The Chinese and even European cultivators used formerly to engage the Chinese who had just arrived from China; they paid off their passage-money, and then allowed them two dollars monthly, for provisions, for one year; with a suit of clothes, by which means the cost of the labor of one man averaged about three dollars monthly; but this plan is attended with risks.
The cost attendant on the cultivation of two orlongs of land, with pepper, for three years—the Chinese laborer receiving the usual hire of five Spanish dollars monthly—will be nearly as follows:—
| Spanish dollars. | |
| Price of land, clearing, and planting | 40 |
| Quit rent, at 75 cents per annum per orlong | 9 |
| Two thousand plants | 4 |
| Two thousand dadap props | 6 |
| Implements | 6 |
| House | 10 |
| Labor | 200 |
| Interest, loosely calculated at | 30 |
| Total Spanish dollars | 305 |
In a very good soil a pepper vine will yield about one-eighth of a pound of dry produce at the end of the first year; at the end of the second, about a quarter of a pound; and at the expiration of the third, probably one pound; at the end of the fourth, from three to three-and-a-half pounds; ditto fifth, from eight to ten pounds. After the fifth year up to the fifteenth, or even the twentieth year, about ten pounds of dry merchantable produce may be obtained from each vine, under favorable circumstances. The Chinese speculator used to rent out his half-share of a new plantation for five years, to his cultivating partner, after the expiration of the first three years, at the rate of thirty piculs per annum; the total produce of these five years giving about fifty-six piculs annually as an average.
A pepper plantation never survives the thirtieth year, unless in extremely rich soil, and then it is unproductive; nor will the young vine thrive on an old worn out pepper land, a peculiarity which is applicable to the coffee tree. The chief crop lasts from August to February. Four pounds of dry produce, for ten of green, is considered a fair estimate. Great care is requisite in the management of the vine, and especially in training and tying it on the props. It is subject to be injured by the attacks of a small insect. The green pepper dries in two or three days, and if it is intended that it shall be black, it is pulled before it is quite ripe. To make white pepper, the berry is allowed to remain somewhat longer on the vine; it is, when plucked, immersed in boiling water, by means of which process and subsequent friction, before drying, the husk is separated.
The exports of pepper from Pinang in the last four years have been—In 1849, 2,591,233 lbs.; in 1850, 6,397,733 lbs.; in 1851, 2,366,933 lbs.; in 1852, 2,112,133 lbs."
A small quantity of pepper seems to be annually exported from Ceylon, which I presume is the growth of that island; thus there were:—
| 54 | cwts. | shipped in | 1842 |
| 83 | " | " | 1843 |
| 102 | " | " | 1844 |
In the Customs' returns of Ceylon, it is classed with cardamoms, and 160 to 170 cwt. of the two were shipped in each of the years 1850 and 1851. Last year the quantity was smaller.
Pepper cultivation has been introduced into the Mauritius, and in 1839 more than 500,000 lbs. were imported from thence, but as the shipments have since decreased, I presume it has given place to the more profitable staple sugar. I have been able to glean no information as to the progress it has made in the West Indies. In Cayenne it has been successfully carried on for many years; and large shipments of pepper have been made thence to France.