§2 
Supphmint to thi “ Tropical Agriculturist." 
[March 2. iSgr. 
3. Vaeieties. — The varieties of tlie vine are 
very numerous, partly from its antiquity, partly 
from the influence of climates and soils in chang- 
ing the qualities of grapes, and partly from new 
so'ds being procured from seed by cross-fertili- 
sation. Horticulturists base their classification 
of grape-vines on the character of the stems, 
shoots, leaves, flowers, bunches or berries. 
Clemente, a Spanish writer, describes 120 varieties, 
comprising them in two sections, downy and 
smooth-leaA'ed. The Hamburgh and Muscat or 
Alexandria varieties are among the best. 
E. T. Hooee. 
Haputale, 23rd Jan. 1891. 
( To be . coutmued.) 
NEWS FEOM OLD BOYS. 
Mr. H. D. Juanis writes: — 
Nildandahinna, a village of Walapane, contains 
only about thirty dwelling-houses, and is forty 
miles distant from Kandy. The inhabitants who 
are a verj' poor and ignorant lot, depend chiefly 
on liurakkaii and Indian corn cultivation. The 
soil is rich, and is generally of a clay-loam nature. 
Paddy-fields occupy many of the hillsides, and 
are laid out in terraces which are irrigated by 
streams from above : these fields, however, are 
not A'ery profitable. This month (February) is 
the sowing time for the maha crop, the weather 
being now, as it was last month, very wet. The 
rains e.xtend from December to April. During 
the latter part of last year I visited a place 
known as Lemesuriergama in Uda-Hewaheta, and 
prepared nurseries and land for tea, coffee, cotton, 
arecanuts and paddy, and supervised the laying 
down of land under grass. The transplanting 
of the paddy ought to be done now, but is being 
delayed for want of water, which is a great draw- 
back in that part of the country. The work of 
cutting a canal from Bodi-ela has been suspended 
for a time owing to washing away of a part of the 
excavation by heavy rain a little time ago. The 
Nildandahinna experimental gardens, known before 
as the Belief Gardens, Walapane, were originally 
planted with different varieties of cotton, castor- 
oil, tobacco and grass. Now they contain dhall, 
arrowroot, sweet potatoes, betel, yams and native 
vegetable.s, and 1 am preparing more land for 
sugarcane, tea, &c. I am intending to plant 
some breadfruit trees which 1 have applied for. 
I put down J seer paddy in a nursery last month, 
and the seedlings will be shortly tran.splanted 
into a field which is being prepared for them 
at jiresent. 
The Assistant Government Agent, Nuwara 
Eliya, is making a jioble effort to improve the 
condition and pro, speeds of the unfortunate in- 
habitants of this district. 
Mr. William Abeysuriya writes:— 
Since my arrival in Wcligama 1 have l)een 
engaged in' cleaning land for tea, sugarcane and 
dliall. I'l I'ai'fs of my proja-rty Indian 
corn thrivi-,s well. In Ibis district citronclla is 
largely grown, and I intended ]dan(ing u\> a por- 
tion of my land with it. J'addy cultivation is 
carried on with success thougli under the old 
system: and 1 am trying to introduce the new 
sydem of cultivation. 
GENERAL ITEMS. 
Prof. W'allace has for some time been adopting 
the plan of delivering a course of about thirty 
lectures on Agriculture to a batch rural of school- 
masters evert^ year, .so as to better equip them 
for the work of teaching agricultural science 
in the schools of the county districts. 
Any housekeeper, according to the Journal of 
Health, ought to be able to detect the adulter- 
ation of milk without trouble. Let her take a 
long slender bottle, cleanse it well, and let it 
dry out. If then it is filled with milk and 
allowed to stand in a cool place for forty-eight 
hours, all the foreign fluid will be precipitated, 
that i.s, it will settle to the bottom of the 
bottle. The soured milk will then fill the 
middle of the bottle, and the fatty substance will 
be found floating on the top. Sometimes the top 
will be a layer of cream, then will come a 
layer of albumen, another artificial device to 
make the milk look rich ; then will come the 
soured milk, azid at the bottom will come the 
foreign water. The whole scheme of deception 
can be read at a glance, and though this sort 
of work is not scientifically satisfactory, it will 
always bring out the fundamental fact — whether 
or not the milk is normal. 
The story told of Lord Hopetoun’s housekeeper, 
announcing on his arrival after absence from 
home, that his emu had laid an egg, and that 
as his lordship was away she (the housekeeper) 
had put it under the biggest goose she could find, 
is matched by that told of Lord Rosebery to whom 
a county schoolmaster who was seeking patron- 
age for a literary work, wrote asking permission 
to make mention of his lordship's name in his 
pamjihlet on “ insect pests.” 
Two Doctors of Nantes claim to have dis- 
covered another cure for tuberculosis, and base 
their method on the well-known fact that goats 
are incapable of being infected with tuberculosis. 
Th.e theory of these Doctors is that inasmuch 
as the blood of goats must possess prophylactic 
properties which protect them against tubercular 
disease, the transfusion of the blood of those 
animals into that of human or animal sufferers 
from tuberculosis must give to the latter power 
to resist the attack of the malady. 
Mr. R. Hedger- AYallace, late of Edinburgh and 
Glasgow, and a student of Prof. Wallace of the 
University of Edinburgh, has, we learn from 
an Australian paper, been making a lecturing 
tour through Victoria and Tasmania. 
The .second year students at the School of 
Agriculture include Johannes, Dias, Vairamuttu, 
Perera, Salgado, Amarawickrama, and Dias 
Bandaranayake. 
The following are the new boys admitted in 
January: — Dias, Ayaturai, Fernando, Nallatamby, 
Atha])athu, Kehelpannela, Abeyesekere, Banda, 
Savai-imuttu, Kumarasinghe, Alwis, Gunewardene, 
Romail, Perei'a, and Thiedman — the last three 
Izeing day scholars, 
