238 
VHE tropical agriculturist. [October i, 1890 
theine, and it mil be seen from the followine table 
that the conclusion we had previously arrived at as to 
the presence of theine in greater proportion than had 
been assumed is fully austained by the analytical data 
there given. 
Theine. 
TEA. 
Mois- 
Origi- 
Price. 
ture. 
nal Tea 
Dry Tea 
p. c. 
p.c. 
p. c. 
Retail. 
29 
0.C 
. 2s 4d 
7' 60 
•3-.54 
3'83 
SO 
, 2s 
6'75 
.3-66 
3'93 
SI 
. Is 6(1 
6-20 
3-12 
3-39 
32 
M* 
, Is 6d 
6-60 
3-06 
3-27 
S3 
• •• »t. 
. Is 4d 
6-40 
3'42 
.3-61 
34 
, IsSd 
8-00 
2-82 
3-06 
85 
. Is 4d 
6-60 
2-74 
2-93 
36 
, ised 
7-40 
2-92 
3-1.5 
37 
Ceylon dust 
— 
8-00 
3'68 
3'89 
Broker. 
38 
China ... 
Is .3d 
8-60 
3-46 
3-78 
39 
••• 
IIM 
8-40 
3-32 
3-6.3 
40 
,, «.* 
7d 
8'60 
3-20 
3-50 
41 
Japan Congou 
4jd 
8-98 
2-20 
2-42 
43 
7d 
6-42 
2-74 
2-93 
43 
6Jd 
6'28 
2-72 
2-90 
44 
S9 »> ••• 
Java Pekoe Pl’y ... 
5d 
7-64 
2-58 
2-79 
45 
4|d 
6-92 
2'42 
2'60 
46 
Is 7*d 
7-34 
3-16 
3-41 
47 
)1 »» ••• 
, Is 2d 
7-92 
3-78 
4-10 
48 
,, „ S*chong... 
. lid 
7-04 
2-94 
3-16 
CEYPTOMEEIA JAPONICA. 
This timber tree which has flourished in and around 
Darjeeling at 7,000 feet and down to 3,000, ever since 
Fortune, nearly sixty years ago, brought the seeds from 
China. has been planted to a considerable extent in and 
around Nuwara Eliya. Dr. Trimen has expressed 
a fear lest the climate of our hills should be too 
wet for this tree ; but in the latest report of the 
Eoyal Botanic Gardens, we have Mr. Nock’s testi- 
mony regarding a specimen cut down at Hakgala, 
when only sixteen years old. It yielded 90 feet of 1 
inch boards, measuring in width 16 inches at 
bottom to 6 inches at top. This is surely an 
encouraging result, considering the age of the tree, 
and until now all the accounts we have received 
of the Japan pine have been largely favourable. 
Mr. W.E. Tringham, of Nuwara Eliya, however, sends 
us the following extract to “ show that the tree is 
not of such rapid or big growth, or the timber of 
such value, as was supposed” : — 
(Extract Notes upon Useful Japanese Timber, by 
J. N. T. Turner, a. m. i- c. e.) 
The Sugi {Gryptonieria japonica) has a coarse fibre, 
and the annual rings of growth are distinctly marked. 
The heart-wood is ruddy brown, and the sap-wood 
straw colour. It is a feeble and perishable timber ; 
but being very straight grained, it opposes considerable 
resistance to longitudinal stress. This property renders 
sugi a useful timber for uprights in houses of light 
construction; though it is most extensively employed 
in the characteristic scaffoldings of the country. For 
timber, the felling age is about 35 years, when the 
average girth is 3 to 4 feet ; but for poles it is felled 
much younger. When full grown, a girth of 15 feet is 
not uncommonly attained. The present price is 25 sen, 
or 9d per cubic foot. 
All the above timbers are inferior in strength to their 
European analogues, as they are, under the climatic 
conditions of Japan, of more rapid and exuberant 
growth. The trees are generally felled long before tbeir 
full growth has been attained. Felling is carried on 
through all seasons, the summer months being the 
favourite Ac. &c. 
Taken from minutes of proceedings of the Institution 
of Civil Engineers, vol. 89, issued July 1887. 
What is above stated, if accepted fully, does not dis- 
prove the value of the tree as yielding fuel from 
its pruningB and thinnings, and timber suitable 
for tea boxes and packing cases and for such indoor 
work as ceilings and posts of houses and like pur- 
poses. Wo saw Mr. Nook’s planks and they seemed 
to us to be equal to good fir or spruce fir deals. It 
seems probable that a twenty-year old tree in Ceylon 
may be equal to one of thirty years’ growth in 
Japan. If grown extensively, it might yield soft wood 
railway sleepers which could becreosoted, vulcanized, 
or otherwise preserved locally. Uamble, in his Manual 
of Indian Timber Trees, writes of a specimen of 
the wood from Darjiling, “ wood soft, white, with 
a brown, often almost black heartwood. Very 
uniform, with narrow bands of firmer and darker 
tissue at the edge of each annual ring. Medal- 
lary rays short, fine and very fine, extremely 
umerouB." Of the tree he says: “If* growth is 
extremely rapid : One specimen shows an average of 
1’2 ring per inch of radius, and many of the rings 
are one inch wide. It is brittle and the 
tops and branches are broken by high winds.” 
Close planting may protect the trees from such 
misadventure. Von Muller gives a very favour- 
able account of the trees thus: — 
The Sugi or Japanese Cedar. Japan and Northern 
China. The largest tree in Japan, tbp trunk attaining 
35 feet in circumference (Rein) and 120 f>-et in height. 
Stem long, clear, of perfect straightness ; the plant 
is also grown for hedges ; in Japan it yields the most 
esteemed timber, scented like that of Cedrela (Christie). 
It requires forest-valleys for successful growth. The 
wood is durable, compact, soft and easy to work ; more 
extensively utilised in Japan than any other. In the 
Azores the tree is preferred even to the Pinus Hale- 
pensis for timber-culture, on account of its still more 
rapid growrh in that insular climate. Several garden- 
varieties exist. 
It would thus appear that the tree (which is 
easily propagated from seed or cuttings) is valu- 
able in many respects and for various purposes. 
Teak, about the best timber in the world, if tested 
by the breaking weight strain, compares very 
poorly with Australian iron and stringy bark timber. 
But teak is still the superior timber, one of its 
merhs 5eing that it is easily worked. That is also one 
of the mfrits of P. japonica, and its perishableness 
in Japan may be due to the fact that the timber 
is not properly seasoned. It is curious that a 
tree which grows to a height of 120 feet and a 
circumference of 35 feet should be capable of being 
treated as a hedge plant. But the Japanese are 
great in the art of dwarfing vegetation. 
CATTLE AND CATTLE DISFASE IN 
CEYLON. 
Nothing could be more approprite to the discussion 
of this question than the appearanci' of the amended 
Ordinance relating to Village Communities. Here 
we find, as we anticipated, that the native tribunals 
and committees are vested with very large powers 
for the repression of cattle trespass, cattle stealing 
and cattle disease. All that is needed is that the 
natives, to whom so large a degree of self-govern- 
ment has been conceded, should, under the judicious 
guidance of the Government Agents and their 
Assistants, use the powers entrusted to them 
wisely, actively and courageously, without fear or 
favour. They can make such rules as they deem 
expedient for places lor the slaughter of cattle, 
sleep or swine, for taking care of wa^te and other 
hands set apart for the purpose of the pasturage 
of cattle or for any other conimon purpose ; and 
for breeding, registering and branding cattle, for 
regulating the sale, removal and slaughtering of 
cat’le, and for preventing call e trespass, cattle 
disease and cattle stealing. The gansabliawa courts, 
too, in their criminal jurisdiction can deal with oases 
of cattle trespass under the Ordinance No. 9 of 1876. 
Wide powers arc thus given to the natives to deal 
