Tobacco.

Chief tobacco

areas.

Tobacco

trade.

Tobaccocuring.

Tobacco is grown in every District of India for local consumption. The soil and climate are favourable; but the quality of native cured tobacco is so inferior, as to scarcely find a market in Europe. The principal tobacco- growing tracts are Rangpur and Tirhut in Bengal, Kaira in Bombay, the delta of the Godávari, and Coimbatore and Madura Districts in Madras. The two last-mentioned Districts supply the raw material for the well-known 'Trichinopoli cheroot,' almost the only form of Indian tobacco that finds favour with Europeans; the produce of the lánkás or alluvial islands in the Godávari is manufactured into 'coconadas.' The tobacco of Northern Bengal is largely exported to British Burma; for the Burmese, although great smokers, do not grow sufficient for their own needs. The manufacture of tobacco, both in Madras and Burma, is now making progress under European supervision, and promises to supply an important new staple in the exports of India.

In 1876-77, the total registered imports of tobacco into Calcutta were 521,700 maunds, valued at £261,000, of which more than half came from the single District of Rangpur. Tobacco is also grown for export in the Chittagong Hill Tracts. The tobacco of Tirhut is chiefly exported towards the west. The total area under tobacco in that District is estimated at 40,000 acres, the best quality being grown in parganá Saressa of the Tájpúr Subdivision.

Since 1875, a private firm of capitalists, backed by Government support, has begun to grow tobacco, and manufacture it for the European market. The scene of operations is two abandoned stud-farms at Gházípur in the North-Western Provinces, and at Pusa in Tirhut District, Bengal. In 1878-79, about 240 acres were cultivated with tobacco, the total crop being about 160,000 lbs. Five English or American curers were employed. Some of the produce was exported to England as 'cured leaf;' but the larger part was put upon the Indian market in the form of 'manufactured smoking mixture.' This mixture is in demand at regimental messes and canteens, and has also found its way to Australia. The enterprise may now be said to have passed beyond the stage of experiment, and has probably opened a new sphere alike for Indian agriculture and European capital. The one essential condition of success is skilled supervision in the delicate process of tobacco-curing. Tobacco to the value of £128,330 was exported from India in 1878-79.

Before proceeding to crops of a special character, such as

statistics.

coffee, tea, and cinchona, it may be well to give a general Uncerview of the area covered by the staples of Indian agriculture. Indian The table on next page must be taken as approximate only; crop it represents, however, the best information available (1880). Its figures show various changes from the estimates in 1875, incorporated in some of the foregoing paragraphs. But it is necessary to warn the reader that Indian agricultural returns do not always stand the test of statistical analysis. I can only reproduce the local figures without verifying them; alike in the preceding pages, and in this tabular statement (p. 396). But steps are now being taken to secure a higher degree of trustworthiness in such returns.

The cultivation of coffee is confined to Southern India, Coffee. although attempts have been made to introduce the plant both into British Burma and into the Bengal District of Chittagong. The coffee tract may be roughly defined as a section of the landward slope of the Western Ghats, extending from Kánara in the north to Travancore in the extreme south. This Coffee tract includes almost the whole of Coorg, the Districts of area. Kádur and Hassan in Mysore, and the Nilgiri Hills, enlarged by the recent annexation of the Wainád. Within the last few years, the cultivation has extended to the Shevaroy Hills in Salem District, and to the Palni Hills in Madura. Unlike tea, coffee was not introduced into. India by European enterprise; and even to the present day its cultivation is largely conducted by natives. The Malabar coast has always enjoyed a direct commerce with Arabia, and yielded many converts to Islám. One of these converts, Bába Budan, is said to have gone Introducon a pilgrimage to Mecca, and to have brought back with tion into him the coffee berry, which he planted on the hill range in Mysore still called after his name. According to local tradition, this happened about two centuries ago. The shrubs thus sown lived on, but the cultivation did not spread until the beginning of the present century. The State of Mysore and the Bába Budan range also witnessed the first opening of a coffee-garden by an English planter about forty years ago. The success of this experiment led to the extension of coffee cultivation into the neighbouring tract of Manjarábád, also in Mysore, and into the Wainád Subdivision of the Madras District of Malabar. From 1840 to 1860, the enterprise made Its proslow progress; but since the latter date, it has spread with gress, 1840-60. great rapidity along the whole line of the Western Ghats, clearing away the primeval forest, and opening a new era of prosperity to the labouring classes. The following statistics [Sentence continued on p. 397.

India.

Sentence continued from p. 395.] show the area under coffee for the year 1877-78:-In Mysore, Coffee Statistics, 128,438 acres, almost confined to the two Districts of Hassan 1878. and Kádúr; in Madras, 58,988 acres, chiefly in Malabar, the Nilgiris, and Salem; in Coorg, 45,150 acres: total, 232,576 acres, exclusive of Travancore. The average out-turn is estimated at about 3 cwts. per acre of mature plant. The total Indian exports (from Madras) in 1877-78 were 33,399,352 lbs., valued at £1,355,643, of which about one-half was consigned to the United Kingdom. In 1878-79, the exports amounted to 38,336,000 lbs., valued at £1,548,481.

coffee

gardens ;

Considerable judgment is required to select a suitable site Sites for for a coffee-garden, for the shrub will only thrive under special circumstances, which it is not very easy to anticipate beforehand. It is essential that the spot should be sheltered from the full force of the monsoon, and that the rainfall, though ample, should not be excessive. The most desirable elevation elevation; is between 2500 and 3500 feet above sea level. The climate must be warm and damp, conditions which are not conducive to the health of Europeans. Almost any kind of forest land will do, but the deeper the upper stratum of decomposed vegetable matter the better. The site chosen for a garden is

first cleared with the axe of jungle and undergrowth, but clearing ; sufficient timber-trees should be left to furnish shade.

In

the month of December, the berries are sown in a nursery, which has previously been dug, manured, weeded, and watered as carefully as a garden. Between June and August, the seedlings are planted out in pits dug in prepared ground at regular cultivaintervals; an operation which demands the utmost carefulness tion; in order that the roots may not be injured. In the first year, weeding only is required; in the second year, the shrubs are 'topped,' to keep them at an average height of about 3 feet; in the third year, they commence to bear, but it is not until the seventh or eighth year that the planter is rewarded by a full crop. The season for blossoming is March and April, when the entire shrub burgeons in a snowy expanse of flower, with a most delicate fragrance. Gentle showers or heavy mists at this season contribute greatly to the fecundity of the blossoms. The crop ripens in October and November. The berries are picking; picked by hand, and collected in baskets to be 'pulped' on the pulping; spot. This operation is performed by means of a revolving iron cylinder, fixed against a breastwork at such an interval that only the 'beans' proper pass through, while the husks are rejected. The beans are then left to ferment for about twenty

peeling.

Tea.

Home of

the teaplant, Assam.

four hours, when their saccharine covering is washed off. After drying in the sun for six or eight days, they are ready to be put in bags and despatched from the garden. But before being shipped, they have yet to be prepared for the home market. This is done at large coffee-works, to be found at the western ports and in the interior of Mysore. The berries are here 'peeled' in an iron trough by broad iron wheels, worked by steam power; and afterwards 'winnowed,' graded, and sorted for the market.

The cultivation of tea in India commenced within the memory of men still living, and the industry now surpasses even indigo as a field for European capital. Unlike coffee-planting, the enterprise owes its origin to the initiation of Government, and it has never attracted the attention of the natives. Early travellers reported that the tea- plant was indigenous to the southern valleys of the Himalayas; but they were mistaken in the identity of the shrub, which was the Osyris nepalensis. The real tea (Thea viridis), a plant akin to the camellia, grows wild in Assam, being commonly found throughout the hill tracts between the valleys of the Brahmaputra and the Bárak. It there sometimes attains the dimensions of a large tree; and from this, as well as from other indications, it has been plausibly inferred that Assam is the real home of the plant, which was thence introduced at a prehistoric date into China. The discovery of the tea-plant growing wild in Assam is generally attributed to two brothers named Bruce, who brought back specimens of the plant and the seed, after the conquest of the Discovered Province from the Burmese in 1826. In January 1834, under the Governor-Generalship of Lord William Bentinck, a committee was appointed for the purpose of submitting a plan for the introduction of tea-culture into India.' In the following year, plants and seed were brought from China, and widely distributed throughout the country. Government itself underState ex- took the formation of experimental plantations in Upper periments, Assam, and in the sub-Himálayan Districts of Kumáun and 1834-49.

1826.

Private Companies, 1839-51.

Garhwal in the North-Western Provinces. A party of skilled manufacturers was brought from China, and the leaf which they prepared was favourably reported upon in the London market. Forthwith private speculation took up the enterprise. The Assam Tea Company, still by far the largest, was formed in 1839, and received from the Government an extensive grant of land, with the nurseries which had been already laid out. In Kumaun, retired members of the civil and military services came forward with equal eagerness. Many fundamental mis