Progress of Cultivation in India.—­There are said to be ten varieties of the coffee, but only one is found indigenous to India, and it is questionable if this is not the Mocha species introduced from Arabia.  The cultivation of this important crop is spreading fast throughout the east, and has been adopted in many parts of Hindostan.  In the Tenasserim provinces, on the table land of Mysore, in Penang, and especially in the islands of Bourbon and Ceylon, it is becoming more and more an object of attention.  It is known to have given good produce in Sangar and the Nerbudda; also in Mirzapore, as well as Dacca, and other parts of Bengal; Chota Najpore, Malabar, and Travancore.  From three to four million pounds of coffee are now exported from the Indian presidencies annually.  The highest quantity was four and a quarter million pounds in 1845, but the progress of culture, judging from the export, has been small.

On the hilly districts on the east coast of the Gulf of Siam, the cultivation is carried on on a limited scale.  The annual produce is not much more than about 400 cwt., although it is understood to be increasing.  The quality of the berry is reckoned to be nearly equal to Mocha, and it commands a high price in the English market.

The soil recommended in India is a good rich garden land, the situation high and not liable to inundation, and well sheltered to the north-west, or in such other direction as the prevailing storms are found to come from.

A plantation, or a hill affording the shrubs shade, has been found beneficial in all tropical climates, because, if grown fully exposed to the sun, the berries have been found to be ripened prematurely.

The spot should be well dug to a depth of two feet before the trees are planted out, and the earth pulverised and cleared from the roots of rank weeds, but particularly from the coarse woody grasses with which all parts of India abound.

The best manure is found in the decayed leaves that fall from the trees themselves, to which may be added the weeds produced in the plantation, dried and burnt.  These, then, dug in, are the only manure that will be required.  Cow-dung is the best manure for the seed-beds.

The seed reserved for sowing must be put into the ground quite fresh, as it soon loses its power of germination.  Clean, well-formed berries, free from injury by insects, or the decay of the pulp, should be selected.

These berries must be sown in a nursery, either in small, well-manured beds, or in pots in a sheltered spot, not too close, as it is well to leave them where sown until they acquire a good growth; indeed, it is better if they are removed at once from the bed where they are sown, to the plantation.  Here they should be planted as soon as they have attained two years of age, for, be it remembered, that if they are left too long in the nursery, they become unproductive and never recover.  The distance at which they should be put out in the plantation need not exceed eight feet apart in the rows, between which, also, there should be eight feet distance.  The seedlings appear in about a month after the seed is sown.