December i, 1890.] 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST, 
40 r 
THE DEVELOPMENT OF MADAGASOAE. 
In a letter recently to hand from Antananarivo, 
the Editor of the Madagascar News says: 
“ Madagascar by reason of the Anglo-French 
Treaty on African partition is now prominently 
before the world, and the course of events hero 
will doubtless be of interest to your readers, 
especially as there is every reason to expect that the 
vast mineral resources of the country will very soon, 
if not immediately, be opened, either by the 
Malagasy or the French, for development. To push 
on the approaching development and to forward 
British interests here, I shall be much obliged 
if you will exchange papers regularly, and I would 
impress upon you that the so doing would materially 
promote British interests in other country by 
strengthening the only British newspaper published 
in the island. 
Writing to us on Sept, 29th the Editor further 
says : — 
“ Many thanks for your notice. Shall be pleased 
to exchange with your regularly. It is expected 
here that the liovas will cave in,’ The feeling 
is, the sooner the better if they do not throw the 
country ‘ open. Missionaries as well as merchants 
are tired of waiting for progress. The country 
is growing poorer, the people becoming more down- 
trodden, when under a fair ruler both have great 
capacities for development. The liovas have 
alienated their best friends by their misgovern- 
inent ; and the feeling, as before said, is, the sooner 
something is done the better.” 
% 
THE rREHAKATlOiV OF CACAO (COCOA). 
In the Trinidad Agricultural Record has been 
published a series of elaborate essays on the fer- 
mentation of cacao beans and the other processes 
necessary to leiulcr them fit for despatch to the 
selling market. I'hose essays will be reprinted in 
the Tropical Agriculturist, and meantime we are able 
to present to our readers a review of their contents, 
by a planter entitled to speak with authority, in 
which the results of local experience are given in a 
most able and valuable form, such as must render it 
acceptable to all interested in the product, here and 
elsewhere : — 
The Essays on Cacao Fermentation appearing in 
the Agrtcuhural Record of _ Trinidad for March 
1890 ate exceedingly interesting ; and although the 
methods described all differ much from that pursued 
by US, which we consider the best, it by no means 
follows that we have arrived at perfection, or that we 
have nothing to learn ; indeed judging by the range 
of prices realized by different estates it seems that 
some of US have yet much to learn in this important 
matter of curing of cacao. Knowing little of chemistry 
I cannot fully follow the learned writer of the essay 
to which was awarded the first prize. I have no 
doubt that tho various changes described as taking 
place during fermentation arc all accurately recorded, 
and that to those who understand them they will 
prove most interesting and instructive. To the ordi- 
nary planter, however, the fact that daring fetinen- 
taliou certain changes take place which suppress the 
hitter principle and develop tho conditions and flavour 
necessary to render it fit for food and marketable, is 
all he cares to know ; and to alford the disirable 
information ns to which method is tlie best to gain 
this end is tho object of the essayists. The various 
mot hods in vogiio in Tk inidacl and Grenada aro fully 
described, and preferonoo seems to be given to that 
introduced by a klr. Strickland. The writer of the 
first essay says that tho Criolo cacao requires only 3 
days’ fennentation (wo allow a to 7), and as Ceylon 
cacao is the Criolo or Caracas variety, it may in some 
degree perhaps acoount for tiio fact that tlio elaborate 
and lengthened fermoutatiou, said to bo uecessary to 
51 
I the full development of the flavour and requisite 
colour of the forastero or Trinidad cacao.s, has never 
I been tried here. It is only within the last five yeaars — 
after the scare caused by drought and heiopeUis— that 
these hardier varieties have found favour with some, 
most still standing by the delicate criola as tho best 
paying. Ceylou planters object to “ dirt in the wrong 
place,” ami bonce have never adopted the practice of 
drying cacao by mixing earth or any other substance 
with it. On ono occasion an experiment was tried with 
a few lots by drying without washing, but the result 
every way was so uusatisfactory that it was never re- 
peated. It is just possible that the curing of the 
forastero beans may not be such a simple matter as 
is that of Criolo, and someone or other of the best 
methods described by the essayists might be tried with 
a view to determining whether or not they aro im- 
provements upon ours. 
I may hero state th.nt I havo sold in the 
local m.urket forastero cacao cured in the ordi- 
nary Ceylou fashion at from El to 112 per cwt. 
more than that realized by Criolo. Two lots of 
forastero fetched K55 nud E5150 per cwt., while 
Criolo sold at the same time brought only K54 and 
E49’50 per owt. I have not yet tested the home market 
vs'ith it, but I believe that other, s have, ami that prices 
equal to that obtained for the best criola have been 
realized. The plan of curing generally adopted by 
Ceylon planters is as follows, and is simple, expeditious 
and cleanly ; as a rule no cisterns are built, though 
boxes or troughs are sometimes used, and there is no 
testing with .a thermometer to ascertain the degree of 
hi-at in the mass. Puds are always gathered ripe 
and are brought and heaped on (ho nearest roadside; 
an hour or two before knock-off time they aro broken 
with wooden mallets, the beans being scraped out by 
hand and put into baskets or sacks and carried by the 
men to the fermenting house. This may be a room 
or two with mud walls and thatched roof, a lean-to 
to the store, or the cisterns of an old coffee pulpiug- 
bouse A wooden cistern is always attached for wash- 
ing the beans after fermentation is completed. Upon 
a platform of reopers and coir matting raised a few 
feet frotn the ground, and which allows the free es- 
cape of the liquor brewed during sweating, the green 
beans are heaped two to three feet deep, and covered 
over with old sacks and coir mats. Fermentation is 
completed in from 5 to 7 days according to the state of 
tbs weather and tho thickness of the lieaps ; the 
heaps being turned over with wooden shovels and 
recovered on alternate days. This is for Oriole 
cacao ; forastero should have 24 hours less fermen- 
tation. The beans are now thoroughly washed in 
several waters to free them from all trace of the 
sour mucilagenous matter adhering to them, and if 
the weather is fine they ate spread thinly on coir 
mats laid on barl ecues to dry in the sun, to ensnao 
even drying and to prevent blistering, they are turned 
frequently by hand, and in three days are dry enough 
for dispatchirg. Should the weather be wet the 
washed cacao is at once taken to the drying-house 
which is a long coiled room with two or three lofts of 
rcepers and coir matting ; upon these it is spread, and 
hot air supplied from many iron tubes heated by a 
furnace outside is drawn over nud through the cacao 
and out at the bottom at the other end by means of 
a Blackman’s or othi r fan. Twenty-four hours in this 
drying-house — called a Clerihew — is sufficient to dr_y 
it thoroughly. Blr. Jaoksou’s tea drier is highly 
spoken of as a cacao drier. Mr. E. S. F'raser of 
Wariyapola says; “ Mr. Jackson's ten drier is a per- 
fect cacao drier, both in the very large quantity it will 
get through in a very short space of time, and tho 
way in which it does it.” Seo vol. V., page 371), of 
the Tropical Agriculturist. The American fruit drier 
has also been used with success. When there is no 
drying-houso or where the quantity to be cured is only 
from 3 to .') owt. at a time, it is dried on a reepere’d 
staging covered with coir malting raised about :U 
feet above the ground ; under this fires of dry wood 
are lighted aud kept burning for about 36 hours, tho 
bonus being constantly turned. To concentrate tho 
heat tho apace within tlie staging is enclosed : when 
perfectly dry wood is used tho colour of tho husk is 
