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CINCHONA STATISTICS, 1882-83.

511

of bark, which was all handed over to the quinologist, and yielded 5162 lbs. of the febrifuge.

In 1882-83, the four Government plantations on the Nilgiri Cinchona Hills comprised a total area of 847 acres, with 765,763 full- statistics, 1882-83. grown plants. The total out-turn of bark (exclusive of stocks in hand) was 129,713 lbs. The quantity shipped to the home market was 62,518 lbs., realizing £9768, while 69,327 lbs. were sold locally by public auction, realizing £10,639, or an average of 3s. 1d. per lb. The total proceeds from the Nilgiri plantations in 1882-83, including sale of seeds, plants, etc., was £20,842 ; expenditure, £8335, leaving a profit of £12,507. In the Government plantations in Dárjiling District, the area in 1882 was 2294 acres, with 4,711,168 full-grown plants. The out-turn of the year, 396,980 lbs. of dry bark, was the heaviest ever yielded. By far the greater proportion was converted locally into cinchona febrifuge by the Government quinologist, while about 42,000 lbs. of bark were forwarded to London at the request of the Secretary of State, to be there converted into various forms of febrifuge, and returned to India for trial by the Medical Department. The revenue Profits of derived from the Dárjiling sales to the public, to the medical cinchona, 1882-83. and other departments, and from sale of seeds, plants, etc., amounted to 15,280 in 1882-83, the operations of the year resulting in a direct profit of £6628, equal to a dividend of 6 per cent. on the capital outlay. Total profit from the Nilgiri and Dárjíling plantations in 1882-83, £19,135.

These profits, however, do not represent the whole of the Indirect gains. In Bengal alone, the cost of an equal quantity of profits. quinine would have amounted to £40,132, while the cost of the febrifuge produced was only £6898, showing a saving of £33,234. The total saving effected since the opening of the factories up till the end of the year 1882-83, is stated to be £235,000, or more than double the cost of the plantations. Besides the Government cinchona estates, a number of private plantations have been established, covering an area of about 2500 acres, with about 2 millions of full-grown plants.

Sericulture in India is a stationary, if not a declining industry. Silk. The large production in China, Japan, and the Mediterranean countries controls the European markets; and on an average of years, the imports of raw silk into India exceed the exports. The East India Company from the first took The Comgreat pains to foster the production of silk. As early as pany's early silk1767, two years after the grant of the financial administration factories. of Bengal had been conferred upon the Company, we find

Italian reelers, 1769.

the Governor, Mr. Verelst, personally urging the zamindárs, gathered at Murshidábád for the ceremony of the Punyá, 'to give all possible encouragement to the cultivation of mulberry.' In 1759, a colony of reelers was brought from Italy to teach the system followed in the filatures at Novi. The first silk prepared after the Italian method reached England in 1772, and Bengal silk soon became an important article of export. Similar efforts started at Madras in 1793 were abandoned after a trial of five years. The silk-worm is said to have been Tipu's ex- introduced into Mysore by Tipu Sultán, and for many years periments, continued to prosper. But recently the Mysore worms have been afflicted by an epidemic; and despite the enterprise of an Italian gentleman, who imported fresh breeds from Japan, the business has dwindled to insignificance.

1795.

Bengal Bengal has always been the chief seat of mulberry cultivafactories, tion. When the trading operations of the Company ceased in 1799-1833. 1833, they owned 11 head factories in that Province, each

supplied by numerous filatures, to which the cultivators brought in their cocoons. The annual export of raw silk from Calcutta was then about 1 million lbs. But in those days the weaving of silk formed a large portion of the business of the factories. In 1779, Rennel wrote that at Kasímbázár alone about 400,000 lbs. weight of silk was consumed in the local European factories. In 1802, Lord Valentia describes Jangipur as 'the greatest silk station of the Company, with 600 furnaces, and giving employment to 3000 persons.' Under the new Charter of 1833, the Company's silk trade and its commerce with China were to cease. But it could not suddenly throw out of employment the numbers of people employed upon silk production, and its factories were not entirely disposed of until 1837.

Silk area When the Company abandoned the trade on its own of Bengal. account, sericulture was taken up by private enterprise, and still clings to its old head-quarters. At the present time, the cultivation of the mulberry is mainly confined to the Rájsháhí and Bardwán Divisions of Lower Bengal. This branch of agriculture, together with the rearing of the silk-worms, is conducted by the peasantry themselves, who are free to follow or abandon the business. The destination of the cocoons is twofold. They may either be sent to small native filatures, where the silk is roughly wound, and usually consumed in the hand-looms of the country; or they may be brought to the great European factories, which generally use steam machinery, and consign their produce direct to Europe.

The exports vary considerably from year to year, being

SILK STATISTICS, 1878-83.

513

determined partly by the local yield, and still more by the

prices ruling in Europe.
1877-78 and 1882-83.
of silk were exported, viz. :-Raw silk, 658,000 lbs. ; chasan, Silk
or the outer covering of the cocoon, 823,000 lbs. ; the aggre- statistics,
1878-1883.
gate value was £750,439. In the same year, the imports of
raw silk (chiefly received at Bombay and Rangoon) were a
little over 2 million lbs., valued at £678,069. By 1882-83,
the imports of raw and manufactured silk had considerably
exceeded the exports of the Indian production. In that year
the exports of raw silk amounted to only 665,838 lbs., valued
at £596,836, besides silk manufactures valued at £306,928.
On the other hand, the imports of foreign silk into British
Indian ports in the same year amounted to 2,386,150 lbs.,
valued at £1,074,156, besides 9,671,261 yards of manufactured
silk, and 2989 lbs. of silk thread, valued at £977,768.

The following are the returns for
In 1877-78, about 1 million lbs.

The cultivation of the mulberry is chiefly carried on in the Ben- Mulberry cultivation gal Districts of Rájsháhí, Bográ, Maldah, Murshidábád, Birbhum, 1, in Bengal. Bardwán, and Midnapur. No complete statistics are available, but in Rajshahí alone the area under mulberry is estimated at 80,000 acres. The mulberry grown as food for the silk-worms is not the fruit-tree with which we are familiar in England, but a comparatively small shrub. Any fairly good land that does not grow rice will grow mulberry. But the shrubs must be preserved from floods; and the land generally requires to be artificially raised in square plots, with broad trenches between, like a chess-board. The mulberry differs from most Indian crops in being a perennial, i.e. it will yield its harvest of leaves for several years in succession, provided that care be taken to preserve it. It is planted between the months of November and January. Three growths of silk-worms are usually obtained in the year-in November, March, and August.

Besides the silk-worm proper (Bombyx mori), fed upon the Jungle mulberry, several other species of silk-yielding worms abound silks; in the jungles of India, and are utilized, and in some cases domesticated, by the natives. Throughout Assam, especially, an inferior silk is produced in this way, which has from time immemorial furnished the common dress of the people. These 'wild silks' are known to commerce under the generic name of tasar or tusser, but they are really the produce of (tasar). several distinct varieties of worm, fed on many different trees. The worm that yields tasar silk in Chutiá Nágpur has been in Bengal ; identified as the caterpillar of Antheroa paphia. When wild,

it feeds indiscriminately upon the sál (Shorea robusta), the

VOL. VI.

2 K

in Central

baer (Zizyphus jujuba), and other forest trees; but in a state of semi-domestication, it is exclusively reared upon the ásan (Terminalia tomentosa), which grows conveniently in clumps. The cocoons are sometimes collected in the jungle, but more frequently bred from an earlier generation of jungle cocoons. The worms require constant attention while feeding, to protect them from crows and other birds. They give three crops in the year-in August, November, and May-of which the second is by far the most important.

The tasar silk-worm is also found and utilized throughout Provinces; the Central Provinces, in the hills of the Bombay Presidency, and along the southern slopes of the Himalayas. During the past twenty years, repeated attempts have been made to raise this industry out of its precarious condition, and to introduce tasar silk into the European market. That the raw material abounds is certain; but the great difficulty is to obtain it in a state which will be acceptable to European manufacturers. Native spun tasar thread is only fit for native hand-looms. In in Assam. Assam, two distinct qualities of silk are made, the eriá and mugá. The former is obtained from the cocoons of Phalœna cynthia ; and the worm is fed, as the native name implies, upon the leaves of the castor-oil plant (Ricinus communis). This variety may be said to be entirely domesticated, being reared indoors. Mugá silk is obtained from the cocoons of Saturnia assamungis. The moth, which is remarkable for its size, is found wild in the jungle; but the breed is so far domesticated that cocoons are brought from one part of the Province to another, and the súm tree is artificially propagated to supply the worms with food.

Lac.

The collection of lac is in a somewhat similar position to that of tasar silk. The lac insect abounds on certain jungle trees in every part of the country; and from time immemorial it has been collected by the wild tribes, in order to be worked up into lacquered ware. But European enterprise has not yet placed the industry upon a stable and an organized basis. Although lac is to be found everywhere, foreign exportation is almost entirely confined to Calcutta, which draws its supplies from the hills of Chutiá Nágpur, and in a less degree from Assam and Mírzápur in the North-Western Provinces. Lac is known to commerce both as a gum (shell-lac) and as a Lac dye. In 1878, the total exports of lac of all kinds were statistics, 104,717 cwts., valued at £362,244. In 1879, the total exports were 91,985 cwts., valued at £300,072. In 1882-83, the exports of lac of all kinds was 138,844 cwts., of the value of £699,113.

1878-1885.

LAC-DYE AND SHELL-LAC.

515

Lac (lák) is a cellular, resinous incrustation of a deep orange Descripcolour, secreted by an insect (Coccus lacca) round the branches tion of lac. of various trees, chiefly kúsúm (Schleichera trijuga), palás (Butea frondosa), pipal (Ficus religiosa), and baer (Zizyphus jujuba). The principal component is resin, forming about 60

or 70 per cent., from which is manufactured the shell-lac of Shell-lac. commerce. Lac-dye is obtained from the small cells of the Lac-dye. incrustration, and is itself a portion of the body of the female insect. The entire incrustation, while still adhering to the twig, is called stick-lac. In order to obtain the largest quantity Stick-lac. of dye, the stick-lac should be gathered before the young come out, which happens twice in the year-in January and July. The dye is first extracted by repeated processes of washing and straining, while the shell-lac is worked up from what remains in a hot and semi-liquid state.

For all articles in which a fast colour is not required, lac-dye Uses of can never compete with the cheaper and less permanent lac-dye. aniline dyes; while for more lasting colours, cochineal is preferred. Lac-dye, however, is said to be superior even to cochineal in resisting the action of human perspiration; and it is probable that in the event of the supply of cochineal falling off, lac-dye might be used in its stead to produce the regimental scarlet. It has largely replaced cochineal of late years in dyeing officers' coats; and a further extension of its use for similar purposes seems possible. The chief establishment in India for manufacturing lac was for long near Dorandá, in Lohárdagá District, Chutiá Nágpur, to which stick-lac is brought in from all the country round as far as the Central Provinces. The annual out-turn is about 6000 cwts. of shelllac, made from double that quantity of raw material. In 1877-78, this factory had for a time to cease working, owing to the depressed state of the market in Europe.

farms.

The efforts of Government to improve the native methods Model of agriculture, by the establishment of model farms under skilled European supervision, have not been generally successful. In too many cases, the skilled agriculturists from Europe have been gardeners rather than farmers. In other cases, believing only in their own maxims of high cultivation. -deep ploughing, subsoil drainage, manuring, and rotation. of crops they have despised the ancient rules of native experience, and have not adapted their Western learning to the circumstances of a tropical country. Nevertheless, many

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