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The Introduction of Coffee in Western Australia in1869
A letter from Rosendo Salvado to Venancio Garrido ©
 

SHORT VERSION OF - VERSION MODIFICADA DE: Teresa de Castro, «The introduction of coffee and coconut in Western Australia in 1869, including a letter of Rosendo Salvado to Venancio Garrido», New Norcia's Studies Journal (Perth, Western Australia), 10, 2002, pp. 57-63 (La aclimatización del arbusto del café y el cocotero en Western Australia en 1869 según ua carta de Rosendo Salvado a Venancio Garrido).
Teresa de Castro © 2009-2013. This paper is protected by Copyright Laws

The aim of this paper is to make known a letter that Bishop Rosendo Salvado sent to Father Venancio Garrido, Prior of New Norcia, in October 1869 discussing experimentation with coffee and coconut in New Norcia. The paper begins by examining the formal characteristics of this letter. Next the paper offers some details on the trip that Salvado was making from Australia to Italy and about the production of coffee in Ceylon. The paper also examines the reasons that lead Salvado to introduce coffee and other non-native plants in New Norcia and analyses the results of this botanical experiment. The paper finishes by presenting the edition of the text of the letter translated into English.

Salvado wrote this letter during a forced stop in the port of Galle (Sri Lanka) on his way to Italy. Salvado was going to the Vatican in order to take part in the 20th Ecumenical Council of the Roman Catholic Church -Vatican I- convened by Pius IX. When Salvado arrived at Galle the ship to Europe had left and he decided to wait for the next ship of the French Company. Salvado saw the coffee tree and the coconuts while he was visiting the chief of the Cingalies, a catholic man, in Galle. So that, Salvado did a short trip to the city of Colombo in order to obtain information about the cultivation of coffee. Once in Colombo Salvado also gathered information about the production of coconut and tried unsuccessfully to obtain seeds of cinnamon.

The letter is a sort of small diary or memorandum of the activities of Bishop Salvado in Colombo between the 17th and the 28th October 1869. This is not the kind of letter that Salvado was used to sending to the Propaganda Fide (the organism that controlled missions overseas) or to his religious “colleagues” in Europe, but is a relaxed and chaotic letter in which Salvado was writing to Garrido about an exciting project. The style of Salvado’s letter is a reflection of the mix of ideas that were boiling in his mind in that time. Salvado was thinking and writing on the spur of the moment and he was only making rough corrections. As a result, the paragraphs and the sentences are too long and disorganised. Sometimes Salvado repeated  the same thing and sometimes did not included enough explanation or did it by using brackets in the middle of the wrong sentence.

Salvado’s letter gives an idea of the way people were travelling from Western Australia to Europe at the end of the 19th century. Bishop Salvado left Western Australia from King George's Sound, near Albany, on 18 September 1869 on the steamer “Avoca”, and arrived at Galle on 2 October. According to Salvado's own notes the ship travelled 3.330 miles in almost 13 days, at approximately 11 miles per hour.

Salvado was using the P&O for sending his mail but not for his voyage. On his way to Italy Salvado was travelling by a steamship belonging to the French Messageries Maritimes, also known as the French Company or the French Line. In 1869 the traffic of steamships between the Mediterranean and the East was very competitive because of the adoption of an improved steam engine; however, seven out of ten steamers were British ones. This fact could explain why the French Company offered reduced prices to the bishops who were going to the Ecumenical Council and why Salvado decided to wait for the French steamer. The ship that Salvado was waiting for was “L’Imperatrice”, a steamer that according to Salvado weighed 2.000 tons and had 500 horses of power.

After leaving Galle, the steamship made a brief stop in Aden and then it continued the voyage to Suez. From Suez, by train, Salvado get Alexandria, where he took the steamer “Moerir” to Marseille. Salvado arrived at Marseille on 20 December, at 2 p. m., and on the evening he took the ship “Possilipo” to Cività Vecchia. Salvado got Roma the 26th December.

The Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company, the P&O as it was called in the letter, was one of the most important companies for the transport of passengers and mail during the 19th century. In 1837 the P & O started a service that connected Bombay and Suez through the Middle East instead of circumnavigating Africa. The East India Company steamer service was doing the trip from Suez to Bombay until 1854, year in which the P & O took it over. Moreover, from 1840 the P & O secured the mail service between England and Egypt, from 1843 was operating the mail service between Suez, Ceylon and Calcutta, and in 1845 extended it to Singapore and Hong Kong.

Before the opening of the Suez Canal (November 17, 1869) travellers going to Europe made part of their journey by land. They made the trip between Suez and Cairo by coaches drawn by horses, while camels carried the luggage and cargo; from Cairo, via the Nile and the Mahmoudieh Canal, the travellers got to the port of Alexandria. From 1858 the railway already connected Suez to Cairo.

In 1869 Ceylon (Sri Lanka), was an English colony and an important part of the economy of the British Empire. Cinnamon had been Ceylon's main source of wealth during the 17th and 18th centuries. Although Ceylonese cinnamon was considered the best in the world, the competition of an inexpensive variety of cinnamon produced in Java damaged Ceylon’s market. This explains why in 1869 the production of cinnamon had been surpassed by the production of coffee.

The British developed the cultivation of coffee especially in Kandayan lands (in central Ceylon). The role of the Ceylonese botanical gardens and the efforts made by Alexander Moon were decisive for the acclimatisation of coffee. The systematic production of coffee did not begin until 1823-1825, even though before this date some peasants were cultivating coffee in their home gardens. The cultivation of coffee developed quickly until the mid-forties due to the existence of producers seeking quick fortunes. Nevertheless, these men did not understood how to manage properly the plantation and the production of coffee and, as a consequence, the second half of the forties was a period of recession. Once this crisis was over, professional cultivators undertook the production of coffee on a serious basis, and there began a booming period in which also emerged different agency houses and the first organisation of planters. The extension of the coffee disease and the fact that producers did not believe that this would be a serious problem –especially when the prices of coffee were high-, lead to a general spread of the disease. The consequence was the complete destruction of the plantations and, during the eighties, a transition from coffee production to tea, cinchona, cocoa, cardamom and rubber productions.

Despite its eventual failure, the production of coffee had a successful effect on the development of the network of roads and railways in Ceylon. The Governor Sir Edward Barnes strongly supported this policy as a result of his wish to provide infrastructures for the commercialisation of coffee, in which he was directly interested. The road that linked Colombo and Kandy was one of the most important achievements of this policy, but the road that Salvado mentions in his letter was also a result of this policy.

In those days Colombo was the capital and the most important port of Ceylon. The port of the city had been successively developed and improved from the 17th century by the Portuguese, the Dutch and the British. When Salvado visited Colombo the city was, moreover, the most important centre for the processing and commercialisation of coffee in Sri Lanka. Galle was the second most important port of the country. When Colombo’s port was overcrowded, ships were diverted to Galle; Galle’s port was likewise a stop for the steamers that followed the route between the Far East and Europe via Bombay.

Salvado’s letter gives a clear image of the kind of activities that European settlers were undertaking in Western Australia during the colonial period. By reading Salvado’s letter to Garrido it is easy to understand why Salvado was interested in sending coffee, cinnamon and coconuts to New Norcia. These three products were the staples of the flamboyant Ceylonese economy of the time, an economy that had been developed and supported by the British governors. Why not think of a similar success for coffee in Western Australia?

There were many reasons for Bishop Salvado to support sowing coffee and -after visiting Colombo- also experimenting with coconuts. In the first place, as Salvado stated in his letter, to cultivate and to produce coffee required nothing but to weed the plant and to add manure if required. The requirement of big quantities of manure was a matter of importance, but in 1869 New Norcia was already one of the majors owners of cattle in Western Australia, and so the supply of manure was guaranteed. Besides, there was the possibility of doing some operations by hand, a fact that eliminated the need of any big initial investment for buying machinery. Still, the lack of any reference in Salvado’s letter to the  coffee disease is surprising, because it was already a problem in Ceylon in 1869. In fact, Baker’s description of Ceylonese coffee, written between 1845-1853, mentioned it:

This is a minute and gregarious insect, which lives upon the juices of the coffee tree, and accordingly is most destructive to an estate... This attack is usually of about two years' duration; after which time the tree loses its blackened appearance, which peels off the surface of the leaves like gold-beaters' skin, -and they appear in their natural colour. Coffee plants of young growth are liable to complete destruction if severely attacked by bug.

In the second place, Salvado’s idea of pioneering the production of coffee in Australia had both a prestigious and an economical aim. Growing coffee would have brought prestige because some agricultural and botanical societies were experimenting on the introduction of new crops and plants in Australia. If New Norcia could have produced coffee, the Mission would be well known and respected from a scientific point of view.

It is interesting to note that some years earlier New Norcia had done something similar with tobacco. During the sixties the York Agricultural Society encouraged the cultivation of tobacco in Western Australia but at an experimental level. Nevertheless, only New Norcia had achieved success, and in 1864 New Norcia was producing large quantities of a good-quality tobacco. Tobacco was the only known treatment for scab, a mortal sheep disease, fact that explains the interest of New Norcia in tobacco production. The result was that the secretary of the colony of Western Australia asked Salvado for instructions on the methods of cultivation used in New Norcia.

Furthermore, growing coffee would have positive economic repercussions in New Norcia. The Mission always needed more income, especially for purchasing lands. If the experiment would have any success there would be an open door for the production and trade of coffee and coconut. This helps to understand the secrecy that Salvado showed regarding the opening of the box that was containing the coffee beans and the coconut buds.

Salvado had no news of the fact that as early as 1832 there was a small plantation of coffee at Kangaroo Point (Brisbane) and that the cultivation of coffee was developing along the coast between Cairns and north of New South Wales.

TRANSLATED FROM SPANISH

            (On coffee)

           Galli  (Ceylon) 17 October 1869

            Dear Father Prior Garrido,

            I am sure that at this moment you think I am near Rome or at least navigating the Mediterranean but, my friend, I am doing neither. I am in Galli making preparations to go tomorrow to Colombo with my brother in habit Brother Martín. You will be wondering what has happened so that I have stopped here. I answer that this is because when I arrived at here (the second day of the current month) the French steamer had just departed for Suez and there was no other until the 28^th of this month. Certainly, I could have continued my trip on one of the steamers of the P&O Company that was carrying the post, or I could do it in few days’ time on other of the same company. However, travelling to Suez on one of the steamers of this company would cost me the same as travelling to Cività Vecchia on one of the steamers of the French Company, as a consequence of the reduction of the 30% on the normal price that this company offers to the gentlemen bishops that are going to participate at the Ecumenical Council. This is the explanation to the mystery. According to the estimates that the agent of the French company made, by leaving here on the 28^th of this month, I should arrive at Cività Vecchia on 24 November, Wednesday, at five o’clock in the morning. But stop with this.

            Since I arrived [here] I have seen for the first time in my life the little coffee trees, which fortunately have fruit; some of the trees are already ripe and others will be it shortly. The first idea that I had when I saw them  /**/ was that they were cherry trees or sour-cherry trees, and in fact the similarity of the fruit and [the similarity] of the colour could not be greater. Certainly, the coffee trees are small (about the height of a man as a maximum), although I have seen cherry trees and sour-cherry trees in fruit not bigger than the coffee tree. Who knows if the plant of the coffee would have success in those parts! It would bring many advantages, especially because I was assured that its cultivation does not require digging or ploughing the land but only removing the weeds; however, removing the weed in those parts cannot be done without the plough or the spade. [The coffee trees] are sown one year and transplanted the following, when they are about one English foot high, putting six feet of distance between them. I was told that the good cultivators of coffee prune their trees to prevent them from growing more than the height of a man, and even less than that, to only four feet. However, I will stop writing until I return from Colombo, because then I might write more on this matter.

            So, on Monday the 18^th I went to Colombo with Martín. We departed at 6 a. m. with the Post's coach and, after 72 miles of excellent roads, we arrived at Colombo at 4.30 p.m. Father Fernando came to receive us. Monsignor Sillani was six miles away performing confirmations and we went to visit him the following day, the 19^th.

            Let's go to the matter of coffee. I have gathered all the information that I could [obtain] on this subject [after] deciding to look for [coffee] seeds and to send them to [New Norcia] for sowing and for seeing what we can get from this productive and advantageous plant. Well, Sir, I have obtained seeds of coffee, and [seeds] of the coffee of the district of Hajepoolella, which are considered the best in this island and in all Kandy. /**/

            Before continuing, I tell you that I have come back from Colombo just today 23 [October] 1869, Saturday, at 4.30 p.m.

            The tree or small shrub of the coffee produces a sort of cherry or berry, each one with two seeds that, although they look like two halves, are both perfect seeds. When the flesh of the berry is ripe it has a red colour, like the cherry that it resembles. For sowing the seeds [you have to] take the pulp out, because it is said that if they are sown with the pulp the two seeds grow together and the worst thing would be that they would not germinate. Once the soil is prepared in the best possible way for the seedbed, make some rows one inch in depth and put the seeds in -each seed looks like half a seed- [put] a distance of one inch between them, and cover the seeds with half an inch of well-worked soil. The following morning water the seedbed and repeat [the watering] on other days if it is necessary, as if they were seeds of another fruit tree. The tree germinates usually in 15 or 20 days’ time. I think that the best place for the seedbed is next to the laundry house, which once was used to plant tobacco. And the best time for doing it seems to me the end of April. Just in case, once the trees it have grown they should be covered during the time of frost. Notice that this plant requires a good soil and would be good to plant more than one seedbed in different places and even times, just in case. I think that the most suitable [places] for transplanting are the field beside the new iron-works and the threshing-floor, but this operation is for the following year, because by then the trees will have grown to at least two English feet.

            So, transplant the trees the year following the sowing (and having taken care of watering during summer). Dig holes for transplanting the trees, each hole 18 squared inches and three feet of depth at least. If [you] dig the holes in summer the sun will have burnt the soil and this will be very advantageous [for the plant]. Leave six feet between each hole, from centre to centre; make the holes in line so that the trees also will be in line, as it is done with the grapevines. On the same day you dig up the trees transplant them carefully one foot deep, leaving six inches uncovered. Cut off anything that exceeds these 6 inches, so that only 18 inches -that is, one foot and a half- of the tree remains. I think that the best month for doing the transplantation is May, when the soil and the weather become colder. A cutting transplanted in this way may produce about 1,200 trees, and if these go well /**/ will produce at least 50 bushels of coffee, and each bushel usually weights 64 pounds.

            The trees do not produce during the first year and usually neither during the second, but they produce during the third year. During all of this time and afterwards [the trees] only require weeding, a bit of manure if they need it -but not too close to their roots- and pruning to prevent the trees growing more than four feet, because in this way the strength that they lose in producing branches will be used for producing fruit. These trees usually last many years, and some people say that they last more than fifty years.

            I am now going to write about the [coffee] fruit and about its preparation for roasting. Each cherry or berry contains two seeds (that do seem two half a bean or two halves) and sometimes only one oval seed almost cylindrical, and when the berry has only one [it] is much more expensive and of much more value. Take the coffee seeds or beans out of the pulp either for using it or for sowing it. Europeans usually do this with a machine, but the natives of Ceylon take the pulp out with a sort of utensil, which can be wooden, inside a container, similar to a big mortar. Once the pulp has been removed the beans are dried in the sun either for trading or for sowing. However, to sow in that country [you have to] dry [the beans] in the shade because if you do it in the sun the high heat might kill their ability of germinate. For general use dry the beans well (the best month [for doing it] there would be in January, but I do not know if by then [we] are going to have any results) because I think the driest the beans are, the easiest is to break and to remove their coverings or jackets. Some machines are also used for this operation [in Ceylon], although the islanders remove the said coverings or films by beating the beans, but [they do it] carefully to not break them. The hotter and drier it is the easier the films pop off. Later, for eliminating the broken films or rinds it is possible to winnow the beans as it is done with wheat. In this way the coffee beans will be clean of dust and rind, ready for selling or for using them, which is my principal aim. Notice that [if] the beans are black or almost black it is an indication that they were not ripe when they were plucked and therefore they will not make good coffee. I have not seen or heard of any machine that separates the whole beans from the broken ones; [in fact,] I have seen boys and girls separating and selecting coffee by hand in the best establishments of Colombo, where there were thousands of arrobas of coffee. I also saw [people] selecting the beans that, as I previously mentioned, were oval and almost cylindrical like pine nuts. Obviously, the selected whole beans are much more expensive that the mix of whole and broken, and much more expensive yet is the oval and almost cylindrical bean. /**/

            Well, Sir, I reckon that I have said all that I knew and all that I had to say on the matter "cultivation of coffee", at least all that is convenient to know now on this subject. I have also tried to get some information on the cultivation and operations related to cinnamon -truly I did not go to Colombo for a stroll- but I could find a single bean of this seed nowhere, everybody telling me that it was off season and it that was impossible to find, as it was.

            Meanwhile I am going to say a little [more] on coffee because I am persuaded that it will reward the work, and anyway we can lose little in trying to grow it. I believe that we will be pioneers in doing it in Australia. Coffee has been cultivated with good results in much colder countries, and the best coffee of Ceylon is generally obtained in the highest mountains and in the stoniest [soils] of Kandy.

            It is already October 25^th ‘69. I have just put in a purpose-built box three sorts of coffee for sowing. In a hemp sachet there are some seeds (seven pounds, I think) that I consider the best. In the same box there is also a straw sachet with more superior-quality coffee seeds. In the same place you will find several single seeds with their pulp, and it would be good to sow them as they are -that is, with the pulp- in order to check what they produce. The box is divided in two parts. In one part are the said seeds and one germinated coconut that I put to test if it arrives there alive. So take care not to break the nut while taking out the sachets because it would be a pity to break them if they arrived alive and safe there. In the other part or division of the box there are five sprouting coconuts. I put moist soil around these coconuts to keep them cool and to test if they reached there alive. Over there they said that this soil stays moist for a long time. Two out of the five coconuts are small ones and three are big ones. The first two are of a particular species and I was assured that they yield fruit after 4 years of sowing, I mean, planting.

            I warn you that when planting [the coconuts] you don not need much soil, with the nut barely touching the land. Here coconuts are usually hung on the branch of a tree by the shell (I saw lots of them like this, both germinated ones and not germinated), and the coconuts are left there until they germinate; when the sprout is already grown the coconuts are taken down and planted with almost no soil, as I previously mentioned.  /**/ I think that the best place for planting these six (sic) coconuts is the mound with the pine tree. Supposing that the nuts arrive alive, try to plant them and to moisten their soil as soon as possible. Put [the nuts] ten feet or so from each other. If the coconuts manage to take root it will be possible to multiply them in the future, supposing that they give fruit as it is expected. In the moist soil that I put on the coconuts I [also] put some seeds of coffee. Who knows if any of them will have germinated before you unpack the box there.

            If the box arrives there (I mean, in Perth) when you are in the capital, do not allow anybody to open it, because the box should not be opened until reaching New Norcia. Under no circumstance give news of the content of the box to anybody. I will be very displeased if you or another person would do it. If you are not in Perth entrust the box to Mr. G. Shenton to whom, just in case, I have addressed it; beg him to send [somebody] for the box just after the Post arrives from Europe and [beg him] to inform you that he has the box so that you [can] send for it as soon as possible. You do have to remember to take the coffee out of the sachets just after arriving at New Norcia and to spread it in a cool place, such as the cellar, and leave it there until it is sowing time. Do not forget to tell me about the conditions of the box when it arrives and [to give me] other details on the matter. Understand well, I shall not be able to pay for the box here but until [the box arrives at] K. S. Sound. You will work out its transportation from there to Perth and to New Norcia. The box is addressed to Father Delaney in Albany so that he collects it as quickly as possible and sends the box immediately to Mr. Shenton, to whom is also addressed. After you receive the box write to the aforesaid Father and ask him for his costs; if it is not possible to pay him in cash, because is impossible to send him any money, pay with postage stamps.

            Before I forget it, I think it will be good to sow some dozens of coffee beans just after they arrive there to prevent losing all of them if we wait until April. Better a "just in case" than a thousand complaints! So look sharp! It is said that coffee loves stony soil when /**/ transplanted, but experience will indicate what is going to happen over there.

            27/10/69. It is six o'clock in the morning and the steamer that I was expecting from China, "The Imperatrice", has just arrived, so I am departing tomorrow at the latest. On another three steamers that arrived yesterday came three gentlemen bishops and several priests who are on their way to Rome. Curious enough, none of the two gentlemen bishops of Ceylon thought of going to Rome! On the last steamer another twelve gentlemen bishops, I think, are going or went to Rome.

            I delivered yesterday the box with the coffee and the coconuts to the office of the P&O Company.

            Here in Galli there is now a Spanish consul. This one is already the second one. It is said that the Spanish consul in Sydney lost his mind and threw himself out of the window from the second floor and died. Another one appointed by the "revolutionary nephew" was going to replace him in his office or consulship. In Spain [things are going] from bad to worse.

            I hope that there is no particular news, and everybody and everything are going on satisfactorily.

            I give my greetings and I embrace all of you. I say good-bye to you and to everybody [in the Mission] and I give you the Holy Blessing.

            Very Illustrious Reverend Bishop of Port Victoria (signature)

            P. S.: Father Benito Martín says hello to you, to Santos and particularly to Canon Martelli.

  Revisado - Updated: 05 August, 2009