System and order, a good memory, a good temper, firmness, attention to details, agricultural knowledge, industry, all these, combined with a thorough knowledge of Tea cultivation and Tea manufacture, are the requisites for the successful management of a Tea plantation.

To find men with all these qualities is, I allow, not very easy, still they do exist, and such a one must be had if success in Tea is looked for.

Before the work is given out each day, the manager should decide exactly what is most required, and apply it to that. He should write down, when distributing the men, the works, and the number employed on each. This paper he should carry in his pocket, and he can then verify the men at work at each or any place when he visits it during the day.

The writer, the moonshee, and the jemadar (if there is one), should write similar papers when the coolies are mustered in the morning, and the manager should detail to each of these men which work they are particularly responsible for. This should also be shown in the “Morning Paper.”

Each of the above men then measures out the work to the coolies; visits it once or oftener in the day, and measures all that remains undone at night. A daily report of the work is kept, written by the writer in the evening.

The two forms given below are those I have adopted. The latter is suited to local labour paid daily, but it can easily be altered to suit either local labour paid monthly or imported coolies.

This is the Morning Paper.

The column of “Probable numbers” is given so that before it is known exactly how many men will be present for work they can be divided in the most likely way.

Each headman (called “Mate,” “Mangee,” &c., in different districts) is best designated by a letter or number. In neither form would there be room to put in names at length.

The form below written in the evening is made into a book for each month. The advantages of it for after reference are great, and it can of course be altered to suit the kind of labour employed on any garden.

The following is the plan I recommend for the leaf-picking and the Tea accounts.

The leaf of each picker is best measured in the field, and, as loads are collected, brought to the factory by one or two men throughout the day. It entails a loss of time, and further a depreciation in the leaf, if it is kept long in a close mass in one basket, which is the case when each picker brings his or her leaf to the factory twice a day. The pickers are paid so much per basket, holding in any case 2½ lbs. I find the most convenient plan is to give the mangee in charge of the pickers tickets of any kind for this, which tickets are changed for money in the evening. As each load of leaf comes in through the day it is weighed, and this gives a check on the tickets given by the mangee or mate. This is the meaning of the two columns in the form below, “tickets by leaf” and “tickets paid.”

In the form the first column of “leaf results” shows the condition of the leaf when picked, whether wet (W) or dry (D). Unless this were noted the proper amount of Teas the leaf ought to make could not be known, and there would be no check against theft, which is carried on to a great extent in many gardens.

As explained previously, only the sections ready in each garden are picked. The sections are not entered in the form, only the number of the garden. The flushes now noted are the 20th, in some the 21st, or 22nd in others.

The Tea is calculated from the leaf. It should be 25 per cent. if the leaf is picked dry, and 22 per cent. if picked wet. As each load comes in a memorandum is made as to whether it is dry or wet, and the figures in the column “Tea should be” are thus found.

The Tea is weighed the morning after it is made and entered in the column “Tea made.” The percentage it bears to the leaf is then calculated and entered in the account column.

After sifting the whole is weighed again, and the result entered in the column “Tea after sifting.” Doing this is very important, for it checks theft. Directly after it is weighed this second time it is put in the bins in the store.

Daily Leaf and Tea Account.

If this system is carried out, no Tea (exceeding a pound or so) can be stolen without its being at once missed, and the importance of this cannot be exaggerated. Tea proprietors do not guess how much is lost in this way. Maunds upon maunds might be stolen in many gardens, and unless the theft were accidentally discovered there is nothing in the Tea accounts to show it to the manager.

I have suppositiously filled up the three first days of the form. The 820 lbs. leaf picked on Sunday is made into Tea on Monday. The 198 is written down Sunday evening. On Tuesday morning, when the Tea is weighed and found to be 200 lbs., that is entered in the Monday line, as also the percentage. On Tuesday evening, after it is sifted and made into different Teas, it is weighed again and found to be 199 lbs., and so entered.

In dry weather after sifting, owing to dust flying off, it is always a little less. In wet weather, on the contrary, it increases in weight. In the Tuesday line where “W” shows it was a wet day and the Tea 230 lbs. before sifting it, is 233 afterwards. This is owing to moisture imbibed, and it is the only objection to sifting daily, whatever the weather. The advantages of the plan, though, are so great, as explained, that I put up with this, and practically I do not find it detrimental. Of course, as previously explained, all moisture is driven off before the Tea is packed. However, to make all quite safe, after a very wet damp day, the Teas might be re-dried for a few minutes over charcoal before being put into their respective bins. I do not do this myself though, and do not think it necessary.

I hope now I have made the above form plain. It is in a book, and each page will hold one week. The total of the Tea made in the week is added up and shown at foot, and that amount is then transferred to the credit side of the Tea store account. Thus (see both forms) 16 maunds 32 lbs. is credited.

The form given on the next page is also kept in a book, and the total of right-hand side subtracted from the left gives at any time the quantity of Tea in store.

Tea Store Account.

Regarding accounts between the manager and his employers, I think they should be of the simplest kind. If a man can be trusted he should be trusted; if he cannot, no system of accounts will restrain him, and he should be kicked out. A simple account current, furnished monthly, showing under few heads the receipts and expenditure, is all that can be required. It is not by any papers received from a manager that an opinion can be expressed as to how he does his work, and how the plantation progresses. A competent person visiting the garden can easily ascertain, and in default of this, and combined with this, the only true test is the balance sheet at the end of each season.

Shortly, it is not by the form, the nicety, the detail of accounts between manager and employer, that success is ensured or even forwarded. It is, as far as accounts are concerned, by the forms and system the manager adopts as between him and his subordinates, and these he should be able to show are good to the employer, or anyone deputed by him to visit the garden.

The profit shown yearly, whether it is large or small, all things considered, is, however, the only true ultimate test.