Nov.  I,  1895.] 
THE  TROPICAL  AGRICULTURIST. 
3” 
SUPPLEMENTING  TEA  WITH  COFFEE 
IN  N.  INDIA. 
First  as  regards  the  elevation  required  for  growing 
coffee  in  the  Bengal  Presidency.  We  can  start  from 
the  low  country,  where  there  is  good  drainage,  to 
any  fairly  sheltei’ed  elevation  below  frost  zone.  There 
are  a few  coffee  trees  in  Calcutta,  but  we  will  cite 
Rangoon,  some  8 deg.  south  of  it,  where  may  be  seen 
over  an  acre  of  coffee  in  their  Botanical  Gardens 
some  20  years  old  grown  in  “ Native  ” fashion — 
cropping  on  suckers.  Owing  to  want  of  method,  it 
crops  heavily  every  two  years.  There  is  no  pamper- 
ing, rather  an  intentional  neglect  to  wisely  prove 
that  it  thrives  under  difdculties.  In  Bengal  we  have 
the  advantage  of  being — roughly — 8 deg.  north  of  Ran- 
goon, where  it  thrives  on  the  plains.  We  have  a 
rainfall  averaging  65  inches  in  the  year,  falling  in 
the  months  best  suited  for  coffee.  A dry  winter  and 
spring,  and  showers  in  April,  with  a wet  October— 
this  last  matures  berry  and  future  bearing  wood. 
Coffee,  like  tea,  will  not  do  on  a wet  subsoil. 
— Indian  Planters'  Gazette,  Sept.  14. 
[And  then  follows  practical  advice. — Ed.  T.A.'\ 
THE  PREPARATION  OF  CAMPHOR. 
In  view  of  the  failure  of  Mr.  Nock’s  persevering 
attempts  to  collect  camphor  from  decoctions  of 
the  bark,  twigs,  &c.,  of  his  trees,  we  applied 
to  Mr.  R.  Porter  to  try  and  get  some  of  his 
friends  of  the  English  Presbyterian  Mission  in 
Formosa,  to  compile  and  give  us  the  necessa.-y 
information.  Tlie  result  is  eminently  satisfactory, 
in  the  paper  we  append  written  from  Taiwanfu, 
the  capital  of  Formosa.  We  give  the  manuscript 
account  in  full  and  we  trust  the  instructions  are 
simple  and  clear  enough  to  enable  Mr.  Nock  to 
utilise  them  in  a fresh  experiment ; there  are  three 
little  sketches — of  the  furnace,  the  style  of  chips, 
and  the  beaten  wood — which  we  also  have  had 
reproduced  : — 
THE  METHOD  OF  PREPARING  CAMPHOR  IN 
FORMOSA. 
The  method  employed  in  Formosa  for  preparing 
camphor  is  very  rough,  and  consequently  not  very 
economical. 
I myself  have  not  seen  the  process  but  have  heard 
it  described  by  several  persons,  particularly  by  the 
man  who  first  had  to  do  with  this  work  in  Formosa. 
The  apparatus  and 
operation  are  as  fol- 
lows : — ' 
1.  A fire-place  is 
built  and  a shallow 
iron  vessel  (the  kind 
used  in  Formosa  for 
boiling  rice)  inserted 
therein. 
2.  The  walls  of  the 
fire-place  are  carried 
up  a short  distance 
and  a meshed  frame 
placed  across  the  open- 
ing. 
3.  A large  earthenware  vessel  is  placed  inverted 
over  the  top.  It  is  made  to  fit  more  or 
less  closely  to  prevent  (as  far  as  is  safe) 
the  escape  of  vapour. 
4.  The  pieces  of  wood  are  chipped  off 
from  the  tree  with  an  adze  diagonally  to 
the  grain. 
5.  Each  piece  of  wood  is  then  beaten  till  it 
splits  more  or  less  up  along  the  grain. 
This  is  to  expose  the  surfaces  where 
the  camphor  lies.  Some  of  the  pieces  of 
wood  are  about  the  size  of  one’s  hand, 
or  less.  The  slices  are  not  very  thick. 
6.  Water — not  too  much — is  put  into  the  iron  vessel. 
7.  The  prepared  pieces  of  wood  are  placed  on  the 
top  of  the  meshed  frame. 
8.  A wood  or  charcoal  fire  is  lighted  under  the 
iron  vessel.  It  must  be  a slow  fire  and  the  water 
must  not  boil  violently. 
[The  idea  seems  to  be  like  that  in  the  making  of 
beef-tea  with  steam,  the  water  from  which  is 
generated  being  allowed  only  to  simmer.] 
9.  The  steam  goes  up  through  the  grating  or 
meshed  frame  and  then  through  the  pieces  of  wood. 
It  gets  impregnated  with  the  camphor  which  is  de- 
posited in  the  inside  of  the  inverted  earthenware 
vessel. 
10.  The  wooden  chips  are  changed  about  every 
twelve  hours,  the  exhausted  ones  being  taken  out  and 
fresh  ones  put  in. 
11.  The  process  goes  on  continuously  for  several 
days  (nights  included.)  A sufficient  quantity  of  cam- 
phor is  obtained  afti-r  six  or  seven  days,  but  it  is  soft 
and  apt  to  run  into  an  oily  fluid.  To  get  a good  hard 
quality  the  process  should  in  all  last  about  ten  days. 
12.  When  the  camphor  is  properly  ready,  it  is 
scraped  off  from  the  inside  of  the  earthen  vessel. 
This  is  the  camphor  of  commerce,  not  the  refined 
kind  sold  by  chemists. 
George  Ede,  E.  P.  Mission,  Formosa. 
^ 
A NEW  TURBINE  FOR  GEEKIYANA- 
KANUE  ESTATE. 
The  Colombo  Commercial  Company  are  erect- 
ing a new  turbine  on  Geekiyanakande  estate, 
Neboda.  The  turbine  is  of  Gunther’s  partial  in- 
jection type,  and  is  so  constructed  as  to  suit  the 
requirements  of  both  the  wet  and  dr}'  seasons  when 
the  supply  of  water  will  vary.  The  horse-power  is 
25,  but  the  turbine  could  be  efficiently  worked  even 
at  3 h.  p.  The  fall  of  water  is  70  feet,  and  the 
machine  passes  250  cubic  feet  of  water  per  minute. 
The  pit  is  45  ft.  deep,  the  excavations  made  through 
rock  being  at  a depth  of  22  feet,  the  upper 
nortion — 23  feet— only,  being  through  earth.  The 
diameter  of  the  pit  is  6 feet  8 in.  and  the  upper 
part  is  lined  with  9-inch  brick  lining.  The  vertical 
shaft  has  a revolution  of  240  turns  a minute. 
The  tail-race  is  2^  chains  in  length— the  cutting 
of  the  first  two  chains  being  through  .solid  rock. 
This  has  been  the  first  instance  in  Ceylon  of 
such  a deep  turbine-pit.  Work  is  now  in  full  swing, 
and  will  be  completed  shortly. 
COFFEE  IN  THE  NORTH  OF  QUEENSLAND. 
It  is  an  interesting  fact  that  the  Cairns  district 
can  now  boast  of  the  largest  area  under  coffee  in 
the  whole  of  Australia.  As  a result  of  the  enterprise 
of  Messrs.  Swallow  Bros.,  of  Hambledon  Plantation, 
thirty-five  acres  of  their  estate  have  just  been  put 
under  the  coffee  plant,  there  being  34,000  trees 
of  the  Arabian  and  1,000  trees  of  the  Liberian 
variety.  It  is  anticipated  that  in  from  two  to 
three  years  the  thirty  five  acres  will  give  a total 
of  about  thirty-one  tons  of  coffee  beans  per  an- 
num, which  at  the  wholesale  rate  of  Is.  per  lb., 
represents  a gross  return  for  the  thirty-five  acres  of 
.£3,500  per  annum.  The  seed  from  which  the  young 
plants  were  grown  was  obtained  direct  from  Ceylon. 
We  always  thought  there  was  “ money  ” in  coffee 
culture,  these  facts  show  it.  Other  agriculturists 
north-wards  should  follow  this  example  \— Australian 
Trojncultui-ist,  Sept  2. 
FOREST-THINNING. 
Mr.  J.  A.  Manton,  who  is  in  charge  of  the 
forest-thinning  operations  in  the  Murray  district 
for  the  New  South  Wales  Government,  reports 
that  the  total  area  thinned  to  date  is  5(J,500 
acres.  The  average  number  of  trees  left  is  about 
250  to  the  acre,  and  it  is  assumed  that  at  least 
100  will  grow  to  marketable  timber  during  the 
next  35  years.  Placing  the  market  value  at  only 
£1  per  tree  there  will  be  a return  of  at  least 
£100  per  acre  in  .35  years.  The  cost  of  the 
thinning  operations  so  far  has  been  5s  2d  per 
acre.  — A ustralasian. 
