Such is my advice to intending beginners. To those who have gardens, I say, reduce your areas till of the size you can really cultivate them highly, and procure manure at any cost.
I shall not have written in vain, and Tea enterprise in India will flourish, if the motto of planters in future be--
[78] See my estimate for cultivation at page 84. I there estimate Rs. 100 per acre per annum from the sixth year, so that Mr. Burland six years ago had come to the same opinion about high cultivation that I hold.
[79] Calculating Tea by maunds is convenient, inasmuch as pounds necessitate such lengthy figures for all calculations. The maund here employed is, however, quite an arbitrary measure. It is _not_ the Indian maund, it equals and is represented exactly by 80 lbs. Any number of maunds multiplied by 80 will naturally give the lbs. of Tea.
[80] Up to this point, viz., the fifth year inclusive, the figures given have been much more than realised, and that on a garden with 15 per cent. vacancies. It has been, though, highly cultivated and liberally manured from the first.
[81] From the fifth to the tenth year is assumption, except that I know one garden which, to my certain knowledge, has given _more_ then ten maunds an acre, and this in spite of about 15 per cent. vacancies. The garden is an old one, planted about 18 years ago. It is also a very small one. The soil is _very_ poor, but the plants are of the highest class. It was much neglected till about eight years ago. From that time it has been highly cultivated in every way except in the point of irrigation, for it has not that advantage. It has been _most_ liberally manured.
[82] Note to Third Edition.--With high cultivation on a favourable site and in a really good Tea climate, I now believe 10 maunds per acre will eventually be realised.
[83] With interest, _see_ pages 164 and 165.
A few words on the past, the present, and the future of Indian Tea will now conclude this Essay, and will, I hope, be acceptable to the reader.
The subject is one of growing importance, but being a new one, there are points connected with it on which the public are very ignorant, and should be enlightened.
To begin with, the following facts are not disputed by those who know anything of the subject:--