290 QUEENSLAND AGRICULTURAL JouRNAL. [1 Aprin, 1899. 
1,000 trees per acre, yielding 2 lb. per tree. Thus there are at the present 
moment not sufficient coffee plants in bearing to overtake the Queensland con- 
sumption alone for the next two years. Meanwhile the population of the colon 
is rapidly increasing, and this area will be quite insufficient for the future. The 
outlook for coffee-planters is, we think, for many years, as hopeful as was that 
for sugar-planters before they had produced suflicient for the colony’s require- 
ments. That Queensland is eminently suited for successful coffee-planting, no 
one can now doubt. The industry has grown beyond the experimental stage, 
and now it is only a question of good management and economical working of 
the plantations. Mr. Newport, the Government Expert, will no doubt sueceed 
in his work of instructing planters in the most up-to-date methods of planting 
and curing. There is no leaf disease here, the climate and soil are adapted to 
the plant, and, if there be any difficulty, it will be in harvesting, owing to the 
present scarcity of pickers, but this is a matter which, like all other problems 
in agriculture, will settle itself as the occasion arises. 
COFFEE NOTES. 
Commow South Sea Island coffee has been lately sold at 31s. per cwt., or a 
fraction over 33d. per Ib. 
From Planting Opinion we take the following figures, supplied by a cor- 
respondent to that journal, relating to parchment coffee :— 
A standard bushel of cherry turns out 45 to 47 per cent. of parechment— 
a box (14 inches cube) turns out 52 to 60 per cent. 
192 bushels cherry = 783 parchment. 
2°60 bushels of cherry are required to give one of parchment dry enough 
for pounding out, or about 40 per cent. only against Ceylon 45 per 
cent. 
The least amount of heaping will make a difference. 
The writer of the notes says that he found it most difficult, on account of 
the popularly conceived idea of 2 bushels cherry equals 1 of parchment, to get 
a club of small native cultivators to accept 40 per cent. as the correct out-turn 
until the matter was proven to them beyond all question. 
There is another popular error that needs discussion, viz. :—‘‘ Parchment 
coffee increases in quantity as it dries.” : 
Mr. Brown, the correspondent alluded to, says:~-I have found from 
careful tests that it does not. There is a slight increase the first day or two 
after washing and measuring, but this increase soon changes to a decrease as 
the drying goes on. 
COFFEE MARKET REPORT. 
(To 13th January, 1899.) 
Cryton.—Plantation.—17 casks 9 barrels sold: Triage, 41s. to 43s.; 
smalls, 44s. to 55s.; low middling, 78s.; middling, 100s. to 101s.; fine middling 
- and bold, 104s. to 112s.; peaberry, 75s. to 110s. 
East Iypta.—20 bags bought in. 
NYAssatanp.—77 bags partly sold: Ordinary mixed, 34s.; fine ordinary, 48s. 
Mocra.—138 packages bought in. 
a ees barrels 27 bags mostly sold: Ordinary, 32s. 6d.; soft greenish, 
8s. 6d. 
TRINIDAD.—27 bags pale sold at 37s. 
Cosva Rica.—821 bags mostly sold: New crop, mixed to fine ordinary 
small, 28s. 6d. to 44s.; fine fine ordinary, 45s. to 52s.; low middling dull 
greenish, 53s. to 58s, 6d.; middling, 62s. to 63s.; good middling to good coloury, 
70s. 6d. to 77s. 6d.; good to fine bold, 81s. to 94s.; peaberry, 71s. to 95s. 
me Eee 
