I may commence here by observing that all the points enumerated as regards the valuation of land suitable for coffee apply equally to plantations, but it is hardly necessary to say that there are many additional points to be considered when valuing a plantation that is for sale, or for which a valuation may be required for any other purpose.  The first point that a valuator should inquire into, is the age of the forest land on which a plantation has been formed.  This may not be very easily determined, as the whole of the original forest may have been removed, but there are nearly certain to be corners left, and the valuator should remember that the surest sign of very old forest is an occasional very old and partly decayed Nandi tree, or large and aged Marragudtha trees.  The next point to be considered is as to whether the forest was all felled at once and burnt off with a running fire, or whether it was cleared by degrees—­i.e., in the first year cleared of underwood and a few of the large trees, and the wood piled and burned in separate heaps, and the large trees gradually removed in subsequent years.  This may be regarded as a very important point, for in the latter case the physical condition of the soil will be sure to have been better maintained, and, in the opinion of one of our most experienced planters, the coffee will be much less liable to attacks of the Borer.  The age of the plantation should next be inquired into, but mere age, it must be remembered, though it may be of great importance, is by no means always so.  At first sight it would appear that a young plantation, with its virgin soil, must be more valuable than an old one, but I have in my mind’s eye a plantation in Manjarabad, belonging to friends of mine, and the planting of which was begun as far back as 1857.  Last year one of my friends took me over it, and a finer plantation it would be impossible to find, and at the end of our walk he said to me, “The place is better than you ever saw it.”  And so it most undoubtedly was:  and, as another planting friend once wrote to me, “All the old established estates in Mysore are to the front still, and many of them better than they ever were,” and better because manuring and cultivation have improved pieces of inferior land and ridges to such a degree as to make them superior to what they were before the land was first cleared and planted.  One of the estates in question was opened about ninety-five years ago, and yet contains as fine coffee as one could wish to see.  All depends upon the care with which the estate has been kept up, and into that the valuator must specially inquire, and he must also specially inquire into the age of the coffee trees, which, always supposing that the soil has been well kept up, is of far more importance than the mere age of the estate.  My friends’ estate, for instance, above alluded to, was an old estate, but it was, comparatively speaking, a fresh plantation, for all the old trees had been removed, and the whole property replanted with the Coorg plant.  So that, though the estate was old, the coffee was by no means so.