170 
BRITISH CENTRAL AFRICA 
“Pazulu, Novembe?' 20 th. 
“ I have been much too busy to write any letters for the last two months—awfully busy 
but wonderfully well and not the least bit dull. When I had cleared my ground for the 
plantation I had it lined out in regular rows from six feet to seven feet apart, and at 
intervals of about six feet along these rows we dug pits 18 inches wide and 18 inches 
deep. The pits were left open for some six weeks u to w'eather,” then we filled them 
up with soil, which was mixed with a manure made of cow-dung and wood ashes. After 
each pit had been filled up we stuck into the middle of it a bamboo stick (bamboos grow 
in abundance along the stream bank and on the hill-sides and dre very useful) to mark 
the place where the coffee plant was to be put it. I made arrangements with a neigh¬ 
bouring planter to buy sufficient coffee seedlings of a year’s growth to plant up the 
50 acres I have cleared. Every day we expect the rainy season to begin now—in fact 
to-day the 20th November is the date on which the big rains ordinarily begin near 
Blantyre (we had occasional showers in July and August and one or two in September, 
but no rain at all in October, only a lot of thunder and lightning and an occasional dry 
tornado). As soon as the rains have really broken I shall put the coffee plants in these 
pits. I am told that whilst the coffee grows the weeds grow even quicker, and that the 
hardest time I shall have with my own men will be during December, January and 
February, keeping the weeds down. If we are not incessantly at work hoeing in 
between the coffee plants they will be smothered by the growth of weeds. 
“ It is so very good of old McClear to put me up in his house that I have been 
doing my best to help him in between working on my own plantation. He gathered 
his first coffee crop this year, and is very pleased at the result. The berries were 
picked off the trees (which are three years old) at the end of June and the beginning of 
July, and all this was over before I arrived on the scene; but I saw the berries when they 
were being pulped by machinery. By this process the sweet fleshy covering of the 
berries is taken off and the bean is disclosed encased in its parchment skin. You know 
of course that this splits into two seeds when you take off the dry skin and it is merely 
these seeds which you see wffien the coffee reaches you at home. I shall not get a 
pulper till I have owned my plantation for about four years, as it is hardly worth while 
for a poor man to have a maiden crop off a small plantation pulped by machinery. 
“ After the beans are pulped they are passed into a brick vat where they are left to 
ferment for between 24 and 36 hours. Then they are removed to a second vat and 
thoroughly washed in water. Then they are taken out and dried on mats. After this 
they are further dried in a drying house and constantly turned over to prevent anything 
like mould. All through the end of September and the beginning of October we were 
busy packing the coffee in stout canvas bags, weighing about 56 lbs. each. Each bag 
was numbered and marked with McClear’s initials by stencil plates, and handed over to 
one of the transport companies here to be shipped direct to London, via Chinde. It 
will of course be carried partly on men’s heads and partly in waggons down to Katunga, 
and then they will send it down river to Chinde. It is to be hoped they will be 
careful not to put the bags into a leaky boat or steamer, because if they are wetted 
the coffee will be quite spoiled. The cost of sending this coffee from Blantyre to 
London is about j £8 a ton. 
“ Blantyre, January 1st. 
“ In spite of the rainy season which is well on us, we have spent a very jolly 
Christmas at Blantyre. Most of the planters from Cholo and the other districts round 
Blantyre have congregated here for Christmas week. We had a little mild horse-racing 
and a shooting competition. Like most of the other Europeans here I belong to the 
Shire Highlands Shooting Club, but I did not score over well on this occasion, because 
I was a bit off colour, having had another little touch of fever—Gaused by the beginning 
