taken out. But this process was
found to be expensive, and of course took much labour, which is sometimes
extremely scarce, and on my property we have for some years
past--excepting in the case of manuring with fish, which is liable to be
carried off by birds, dogs, jackals, and village pigs--scattered all the
manure on the surface, and close around the stem of the tree, with the
idea that the manure would be less likely to be taken up by weeds, and by
the roots of the shade trees. But in connection with this system there is
a fact which I did not take into account, but which is well worthy of
careful consideration, and that is, that the tendency of such a system of
manuring is to keep the coffee roots close to the surface. Now it has been
suggested by the late Mr. Pringle, whose opinion on another matter I have
previously given, that this would have an unfavourable effect, if we had,
as sometimes happens, deficient blossom showers; as in that case, and with
many rootlets near the surface, a stimulus would be given to the plant
which would induce it to throw out the blossom when there was not enough
rain to bring it to perfection; whereas, if, by putting down the manure
more deeply we attracted the roots downwards, the blossom buds could only
be started after such an amount of rain as would give the soil such a
soaking that a successful blossom would be insured. There certainly seems
to me to be a great deal in this idea, but I am not aware that we have had
any experiments made side by side as regards surface manuring, and
manuring in pits, and therefore am not in a position to express a decided
opinion on the subject, but theoretically there would seem to be much in
favour of burying manure in pits, and it seems certain that the manure
would be less likely to be taken up by weeds than in the case of surface
manuring.

I need hardly add that in the case of all steep parts of a plantation all
manure should be, if not buried deeply, at least covered with soil after
the digging of a trench large enough to contain the manure. On the
plantations on the Nilgiri Hills the manure is put into pits 2-1/2 feet
long, 1 foot 6 inches wide, and 1 foot deep on the lower side of the pit,
which of course would make the side of the pit on the upper side of them
much more than one foot in depth. The trenches or pits are dug across the
slope and in front of each coffee tree, and in the line (i.e., not in the
centre of each set of four plan