July i, 1897.] 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
7 
It was Indian seed ; but it got in as the Commis- 
sioner at that time was anxious it should be started. 
The cofiee is planted under shade there.” 
‘‘Then the administration seem to have done very 
little for the conntri' up to date, — I mean as far as 
helping the planter goes. There is a great want 
of roads and transx^ort facilities. We sent all pro- 
duce to Chiromo on the river Zambesi. That is 70 
miles away, and all the produce had to go down on 
niggers’ heads as, though there was a river near us, 
and it led to Chiromo, it was not navigable, from 
Chiromo our produce went to Chinde ; Beira, of course, 
being the port of export. There were two steamer 
lines which took our produce away, namely, the 
German Bast African line, which goes by way of 
Aden, and Rennie’s line, which runs south round 
the Cape direct home, and which took the bulk 
of what we sent. The steamers of these lines call 
alternately once a fortnight. But Beira is just the 
same primitive place, it always was. Not a single 
thing has been done in the way of making proper 
warehouses there, and what is exported and what 
is imported lies about on the shore till removed, and 
is exposed to all sorts of weather. 
‘‘Labour is plentiful. At least it is plentiful with 
the exception of the four wet months. That time 
the natives mostly employ in working their own 
gardens. A lot of the labour comes from Lake 
Nyassa, the people coming down a distance of over 
200 miles. We sent Kanganies to recruit them, and 
when we got the labourers we paid them, in calico, 
three shillings a month, so they were cheap. The 
local labourers only cot two shillings’ worth of calico 
a month. We had no trouble either with advances 
or tundus. The language spoken is Mananga, it is 
very easy to learn, and all of us spoke it. The 
Angonis are the best labourers, and when we got 
them we had to get the Mananga language inter- 
preted, but that was gemjrally easily managed. The 
great want was native artisan. — “Local Times.” 
COFFEE-GROWING. 
C. SKELTON. 
My attention having been drawn to a paragraph 
adverting to a sample of coffee having been forwarded 
to the Department of Agriculture from the Clarence 
River district, as an ex-Ceylou coffee-planter, I felt 
interested in the fact that coffee could he produced 
in New South Wales, and called upon Mr. W. S. 
Campbell — of the Department — who was kind enough 
to show me the sample, which though only partly 
cured, being in the “ parchment ” — ■ which, together 
with the silver skin having to be removed before it 
would be considered a marketable commodity — goes 
to move that a fair quality of coffee can be grown 
in the Colony. The bean seems full, and of a tolerably 
good colour ; so far as I can judge it would fetch 
from 6.03. to 70s. per cwt. in the Loudon market ; 
were it cured in “plantation style” it might realize 
from 20 to 25 per cent. more. The question to be 
solved is, what yield per acre can be obtained from 
the plant in the latitude of the district where the 
sample was produced, for coffee is indubitably a 
tropical product and requires plenty of heat and 
moisture. What I am afraid will be found most 
detrimental to the success of coffee in this Colony 
are the frosts that even in the most northerly parts 
of the Colony are occasionally experienced. In 
Ceylon I once saw a field of coffee killed right out 
by one night’s slight frost ; it was at a very high 
altitude, about 5,000 feet, and it must have been of 
very rare occurrence, for the trees were ten or twelve 
years old when they were bitten. However, if that 
difficulty can be surmounted and labour obtained at 
a reasonable figure, the coffee would have to yield 
from 50 to 60 bushels of “ cherry” coffee per acre 
— equal to about 6 cwt. per acre, or about i lb. of 
clean coffee per tree — to pay working expenses and 
leave a fair profit. 
To the intending planter a few hints from one 
with seventeen years’ experience at coffee-growing 
may not be amiss. Choose, if pjossible, land naturally 
drained, a gentle slope is preferable, so that surface 
water will not lie and sour the soil. Good friable 
soil, of course, is a desideratum, it need not necessarily 
be very deep, as coffee is a surface feeder. Avoid 
cold, wet clay sub-soil, as immediately the tap root 
reaches such a subsoil the tree will be observed to 
decline and ultimately die of what Ceylon prlanters 
used to technically term “ wet feet” ; the only cure 
for it is sub-soil draining, and that runs into a lot 
of money. The land obtaised, the next thing is to 
make a nursery. Clear a piece, sufficient to raise 
plants for the area you intend to open, which, planted 
at 6 feet by 6 feet, runs to about 1,200 plants to 
the acre. Trench the ground and lay it out in beds, 
as you would a vegetable garden. Procure some coffee 
in the “ cherry ” — a bushel of cherry coffee will yield 
somewhere about 30,000 seeds, sufficient to plant 
about 25 acres — and pulp it by squeezing between 
the fingers, plant the seeds in the prepared beds 
9 inches by 9 inches apart, with just acovering of earth 
over them. Water every morning and evening, unless it 
rains, and continue to do so until the plants are 3 
or 4 inches above ground, and afterwards, should the 
weather be dry, give them a good watering every 
alternate evening or so. Meantime, while the plants 
in the nursery are coming on, y'our land is supposed 
to be in process of being cleared. Let the logs that 
have not been consumed by the fire remain on the 
ground; stumping also is unnecessary, as there is no 
ploughing to be done. Get some thousands of pegs 
cut, about 15 inches long ; with these and a lining 
rope (an ordinary clothes line will answer), marked 
at every 6 feet with a piece of rag, or something let 
into the twist, proceed to mark off your ground in 
parallel lines 6 feet apart. Keep your lines as straight 
as possible by using three ranging rods, or wadd 
sticks, as they are usually called here. You will 
find the benefit of having your trees in straight lines 
afterwards in working the place ; besides, nothing 
looks so bad as an irregularly lined field of coffee. 
It may sometimes be fouud necessary to cut or roll 
a log out of the way in order to get the peg m its 
proper place. When all the lining is done proceed 
to dig a hole 18 inches deep, by the same in width, 
at each peg, leaving all the soil dug out in a heap 
at the lower side of the hole. Scrape all the surface 
soil and ashes left from the burning off into the hole 
till it is heaped up, as it will sink considerably, then 
stick back the peg into the heap to mark the hole. 
After the holing and filling in is finished, seize the 
opportunity of the first wet weather to plant out your 
nursery plants, which, we will suppose, are uow five 
or six mouths old, as it will take about that time 
to prepare the land for their reception. Lift each 
alternate plant, either by pulling them up and carrying 
them out to the field in bundles, or, if you have 
time and labour to spare, lifting each with a ball 
of earth at the root and taking them out to the 
field on trays of some sort. The latter way is the 
best when it can be done, but if you have'a large 
field of 80 or 100 acres to plant up it takes a lot 
more labour to do it. Be sure not to put the plant 
in too deep, but only to the same depith that it 
stood in the nursery ; it is a mistake that is often 
made to plant too deep, the leaves grow yellow and 
the plant seems strangled, and often takes a long 
time to recover. It is a good plan to put the plant 
in a little deeper than you intend to leave it, place 
the earth round the roots, then stand with a foot 
on each side, and give the plant a steady, gentle 
pull upwards — that brings all the roots straight. If 
you have favourable weather probably most of your 
plants will come on all right, but there are sure to 
be some failures, and tilling up vacancies with the 
plants left in the nursery should be carried on at 
•very opportunity, that is whenever you have wet 
weather. Planting completed, there is nothing much 
to be done except keeping the place clear of weeds, 
cutting any roads or drains that may be found neces- 
sary, and erecting some sort of temporary house 
accommodation for self and labourers; which should 
be of the cheapest, until such time as you can seg 
