. When he 
returns, he says, he means to go to Madagascar, but 
l^e has not made up his mind yet as to whether ho 
will proceed there direct or visit the " old country " 
first. Most likely he will- do the latter, for, though 
he has passed over a quarter of a century in travel, 
chiefly in the Bast, be keeps up the love for his 
home in Scotland, whioh he visits often, and his 
judgment of whether a tbing is good or bad de- 
pends very greatly on whether it comes from near 
Inverness or far from it. It is not generally known 
that Mr. Sandison was formerly in the Manipur 
district, ntar tho scane of the recent rising. He 
was, howtverj engaged there in pUuting, and came 
v/ithiu an aco ot getting killed by the natives just 
before he left.— /isci. 
Ceylon is marching on ! Even if the rubber 
crop is not yet what was expected, the colony is 
doing well in other things, and it will supply rubber 
in time. It is agitating now for an exhibition, 
not of its own products only, but a cosmopolitan 
affair, at which all nations may show the goods 
they want to sell in the tvopics. —Indiarubber 
Journal, June 8th. 
The Death-dealing Auazon. — Wooden crosses, 
marking the graves of immigrants, are as 
plentiful as the rubber trees on the banks of 
one or two Amazon tributaries. The Purus 
river district ha,s only a population of 16,000, 
instead of the 40,000 which we might expect 
from the immigration that has taken place. — 
Ibid. 
"Be RMUDA ih May." — Such is the title of an 
exceedingly graphic and interesting description of 
the group of coral islands about twenty miles 
square, which, like the Bahamas, are largely re- 
sorted to by Americans who seek change. This 
account appears io Garden and Forest, a valuable 
American publication, whence we shall transfer it 
to the Tropical Agriculturist. Apart from the in- 
digenous cedar and tbe introduced elder tree of 
Britain much ot the leading vegetation is such as 
prevails in Ceylon. 
Rice Cultivation in the United States. 
— An elaborate article on this subject, illustrated 
by engravings, principally from quaint Burmese 
drawings, appears in the Louisiana Planter and 
Sugar Manufacturer, After a sketch of the history 
ot rica culture and tho kinds used and modes of 
cultivation in Egypt, China, India, Burmah, Ceylon 
&a. The whole process of growth and " manu- 
facture " in the United States is described at great 
length. We have marked the article for the 
Tropical Agriculturist, because bints useful in Ceylon 
may ba obtained from the widely different mode 
of culture observed in the Western land whither 
rice seems to have come from Madagiscar. In 
slavery time the enterprise was ot great importance, 
but it was ruined in the Civil War and the writer 
of the paper is not hopeful of iis revival to any 
great extent by means of expensive free labour. 
We have hill rice and irrigated rice in Ceylon : in 
Carolina the grain is amphibious, — grown in 
water, but ripened on dry soil. 
Tsa.— A writer on " Etiquette " in a con- 
temporary emphatically observes, " It is not usual 
to offer a second cup at afternoon tea 
it is not as if tea were a meal." Let us hope 
(writes "Miranda" in the i/adj/'s Pictorial) ievr 
people will be so inhospitable as to ba guided 
by this churlish view of the meagerly supplied 
teapot. Taking is thirsty and fatiguing work, 
especially when combined with the pretty behaviour 
necessary where one's hostess is a smart acquaint- 
ance rather than the familiar friend whom one 
would have no scruple in asking to replenish 
one's cup, and it is an odd way of welcoming 
guests, indeed, to limit them to half the re- 
freshment they would have had at home, 
though judicious, no doubt, when a repetiton of the 
visit is not desired. " They always gives such a 
nice tea," is a remark one frequently hears made 
with much appreciation, and people hardly realise, 
perhaps, how much the popularity of their " day " 
depends on the comfort of this little meal — 
for meal it must certainly be accounted, considering 
the lateness of dinners. Partially warmed cakes, 
served on a cold plate with little islands of half-, 
melted butter on them, stale biscuits, bitter, over- 
drawn tea, or tepid " water bewitched," wiU dis- 
hearten the most cheerful guest, yet such experiences 
are by no means unoommon in making afternoon 
calls, 
