336 
THE  TROPICAL  AGRICULTURIST. 
[Nov.  I,  1895. 
tors  in  UM  Spain  or  I’ortuj'al.  A “ Southern 
gentleman  ” of  English  blood  is  often  a very  fine 
man  ; but  lie  is  not  so  much  nobler  than  an 
English  gentleman  that  he  can  be  quoted  to  prove 
the  truth  of  Mr.  Bates’s  dream.  That  the  hot 
lands  are  not  fatal  to  energy  may  be  true  ; but 
certainly  they  do  not,  with  all  their  natural  ad- 
vantages, ever  tend  to  produce  it.  If  they  did, 
the  most  glorious  of  all  tropical  countries,  Ceylon, 
would  have  produced  a grand  race ; and  it  has 
not  done  it.  There,  witli  land  of  all  altitudes, 
and  all  kinds  of  pow'ers  of  production,  amidst 
perpetual  summer  and  scenes  w hich,  if  the  theo- 
rists are  right,  should  have  bred  in  them  an 
abnormal  sense  of  beauty,  dwells  a race  wdiicli 
we  have  no  wish  to  decry,  but  which  is  certainly 
not  moie  distinguished  than,  say,  the  Belgian  or 
the  Sw-ede  for  any  high  qualities  whatsoever. 
Whether  an  admixture  of  wdiite  blood  would 
have  altered  the  result,  as  w'e  understand  Mr. 
Boyle  to  half  believe — at  least  if  he  does  not  be- 
lieve it,  w-e  do  not  quite  comprehend  the  drift 
of  his  remarks  on  the  cross-breeds — isstill  an  un- 
settled question  ; but  it  is  cl^ear  that  in  the 
Southern  States  of  the  Union,  in  Spanish  America, 
and  in  India,  such  admixture  has  not  developed 
any  markedly  sui)erior  race.  Mr.  Bates’s  hope 
is  a dream. 
We  should  say,  on  a review  of  the  whole 
evidence,  that  it  pointed  to  this  result.  It  is 
probably  much  more  possible  for  lyhite  men  to 
colonise  a tropical  country  than  is  imagined, 
especially  if  the  colony  w'as  so  organised  that 
sanitary  laws  could  be  enforced  from  the  very 
iirst  ; but  the  first  generation  would  suffer  terribly 
from  unaccustomed  diseases — lowfever,  for  example 
. — from  the  de|>ressing  effect  of  a change  of  climate, 
and  from  the  shock  involved  in  a violent  change 
of  daily  habitudes  as  to  diet,^  hours  of 
labour,  and  general  social  life.  This  sufler- 
Ing,  involving  much  mortality,  would  dis- 
courage the  average  colonist  to  such  a degree 
that  he  would  not  remain  for  the  time  which  even 
Mr.  Boyle  admits  to  be  necessary  to  secure 
complete  acclimatisation.  No  generation  of  men 
will  devote  itself  in  this  way  for  the  benefit  of 
its  successors,  and  every  ex])eriment  will  there- 
fore end  either  in  failure,  or  in  the  importation 
of  races  able  to  relieve  the  colonists  of  all  severe 
or  exhausting  toil.  The  second  alternative  may 
succeed,— has,  for  example,  succeeded  in  Loui- 
siana ; but  that  is  not  colonisation  by  white  men. 
It  is  “ settlement,”— a very  different  matter,  and 
one  which  cannot  be  said  to  have  been  as  yet 
fairly  tried.  SVe  can  quite  conceive  of  both  the 
world  and  the  whites  being  benefited  by  the  set- 
tlement of  a tropical  region,  in  which  dark  inen 
shall  labour,  and  white  men,  few  comparatively 
in  number,  shall  guide  their  labour,  and,  while 
reajnng  a profit  out  of  their  exertions,  shall 
deliberately  endeavour  to  keep  up  among  them  a 
lii'di  and  improving  standard  of  civilisation.  A 
bo*tly  of  white  colonists  working  as  a hieratic 
caste,  and  governing  in  the  interest  of  the  labour- 
ers as  well  as  their  own,  might  nroduce,  under 
favouring  circumstances,  such  results  as  the  world 
lias  never  seen,  a civilisation  in  which  poverty, 
tlisease  and  crime  were  almost  entirely  absent, 
and  the  whole  community  exulted  in  struggling 
forward  to  some  lofty  ideal.  The  experiment, 
liowever,  has  never  been  made,  except  by  the 
Jesuits  in  Paraguay,  and  it  is  difhcult  to  imagine 
how  it  could  succeed.  The  guides  become  arbi- 
trary or  the  guided  rebellious,  or  in  the  end  some 
adroit  man  avails  himself  of  human  foibles  to 
seize  the  reins  of  power,  and  wc  have,  as  under 
Dr.  Francia  and  his  heir,  a pure  despotism  which 
ftdvauccs  uothiug,  because  in  the  iiitcicst  of  the 
despotism  individuality  must  be  put  down.  Wc 
rather  wonder,  however,  that  the  experiment  has 
never  been  trieil  by  laymen,  who  witn  a healthy 
African  district  before  tliem,  and  two  regiments 
of  black  freedmen  from  America,  might  achieve, 
for  a time  at  least,  a considerable  result,  and 
would  certainly  add  considerably  to  the  knowl- 
edge of  mankind.  A good  manj’  phalansUres 
have  been  started  from  time  to  time,  and  .a  |dii- 
lanthropic  Baron  Hirsch  might  try  that  one  with 
some  faint  hope  of  success.  It  would,  however, 
be  a faint  hope,  the  law  of  ages  being  clearly 
that  Europeans  and  Asiatics  and  Africans  will 
not,  unless  coerced  by  irresistible  circumstances, 
work  in  continuous  harmony  together. — Spectator. 
PLANTING  AND  PKODUCE. 
Coco.v  Adultek.vtion. — On  this  subject  Messrs.  Cad- 
bury Brothers  write : “ It  may  be  true,  as  stated  by 
a writer  in  the  Times,  that  many  ‘ of  the  leading 
manufacturers  and  the  Government  in  the  victual- 
ling yards’  add  50  per  cent,  of  sugar  and  arrow- 
root  to  the  cocoa  they  prepare,  but  the  word  ‘ all  ’ is 
incorrect.  Our  firm,  which  clears  between  one-third 
and  one-fourth  of  the  cocoa  imported  into  Great 
Britain,  has  resolutely  set  its  face  against  all  such 
admixtures.  Our  cocoa  is  absolutely  pure,  and  does 
not  contain  any  addition  of  sugar  or  starch,  nor  any’  of 
those  alkaline  salts  added  by  many  of  the  Dutch  makeis 
to  produce  their  dark-coloured  and  scented  cocoas.  Mr, 
George  Cadbury,  a member  of  our  firm,  in  giving 
evidence  before  the  Foods  Adulteration  Commission 
of  1872,  proposed  that  the  exact  percentage  of  all 
the  ingredients  used  in  the  manufacture  of  any 
articles  of  food  should  be  distinctly  given  on  the 
label.  To  this  opinion  we  adhere,  and  believe  the 
public  would  soon  learn  its  value  were  it  carried  out. 
The  public  understand  chocolate  to  be  an  article 
containing  sugar  and  flavouring  matters,  such  as 
vanilla.  Our  remarks,  of  course,  only  apply  to  brands 
offered  as  ‘cocoa,’  which  as  a beverage  need  not 
contain  any  starch  and  sugar,  still  less  any  addition 
of  alkaline  salts.” 
Shade  Trees  and  Coffee  Planting.— Mr.  Robert 
Thomson,  who  was  for  many  years  at  the  head  of 
the  Government  gardens  and  plantations  in  Jamaica, 
has  furnished  to  the  Foreign  Office  for  presentation 
to  both  Houses  of  Parliament  an  interesting  report 
on  the  agricultural  products  of  Tolima,  in  the 
Sierra  Nevada  of  Colombia.  He  points  out  that  in 
recent  years  a great  impetus  has  been  given  to  the 
cultivation  of  coffee  in  Colombia  through  the  sys- 
tematic intorplanting  of  shade  trees  with  coffee 
plants.  The  value  of  the  coffee  exported  from  the  terri- 
tory has  increased  from  810,000  dols  in  1877-78  to 
10,000,000  dols  in  1894 ; and  it  may  be  assumed  that  in 
the  course  of  two  or  three  years  the  value  of  the  total 
output  will  amount  to  15,000,000  dols.  Mr.  Thomson 
mentions  that  thousands  of  acres  in  the  district  in 
question  are  being  gradually  reduced  to  a desert  by 
the  practice  of  burning  the  natural  grasses  during  the 
most  scorching  periods  of  drought  for  the  purpose 
of  obtaining  new  and  tender  pasturage,  and  that  the 
soil,  is  only  preserved  from  sterility  by  the  chaparro 
tree,  which  appears  to  flourish  in  consequence  of  the 
fires  and  the  leaves,  which  form  new  vegetable  mould. 
— II.  and  G.  Mail. 
^ 
SALE  OF  THE  MESSRS.  CHAMBERLAIN’S 
BADULLA  ESTATE. 
We  learn  that  Mahapallagalla  estate,  Badulla, 
has  been  sold  by  the  Messrs.  H.  & W.  Cham  her- 
lain  (brothers  of  tlie  Rt.  Hon.  Josejih  Chamberlain, 
M.B.)  to  tlie  Nahavilla  Estates  Co.  for  the  sum 
of  £7,000.  Tlie  pro(ierty  includes  323  acres,  of 
which  47  are  in  collee,  200  in  tea,  20  acres  fuel 
trees  and  the  rest  patena.  It  ought  therefore  to 
bo  a bar^jain  for  the  Company. 
