429 
India and OeyloD teas are attraotiopr so much at- 
tention that we present a map showing the tea- 
growing districts of Indian and Ceylofl. The districts 
in which te» is grown in India at the present time 
are : A«sam. Gaohar, Sylhet, Darjeeliu^;, Cbittagong, 
Neilgberry hills, Chota Nagpore, Kangra, Eamaon, 
Sikkhim, Nepaul, Dehra. 
It is claimed by Baildon, author of a work on tea, 
that India is the natural home of the tea plant. It 
is of exotic grow'h in Japan, where it was introduced, 
acoor liua; to some auihorities, in the 6th century, 
otht-rs placing it during the 9th century. 
The Ifovince of Assam, once called the Inferno of 
Bengal, owing to its huonid and deiidiy ohmate, with 
jungle fevers, ague and tigers, holding supreme t-way 
has been transformed into s fairly cultivated district. 
Parts tf the province areieaohed by railway and the 
fcteamers of two lines. Hundreds of thousands of acres 
of open limd are now to be seen planted with tea. 
This, it is claimed, has changed the character of the 
olimatp. 
Mr. Ball Bays: "Recent discoveries in Assam also 
seem to justify the .ifsumption, if nothing to the 
contrary be known, that it (tea) has spontaneously 
extended its growth along a continuous and almost 
uninterrupted moautanious range, but of moderate 
altitude, neaily from the great river, the Yang-tse- 
Kiang, to the countries flanking the South western 
frontier of China, where this range falls in with or, 
agreeably with the opinion of a well-informed and 
scientific author, Dr. lioyle, forms a continuation of the 
Himalayan range. But in those countries, as iu every 
part of Ohina, if found in the plains or in the 
vicinity ot habitations and cultivated grounds, it may 
be fairly assumed that it was brought and propagated 
there by the agency and industry of man." 
" In the early days of the tea enterprise in India 
indigenous plants were collected and formed into 
gardens, and China plants, propagated from seed, 
were planted iu close proximity to the Indian species. 
The Chinese plants having entirely changed from 
what they were in their origin, in the botanical 
course of nature imparted their altered condition, in 
some degree, to other plants around them, and the 
very obvioHS result of planting two kinds of tea came 
about in the production of a third the hybrid. From 
the small proportion of Obioa plant originally placed 
in the experimental gardens, we see the wonderful 
blending of nature in the fact that very Utile purely 
indigenous, or purely China tea remains, the various 
tea-producing districts in India almost all growing 
hybrid bushes. There are sections of a few — I was 
almost saying two or three— estates in Assam, where 
the indigenous plant is cultivated esolusively, and 
the greatest care is taken to keep all China and hybrid 
plants out of the way, so as to insure the continued 
purity of species." 
The United States Minister to the United Stales 
of Colombia, Hon. .Tohn T. Abbott, states that com- 
petent authorities declare certain sections of the 
Republic to be peculiarly adapted for the development 
of tea culture, 
[One of hundreds of such places where the 
absence of cheap labour plaoes a ban on the 
culture.— Ed. T. A.'] 
GOVERNMENT CINCHONA PLANTA- 
TIONS. 
[We received our own copies of the Madras 
reports, only after the following notice had been 
marked tor extract.— Ed. 2'. A.] 
It ia DOW a little more than ao yeard sinco the Qo- 
vcrnmeut of Madras started cinchona planting on the 
Nilgiris, and the spocesa which has sttended its efforts 
to produce a febrifuge of excellent quality at a low 
cost — one of the main objects with which the planta- 
tions were opened— for tale lo the natives have been 
rewarded with suocebs. The practical effect, however, 
of the uotion of Government iu sailing quiiiiuo for 
almost the cost price will urd jubtedly, as Government 
remarks in its Order on the Report of the working 
of the plantations during last year, to a great extent 
be nulified if no local market is available for the 
medicine. " His Excellency in Council regards it as 
a matter of ttie highest importance that the medicinal 
value and the low cost of quinine should be widely 
known," and he rightly believes *hat " publicity is the 
chief thing wanted in order to obtain for it a ready 
sale." Notices are inserted in all the District Gazettes 
calling attention to the low price at which quinine is 
obtainable, and the Tahsildars, Po&tmasters, Revenue 
officials and heads ot villages have been supplied with 
packets of quinine and asked to let the public know 
that the medicine can be obtained from them. Perhaps 
it is too early yet to give a definite opinion as to the 
general success or otherwise of this experiment ; but 
quininp distributed in some Districts has not' met 
with the ready sale that was anticipated, a fact 
which is attiibutable in great part to the apathy 
of the officers entrusted with its sale. The 
Government thinks it but natural that amongst the 
poorer classes, whose education is imperfect, there 
should be a rooted objection to any payment 
however small, for a foreign medicine of which the 
effects are comparatively unknown ; but ii is hoped 
that by patient and persistent efforts on the part of 
Government officers and by the gradual spread of the 
knowledge of the effects of quinine in preventin.cr and 
curing fever, any existing scruples may be overcome. 
The general use of quinine amongst the peoplo is 
undoubtedly a result most earnestly to be desired, but 
until the apathetic gentlemen are taken smartly to 
task little amelioration can be expected. Government, 
however, fully sees the necessity of thenatives rsaping 
the benefit of enjoying the advantages of a new remedy 
for a disease which prevails in one form or another 
almost every whore throughout the country, and is pro- 
ductive of greater mortality than any other ; and it at 
the same time does not forget the planters, who would 
profit by a rise in prices consequent on any largo in- 
crease in the demand for bark— a hop 3 earnestly ex- 
pressed but unlikely to be fulfilled for some time. 
During the past year the imports of quinine into India 
rose from about 15,000 lb. to over 30,000 lb., a fact due, 
Mr. O'Conor assumes, to the retail druggists taking 
advantage of the rise in exchange to replenish their 
stocks at a profit to themselves. The unfortunate 
people who find themselves obliged to consume this- 
drug not having obtained the benefit of the low price 
at which it is now placed wholesale on the market, 
there has been no large incentive to use it more freely. 
Dnring the past year the crop of bark harvested 
on the Nilgiris amounted to 133,351 lb. apportioned 
thus :— Dodabetta, Crown bark 63,342 lb; Naduvatum, 
Red bark, 51,230 lb and crown bark 3,530; Pykara, 
crown bark 10,166 lb and Red bark. 6,083 lb. At the 
close of the previous year 477,744 lb of the bark remained 
in stock in the godowns, which, added to ths fore, 
going, brings the total bark in stock up to the huge 
figure of 611,695 lb. Of this only 100,400 lb were 
disposed of during the year, leaving therefore in stock 
at its close .510,695 lb ! Only 2,928 lb of quinine were 
manufactured, against an estimate of 4,000 lb. The 
decrease was due, according to Mr. Lawson, the 
Government Botanist and Director of Cinchona Plan- 
tations, to the influenza epidemic in the early part 
of the year, which drove a number of old and ex- 
perienced hands away, ceoessitating the employment 
of fresh hands ; to an insufficiency of machinery ; and 
to the tardy supply of chemicals necessary for the 
manufacture of the alkaloid. Upon these points the 
Government remarks that there was no severe out- 
break of iuflueuza at the factory; that the Adminis- 
tration Report is not the place for the discussion of 
the Butiioieucy or otherwise of machinery ; and that 
the tardy supply of chemicals was no doubt a 
serious obstacle to speedy and extensive work, but 
that for future Mr. Lawson should send in all in- 
dents for submission to the Secretary of State ot 
leaet tsix montlis before the articles are required. Of 
the sulphate of quiniuo mauufsoturod, only 1,356 lb. 
were ilii-poaed of, of which 800 lb. went to Ooylou 
and 4001b., to Bombay; 1,572 lb. tbas reniaiuiug in 
stock at the commencement of this year. Thin and 
more, has already boon iudeutud tor, and the outturn 
