CHAPTER XIII 
WHEAT, MAIZE, COFFEE 
Wheat has been in the past both a considerable 
success and a considerable disappointment, and to what 
extent the amount to be exported will increase is at 
the present moment a matter of doubt. But for one 
drawback, the crop in certain districts is eminently 
desirable. It is cheap to sow and to harvest, and with 
the use of modern machinery requires comparatively 
little native labour. The crop under normal conditions 
is a heavy one, and is readily disposed of either at 
Nairobi for local consumption or for export. The 
great deterrent, as in many other parts of the world, 
is rust, which to a greater or lesser degree has attacked 
every one of the hundred varieties of wheat experi¬ 
mented with. 
Njoro, on Lord Delamere’s and the neighbouring 
estates, has been the chief centre of the wheat-growing 
industry, there being some 5,000 acres under wheat in 
the neighbourhood of the station. The course of 
wheat-growing in this district has run somewhat as 
follows. The first areas ploughed up were planted 
with two or three different varieties of wheat, of which 
“ Gluyas ” formed the principal. The first crops were 
excellent, in some cases more than 30 bushels to the 
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