| Plantation. | Native. | Total. | |
| cwt. | cwt. | cwt. | |
| 1845 | 75,002 | 112,889 | 187,891 |
| 1846 | 91,240 | 70,991 | 162,231 |
| 1847 | 106,198 | 143,457 | 249,655 |
| 1848 | 191,464 | 88,422 | 279,886 |
| 1849 | 243,926 | 118,756 | 362,682 |
| 1850 | 198,997 | 56,692 | 255,689 |
| 1851 | 220,471 | 97,091 | 317,562 |
While, in 1839, the total value of the exports from Ceylon was only £330,000, in 1850 the value of the single staple of coffee was no less than £609,262, and in 1851 had still further increased.
I append a memorandum of the quantities of coffee exported from Ceylon since 1836:—
| Quantity. | Value. £ | |
| cwt. | ||
| 1836 | 60,329 | |
| 1837 | 34,164 | |
| 1838 | 49,541 | |
| 1839 | 41,863 | |
| 1840 | 68,206 | |
| 1841 | 80,584 | 196,048 |
| 1842 | 119,805 | 269,763 |
| 1843 | 94,847 | 192,891 |
| 1844 | 133,957 | 267,663 |
| 1845 | 178,603 | 363,259 |
| 1846 | 173,892 | 328,781 |
| 1847 | 293,221 | 456,624 |
| 1848 | 280,010 | 387,150 |
| 1849 | 373,593 | 545,322 |
| 1850 | 278,473 | 609,262 |
| 1851 | 339,744 | |
| Total in 16 years | 2,600,832 | |
| Average | 162,552 | (Ceylon Almanac for 1853.) |
The local export duty of two-and-a-half per cent., was abolished from 1st September, 1848.
From these figures it appears that, in a period of sixteen years, Ceylon exported two and a half millions of cwts. of coffee. The consumption of coffee, although for a long time stationary in Britain, now that adulteration is no longer legalised, is likely to increase as rapidly as in other parts of the world; and it appears pretty evident that, so long as anything like remunerative prices can be obtained, Ceylon will do her part in supplying the world with an article which occupies the position of a necessary to the poor as well as a luxury to the rich. The exports of coffee from this colony have, within a few thousands of hundredweights, been nearly quadrupled since 1843, when only 94,000 cwts. were sent away.
Dr. Rudolph Gygax, in a paper submitted to the Ceylon Branch of the Royal Asiatic Society, offered remarks on some analyses, of the coffee of Ceylon, with suggestions for the applications of manures.
"Having had," he observes, "my attention drawn to an account of an analysis of the Jamaica coffee berry, made by Mr. Herapath, the Liverpool chemist, I have paid some little attention to the subject of the coffee plant of this island, forming, as it does, so very important a feature in the resources of this colony. The desire that I thus felt for obtaining some information regarding the constituent parts of the Ceylon tree and its fruit, was heightened by a knowledge of the fact, that not a few of those coffee estates, which once gave good promise of success, are now in a very precarious state of production.
I much regret that the means at my disposal have not allowed me to carry out any quantative analysis, but the result of my labours are sufficiently accurate for my present purpose. I have analysed the wood and fruit of trees from two different localities, as well as the ashes of some plants sent me from the Rajawella estate near Kandy, and they all tend to bear out the result of Mr. Herapath's inquiries. Placing the substances traced in the coffee plant in the order in which they occur in the greatest quantity, they will stand thus:—
Lime, potash, magnesia, phosphoric acid, other acids.