IV 
CLOVES 
185 
crepancy may be accounted for by the alteration in the rating, 
which was at first per 300 pishi. I wanted the headmen, etc. 
to receive a fair, but not an excessive wage; as the season 
advanced I found that I had under-estimated the daily pick, 
which was about 400 instead of 300 pishi, so I altered the 
rating accordingly. The spreaders were allowed 3 pice each 
per day, but at Kitumba, where the quantity of cloves to handle 
was proportionally much less, the spreaders were paid at a higher 
rate. This would introduce another slight error into the first 
calculation. The whole of the Kitumba staff of headmen, etc. 
should in reality have been rated differently, but this would 
have led to confusion in the accounts, which were kept by an 
Arab who, admirably as he did his work, was not familiar with 
European methods of book-keeping. Eor the same reason I 
abandoned at Machui the idea of paying the pickers at the rate 
of 4 pice for every pishi picked after the first 6. Where super- 
vision is difficult, as it is in clove picking, this system would 
most certainly have led to imposture by the people. It would, 
for instance, have been easy for two or three to have united their 
day’s gatherings in order to make up the required quantity for 
the extra pice. At Dunga, which was, I believe, the only place 
where the system was adopted, we had got a sufficient amount 
of cloves to judge of its efficacy. 
The net returns to December 31 are then shown to be 
E.6,142. Allowing now for the estimated 300 fraslas still to 
pick, and valuing them at 5 rupees a frasla, the price to which 
cloves subsequently dropped, the total net returns are increased 
to E.7,245. 
Account Statement for the Season (Appy^ox.) 
Net returns to December 31 . . . .E.6,142 
300 fraslas at E.5 ...... 1,500 
Total . . E.7,642 
Cost’ of gathering 300 fraslas . . . . 397 
Balance profit ....... 7,245 
Total . . E.7,642 
Balance profit . . E.7,245 
Eupees 7,245 from 8,500 trees is equal to an income of 13J 
annas per tree. 
The waste upon the trees, which I have estimated at \ of 
the crop, would, if collected, have sufficed to pay for the entire 
expenditure. My object here, however, is to compare our 
actual expenditure and receipts, and to arrive at a fair estimate 
