3d 
Pepper and Gambir before the Tapioca, but of this fhave no record. 
Bad as the stiff clay soil of this area is-, the continued cultivation 
has considerably improved it, and it is an example of what could 
be done with the waste lands, if natives could be induced to con- 
tinue cultivating them. 
The causes of this compulsory rotation of crops are few in num- 
ber. The sr -trees were abandoned on account of a disease in 
i860. In those days there were no scientific men, nor any Botanic 
or Experimental Gardens in the Colony where the causes of such 
diseases could be inve i igated and means of attacking them be 
dev’ d, and so serious a catastrophe is hardly likely to be a cause 
of aoandoning a cultivation again. Liberian Coffee was dropped 
owing to a fall in price of the product. Pepper and Gambier (always 
grown together) died out on account of the available land being 
used up, and the exhaustion of the firewood, which was very extra- 
vagantly used. Tapioca, which like Gambir is a very exhausting 
crop, also went off- the ground from exhaustion of the soil. Indigo, 
almost exclusively cultivated in Singapore, was abandoned, mainly 
on account of the fact that it was necessary to grow it near the 
town where the dye-works were. The development of the town 
and demand for building lots practically drove out the dye-houses, 
which required large supplies of water, only to be had in certain 
places. 
HISTORY OF THE ECONOMIC PLANTS. 
beverages:* 
Coffee {Arabian ). — The earliest mention I have found of the cul- 
tivation of Coffee in the Malay Peninsula is by Dr. KOENIG in his 
manuscript account of his oyage in the East in 1779, where he 
records seeing some in a garden in Malacca. I think, however, it is 
probable that it was introduced earlier, as it was introduced into 
Java >y Van HooRjn'e in 1690, and was probably brought over to 
Malacca by the Dutch when they first occupied Malacca. Newbold 
mentions seeing it in Malacca in small quantities in 1833, in his 
account of Naning, and Balestier (Logan’s Journal II, p. 1 4 1 ) 
mentions a few frees growing in Penang in 1848. In these early 
days, it was chiefly grown in a casual sort of way by natives for 
personal use and there is no really early record of any attempt to 
grow it for export, by Europeans till later, when many attempts 
were made by European planters to cultivate it on a large scale, 
but being a plant un ted for this country these attempts were 
practical failures. It was grown, however, at Waterloo Estate and 
elsewhere as late as 1902. 
The soil and climate, in fact, is not suitable for this plant, and in 
1891 {Agricultural Bulletin , No. 1, p. 14), I wrote, “l do not think 
that Arabian Coffee can ever be successfully cultivated in the Straits 
Settlements.” This statement was strongly criticised and con- 
