Page:History of the Indian Archipelago Vol 3.djvu/389

 ARTICLES OF EXPORTATION. 373 priced than pepper. At present the labour of raising these two commodities is nearly the same, and, therefore, their price is nearly alike. They occupy the same area of ground, are equally proli- fic, bear in the same time, and live nearly the same time. Coffee may, I imagine, be raised in Java, with an ample profit to the farmer, at 4 Spanish dollars the picul. Holland is the principal market of Java coffee, and here it is distinguished into pale, yellow, and brown, varieties which depend on the age of the commodity, and not on the modes of culture, or on any permanent difference in the plants which yield them. The pale coffee is the newest and lowest priced. The brown is the oldest and most esteemed. Coffee stored in Java loses the first year eight per cent., the second about five, and the third about two, after which it continues stationary, and assumes a brown colour. This is the brown coffee of commerce. There is a loss of 15 per cent, of weight, and at least two years and a half of the interest of money, and profits of stock upon this commodity. It is probable, therefore, that the brown coffee will disappear from the markets. The Dutch acquired a taste for it during the time in which the coffee used to be te- diously and improvidently stored, when the mono- poly was in full force. Coffee is an article of co- lonial produce, the value of the different varieties