COFFEE-PICKma. 
bringing in unripe coffee, he picked out all the green 
and half ripe, threw the berries on the ground, and 
deposited the ripe in his bag, brought in his dt-ficient 
coffee to the pulping-house, bad his name marked 
do wo, and went his way, nor did it ever enter into 
the mind of the master, what the result of thia un- 
jnethodical forcing system was ; he bad got the full 
m^^asure nent required in the measure of fruit defici mt, 
and he had lost two by bad picking in tbe green 
and unripe picked out and thrown away. To such an 
extent was this system carried on, that it sometimes 
happened neighbouring bazar-keepers would offer a 
su'ti of money for leave to pick the dried coffee that 
had been dropped during crop, off the ground, of course 
after crop was over, and report sometimes said that 
these bazar-keepers, who, from some reasons or other, 
could make very certain of obtdning this contract 
used to 'quietly bint to the- coolies to drop as much> 
coffee as they could, for some private consideration* 
such as a small weekly supply of salt tish or chillies. 
The pulping-house itself 'was a mere shed, a roof 
of thatch supported on balf-a-di zen. woorien posts, 
with a cherry-loft on the top; no doors or looks rail 
stood open, and sharp coolies have be n known when 
cherry coffee was not pulped over night to purloin 
from the heap in the cherry-loft a bagful of coffee and 
bring it in a second time as newly picked. JN'o won- 
der that the parchment was short, or that the master 
was under the impression it had been stolen, 
when the measurement to despatching carts turned 
out so woefully deficient of what it ought 
to have been. If there was not enough room in the 
receiving cistern, th'» pulped coffee was shoved led out 
on the ground outside, heaped up. and old bags or mats 
covered over it to make it ferpient, being shovelled 
back into the washing cistern in small quantities to 
be washed up as time allowed, and yet I have known 
some of the highest prices procured for coffee that had 
received this treatment, which shews that it does not 
gvnerally ensue that extensive and expensive ru ping- 
houses and stores are necessary for the obtaining of 
good prices. When looking at the stores of tJie oiden 
times, what were they to our present ideas? Ihey were 
better fitted for spoiling coffee than curing it. A 
thatch roof, walls of wattle and mud, close plank doors 
and windows, mud floor on which mats were spread to 
receive the coffee, wet very probably, a raised plat- 
form in the centre, planked, on which the dried coffee 
was stored. There was no ventilation : on the contrary 
on the doors and windows being openeH there was often 
a damp musty smell. After the coffee was turned 
over, the whole of the store would be filled wbih a 
