Dec. t, 1897.] THE TROPICAL 
TEA COMPANIES AND DIVIDENDS. 
THE NEW DIMBULA COMPANY. ^ 
We call attention to the Directors’ Keport 01 
this Company for last year. It indicates con- 
tinued prosperity notwithstanding adverse ex- 
change and a lower average price for tea. 1 he 
“ New Dimbula ” is one of the strongest Coni- 
panies connected with Ceylon, and much credit 
is due to Mr. Dick-Lander and his staff for the 
admirable management of the Company’s ex- 
tensive property, which now includes over '2,300 
acres of tea. The Company has three classes of 
shareholders A. B. and C. and it will be observed 
that the first two have dividends at the rate of 
16 per cent per annum divided amongst them; 
and the third 14 per cent ; while after deductions 
for planting extension, some £3,000 are carrie d 
to the reserve fund. Among the home Direc- 
tors we always tliink of Sir Arthur Birch, 
and Mr. W. Herbert Anderson (the Managing 
Director) in connection with this Company and 
its good Tnanagement. It is in every way a 
credit to the Colony. 
Few Companies give so much information 
about its operations as “The Consolidated 
Estates Coy., Ld.,” whose Keport also finds a 
place in this issue. The interests of this Com- 
pany are spread over a good many districts 
— Dimbula, Kotmalie, Hewaheta, Nilambe, 
Matale and Kalutara — and it has now 2,711 
acres of tea in full bearing, 129 partial with 
334 acres recently planted, besides some carda- 
moms and cacao. The crops of the past year 
have been excellent (and the prospects are good), 
but a lower average price for tea with 
adverse exchange has led to a reduction in 
dividend from eight ]>er cent, in 1895-6, to six 
per cent, in 1896-7. The strictest economy is 
to be exercised during the current year, in 
order, if possible, to counterbalance exchange. 
We need scarcely say that with Messrs. Geo. 
Steuart & Co., as agents in Ceylon, and Messrs. 
Arbuthnot, Latham & Co. in London, the 
interests of “The Consolidated” are in good 
hands. 
Une has never heard much of “The 
Korala Tea Estates Coy.,” and indeed it only 
dates from May 1895, when Riverside, Glenloch, 
Karagastalava, Wewesse and Debedde estates 
were taken up and the Company formed. The 
Keport now published is not pleasant reading ; 
but we trust there are better times in store 
for this Company as indeed for all Ceylon 
Companies. 
PLANTING NOTES. 
Royal Gardens ‘‘ Kew Bulletin,” of Miscellane- 
ous Information. Contents for October is as fol- 
lows ; — Botanic Station, Sierra Leone ; Improve- 
ment of the Sugar-beet and Sugar-cane ; Forest 
Products of Sierra Leone ; Butter and Tallow Tree 
of Sierra Leone ; Coffee Cultivation at the Gold 
Coast ; Botanical Enterprise in West Africa ; Mis- 
cellaneous. 
What the Coffee Planter has to put up with. — 
Professor A. W. Stokes, the public analyst for the 
borough of Hampstead, says in his annual report to 
the vestry of Hampstead, which has just been 
printed: “ Coffee showed an adulteration of 8| per 
cent of its samples, by means of from 50 to 60 per 
cent of chicory. It is usually said that the buyer 
E refers a mixture of chicory and coffee. This may 
e true ; but when the buyer asks for ‘ coffee ’ he 
ought not to get the mixture. But so long as coffee 
costs twenty pence and chicory only four pence per 
E ound the temptation to some vendors to think the 
uyer means a mixture when he says ‘ coffee ’ will be 
irresistible.” — H. and C, Mail, Oct. 22. 
AGRICULTURISt. 393 
From Tea to Coconut Planting. — Mr. T. Patter- 
son, employed on Holmwood estate, Agrapatnas, 
purchased on the 13th October last a block of land 
containing about 97 acres between Negonibo and Miri- 
garna. He intends to leave Holmwood, after four- 
teen years as conductor and assistant superintendent 
to take charge of the new block and, plant coconuts 
and Liberian Coffee. 
Weight of Coconut Crop Per Acre.— Our 
correspondent “D” writes: — “You were asking 
about the weight of a crop of coconuts. Taking 
4 lb. as the average weight of a fresh coconut, 
and calculating 3,000 per acre jier annum, for 
an average crop, the weight of tho produce 
will be something over 5 tons.” We are much 
obliged to our corre.spondent : now for “ cinna- 
mon” sticks and a'l? 
Scientific Research.— We understand that Mr. 
D. Hooper, formerly so well-known as a clever Che- 
mical Analyst at Ootacaiiiund, has established a 
research laboratory in the Indian Museum in con- 
nection with economic products. He will be allowed 
by the Trustees to undertake on a small scale private 
analyses of cinchona bark and other organic produce. 
It is a pity that the Madras Government could not 
see its way to retain his services in this Presidency, 
but, though further off, Madras planters will, we 
fancy, be only too glad to re-avail themselves of 
his invaluable services.— Pfaith'rey Oi>inion. 
guano in the Seychelles,— B y a recent mail 
we had a letter from Mr. John Hughes in wliich, 
inter alia, he mentioned :— 
“ I have this week completed the analysis of a 
Phosphatic guano forwarded me from the office of 
the Crown Colonies in Downing Street. The sample 
was forwarded from the Seychelles Islands. I don’t 
know whether the results will be made public or not, 
so I had better say no more, but it may be inter- 
esting to know that a phosphatic guano exists in 
these islands, to what extent I do not know. 
“I am very busy with agricultural analysis as the 
rise in the price of wheat has given quite an impetus 
to the manufacture and sale of manures.” 
Coffee anb Cacao Cultivation at the Gold 
Coast.— A good deal of general work has been done 
in the Government Botanical Station during the 
year and considerable attentioa has been paid to 
the plantations of coffee and cacao, in the cultiva- 
tion of both of which, but more especially the former, 
the natives appear to have become interested. Along 
the road leading from the Botanical Station through 
the country of Akwapim to the interior are large 
numbers of small clearings in which coffee plants, 
chiefly obtained by pur.-;hase from the Botanic 
Station, are to be seen in a most flourishing con- 
dition. The Liberian coffee plant appears to 
thrive best, but there are large quantities also 
of the Arabian coffee plant, the berry of which, 
however, is small and apparently deteriorated. It will 
probably be necessary for the Government at no 
distant date, if the coffee industry is to be fostered 
into a trade, to instruct these native cultivators 
in the proper way of preparing the berry for export. 
At present the most primitive method is employed! 
The berries are scraped by hand with a round stone 
worked in the hollow of a larger stone, and after 
this process they are washed and dried in the sun. It 
is obvious that a large crop could not be so dealt with, 
and that the employment of machinery in the near 
future is imperative. During the last two years the 
Government has introduced machinery for pulping and 
curing coffee, and consignments of both coffee and 
caono have been forwarded through the Crown Agents 
for sale in the London market. This plan afforded 
tho best means for testing the commercial value of the 
produce, and it is gratifying to find that the result 
shows that coffee and cacao can be grown in West 
Africa capable of realising good prices in European 
markets. Much still remains to be done to induce 
the natives to cultivate and cure their produce in a 
satisfactorv manner . — Kew Bulletin, 
