4 
with 3 furnaces. In each of these furnaces there is a shaft 
driven by pullies to which blades are fixed which work into the 
mass. The reduced pulp which passes through the first furnace 
by the screw motion of the blades is dropped into the second 
furnace. From there it passes into the third furnace, the dry¬ 
ing taking place at 60 lbs steam pressure within 20 minutes. 
This matter thus gradually shredded and dessicated passes 
afterwards into a desintigrator in which it is pulverised and 
then lifted by an elevator into cylindrical revolving sieves for 
sifting out the coarse stuff which is passed a second time into 
the desintigrator. 
During the drying process, centifrugal fans take the fumes 
from the furnaces and blow them into the fire to avoid the 
smell as much as possible. 
A whale 30 feet long yields 13 to 16 barrels of oil (barrels 
of 42 gallons), but a foot in the length of a whale makes a lot 
of difference in the bulk of the body and a whale 55 feet long 
yields as much as 90 to 100 barrels. The average length of 
the 60 whales caught in 4 months up to date was 35 feet and 
the yield amounted to 20 barrels each. The proportion of 
spermaceti and other oils for a whale 44 feet long was the 
following :— 
Spermaceti oil ... 81 barrels 
Blubber oil ... 40 ,, 
Meat oil ... 14 „ 
Total 88 ,, 
bio ambergris was found but remains of beaks of the 
octopus were discovere > in the intestines of the whales tending 
to confirm the olci tiieory that this valuable substance originates 
from concretions formed in the body of the animals round 
undigested fragments of cuttlefish. 
The principal market for whale oil is Marseilles where it 
is turned into all sorts of edible fats or used in soap manu¬ 
factures. Its present price is as high as £34 a ton. 
In the course ot the year a letter was received by TTia 
Excellency the Governor from Professor Gudger of the United 
States with reference to the possibility of studying and cap¬ 
turing shark whales (Chagrin) Rhinoton typicus, in Seychelles 
waters. Fishermen report that this great shark whales (10 
to 50 feet long) is found all the year round in Mahe mostly 
on the shoals between Silhouette and N. W. Bay and at some 
distance between Mamelles and Ste Anne. They appear to be¬ 
come more numerous when big numbers of caraugue bale 
(caranx gymnostethoides) are seen in the neighbourhood. 
METEOROLOGICAL OBSERVATIONS. 
The total rainfall for 1914 is by far the highest on record 
for the last 10 years. It amounted to 121.58 inches, being 
higher by 36 inches than that of 1918. Rain fell very heavily 
from January to June and from September to December, 
leaving only 2 mouths, July and August during which there 
was less rain. Still the number of rainy days were 16 in July 
and 10 in August. Light rains occurred often although the total 
rainfall for these two months did not much exceed 2 inches. 
When rains fall abundantly during 6 months and stops for a. 
short time only to begin again 2 months after with the same 
violence, the period of vegetative activity continues all the year 
round. Though this is beneficial to coconuts, Hevea rubber, 
&c., which are coming from wet equatorial countries, where 
abundant rains occur, the same cannot be said of vanilla which 
is of mexican origin and indigenous to drier countries. It is 
however beneficial in Seychelles to have a long period of rainy 
weather excepting for vanilla which is one of the plants to the 
crop of which continual rains are detrimental. Other plants 
including bananas, coconuts, rubber, cassava, sweet potatoes, 
yams, eddoes (arouilles), breadfruit, jacktrees &c., benefit con¬ 
siderably from heayy T '’rains not only because the soil is softened 
and rendered more accessible to the roots, but also because thet 
rains destroy the numerous parasites that infest the leave?: and. 
flowers of the above mentioned trees during the dry weather. 
