THE  TROPICAL  AGRICQLTURIST. 
[Aug.  I,  1896, 
114 
He,  as  well  as  his  predecssors,  had  always  set  a 
high  value  on  the  assistance  given  by  the  tea  planters 
to  the  administration  in  various  forms.  They  were 
the  backbone  of  the  British  Government  in  tlnit 
district ; and  were  the  chief  members  of  the  District 
Board,  corresponding  to  the  county  councils  in 
England,  through  wliom  were  carried  out  the  making 
and  repairs  of  roads,  the  establishment  of  schools, 
the  improvement  of  sanitation — in  fact,  every  des- 
cription of  work.  The  question  of  labour  was  a 
difficult  one  in  Darjeeling,  though  it  was  not  nearly 
so  difficult  there  as  in  other  parts  of  India.  Re- 
ference had  been  made  in  the  paper  to  the  depletion 
of  tea  gardens  through  competition  by  the  Government 
in  recruiting  labour  for  military  purposes  in  Burmah 
and  Bengal.  This  recruiting  had  been  complained 
of  by  the  tea  planters  as  drawing  upon  their  supply 
of  laboirr.  But  the  Government  had  taken  the 
greatest  possible  pains  to  prevent  any  such  grievance 
arising.  A transport  officer  had  been  appointed  at 
Darjeeling  with  a depot  there,  and  he  had  strict 
injunctions  to  see  that  none  of  the  recruiters  went 
to  the  tea  gardens  or  took  anyone  employed  there. 
The  recruits  were  kept  at  the  depot  for  some 
considerable  time ; so  that  any  planter  who  had 
suspicion  that  his  labourers  had  been  carried  off 
might  go  to  the  depot  and  see  the  recruits,  and  in 
case  he  identified  any  of  his  coolies  the  authorities 
would  not  retain  them.  He  had  heard  the  same 
story  about  the  want  of  male  labourers  on  some 
of  the  gardens,  but  well-mauaged  gardens  in  a favour- 
able situation  did  not  suffer  in  this  way.  The  two 
Tukvar  gardens,  including  the  one  over  which  Mr. 
Christiaon  presided,  were  instances  of  what  could 
be  done  by  good  mauagemeat.  They  did  not  recruit 
labour ; they  bred  more  labour  than  they  could 
employ.  The  labourers  lived  upon  these  estates 
permanently  ; children  grew  up  there  and  multiplied 
to  such  an  extent  that  one  of  the  chief  difficulties 
was  to  find  employment  in  the  gardens  for  the 
children  bred  on  the  estates.  In  other  gardens 
which  were  not  so  near  civilisation,  and  perhaps  not 
so  well  managed,  the  difficulty  of  finding  labour  was 
no  doubt  greater.  The  grievance  was  not,  as  might 
be  supposed,  that  Government  recruited  coolies  em- 
ployed upon  the  gardens,  but  that  Government  went 
Into  the  same  market  as  the  tea  planters,  and  em- 
ployed men  whom  the  planters  might  have  einployed. 
The  immigration  from  Nepal  referred  to  by  Mr. 
Christison  was  employed  in  three  different  ways— part 
went  on  to  the  gardens  as  they  wore  extended,  the 
greatest  part  went  on  to  the  land,  especially  in  inde- 
pendent Sikkim,  whore  agricultural  extension  had  been 
very  large;  and  a small  portion  was  recruited  by  the 
Government  for  military  and  transport  service.  All 
that  could  be  done  was  to  try  and  arrange  that  the 
competition  should  not  be  an  unfair  one.  The  Govern- 
ment required  very  severe  work  from  the  men  it 
recruited  for  the  military  police  and  for  transport  work. 
They  were  sent  long  distances,  and  to  unhealthy 
districts;  cn  the  other  hand,  they  were  seldom  required 
for  a long  period,  whereas  tea  planters  employed  them 
for  life.  As  the  men  had  to  undergo  great  privations 
while  in  the  employ  of  the  Government  they  received 
a larger  wage  than  they  got  from  the  tea  planter, 
and  do  doubt  to  the  more  adventurous  sprits  a higher 
wage  with  a short  period  of  service  was  more  at- 
tractive in  spite  of  the  distance  and  risk  to  life. 
On  the  other  hand,  the  wages  earned  on  the  tea 
gardens  were  certainly  large,  and  thrifty  and  diligent 
families  were  able  to  save  a considerable  sum, 
His  own  belief  was  that  all  had  been  done  which 
could  be  done  to  secure  fairness  in  the  tea  planter’s 
interest.  He  need  not  say  that  if  any  well-considered 
complaint  were  made,  and  some  grievances  established, 
there  would  be  the  greatest  readiness  on  the  p.art 
of  the  Government  to  listen  to  the  complaint  and 
to  remove-  the  grievance.  With  regard  to  the  wider 
auestion  which  had  been  touched  on  by  Sir  Steuart 
Bavlev  he  might  mention  that  the  Commission  which 
had  bemr  sitting  to  di.-cuss  thi  1 particular  question 
and  the  remedy  to  lie  applied,  had  suggested  that 
the  work  of  recruiting  labourers  for  tea  gardens 
Assam  should  be  coucenLrated  inio  a single  hand, 
evil  which  had  arisen  with  regard  to  the 
in 
The 
great 
competition  of  labourers  had  arisen  from  the  im- 
mense number  of  different  persons  who  were  com- 
petiting  against  each  other — deceiving  each  other, 
stealing  each  others  coolies,  kidnapping  women  and 
cliildreu,  or  enticing  them  by  false  pretences,  and 
even  using  force  and  wrongful  confinement  so  that 
they  constantly  figured  in  tbe  police  courts  A great 
contrast  was  presented  by  colonial  emigration,  which 
was  conducted  by  well-paid  agents  established  in 
Calcutta,  who  recruit  from  10,000  to  1.5,000  men  and 
women  every  year  for  the  colonies.  These  recruits 
were  brougnt  down  to  Calcutta  and  embarked  at 
Calcutta  at  15  rupees  per  head.  An  exactly  similar 
class  were  brought  down  from  the  same  parts  of 
the  couut.T}’,  and  taken  to  Assam,  but  instead  of 
costing  15  rupees  they  cost  the  tea  planter  150 
rupees.  And  the  tea  industry  had  to  pay  annually 
a line  of  50  lakhs  of  rupees  on  the  50,000  to  (50,000 
people  who  immigrate  into  Assam.  This  large  sum, 
or  most  of  it,  went  into  the  hands  of  the  middle- 
men. The  only  remedy  which  could  be  suggested 
was  to  sweep  the  middleman  away ; and  ho  trusted 
this  would  be  the  result  of  the  commission  that  was 
now  sitting  to  report  upon  the  subject. 
Mr.  Shillington  said  that,  having  been  a tea-taster 
in  Mincing-lane  for  the  last  30  years,  he  should 
like  to  refer  to  one  point  to  which  Mr.  Christson 
had  alluded,  namely,  that  of  bulking.  It  had  been 
suggested  that  the  dock  companies  did  not  act  fairly 
in  the  matter.  He  wish  to  say  that,  although  the 
treatment  that  tea  received  at  the  docks  was  rather 
rough,  still  it  was  a necessity  that  every  parcel 
should  be  turned  out  and  packed  again.  It  was 
said  the  remedy  was  to  bulk  the  tea  at  the  gardens, 
hut,  unless  they  could  have  perfectly  even  quality, 
it  was  hopeless  to  rely  on  this.  With  regard  to 
the  question  of  tares,  it  had  been  said  that  in 
India  they  could  not  get  wood  which  did  not  dry 
upon  its  way  home.  But  the  difficulty  had  been 
avoided  in  China,  where  they  sawed  their  wood  five 
years  before  it  was  v/anted.  The  Indian  tea  industry 
was  getting  to  be  a large  affair ; and  it  was  a 
terrible  thing  to  tasters  to  have  to  deal  with  such 
a large  number  of  samples.  He  recollected  the  time 
when  one  sample  of  Chinese  tea  would  represent 
COO  chests  ; in  India  a sample  represented  an  avertige 
of  28  chests,  the  consequence  being  that  the  tea 
tasters  had  to  taste  some  50,000  samples  each  year. 
He  suggested  that  in  future  the  uuinber  of  packages 
in  each  break  should  be  increased  to  100  chests 
at  least. 
Mr.  Ernest  Tyo  said  the  paper  was  a most  able 
one,  and  he  had  no  doubt  it  would  give  great 
pleasure  to  many  when  it  appeared  in  the  columns 
of  the  JonruaL  The  most  important  question  referred 
to  in  tho  discussion  was  the  labour  question  ; but 
as  this  had  been  so  exhaustively  dealt  with  by 
previous  speakers,  there  was  little  left  for  him  to 
say.  He  hoped  that  upon  some  future  occasion 
this  question  would  be  dealt  with  by  itself  in  a paper. 
Mr.  George  Williamson  said  he  could  not  agree 
with  everything  that  had  been  said  upon  the  labour 
question.  Groat  profiress  had  been  made  in  tbe 
cultivation  of  lea  in  India,  as  was  appaieut  from  the 
fact  that  an  enormous  quantity  was  now  exported,  while 
in  1818  (the  year  he  entered  tlio  field)  tho  export 
amounted  to  only  250,000  lbs.  There  were  large  areas 
still  suitable  for  tea  cultivation  in  India,  but  in  his 
opinion  the  widening  of  tho  field  of  consuniptio  1 
was  a more  important  factor  in  tho  problem  of 
the  future  prosperity  of  the  indii.stry  than  increas- 
ing the  area  of  production.  Ho  was  very  pleased 
to  see  Ceylon  take  tho  load  as  an  cdiioational  agency, 
but  lo  Ills  mind  the  Ceylon  tea  bad  not  tho  grit 
or  body  of  Indian  lea. 
Mr.  John  I’ciguson  said  that  tiioy  (in  Ceylon) 
acknowledged  that  the  Darjeeling  district  luo  liicod 
tlie  very  finest  lea,  and  v i ro  cm  ions  to  know  what 
increase  might  ho  locked  for  in  Northern  or  Sou- 
thei  n India  of  finest  to  is. 
of  tho  paper  had  not  quite 
tho  1(),()00,()(I0  11).  of  tea  now 
fiom  the  5(5, 01)1)  acres  were 
which  sold  at  tho  highest 
acreage  could  ho  added  to 
O)' 
lie  thonghttho  reader 
made  clear  whctlier 
pi'oduced  in  IXii-jee-litig 
ail  of  tho  fine  lea 
price,  and  whether  this 
materially,  Mr.  Christi- 
