The coffee-plant, which is only known on Java by its European appellation, and its intimate connexion with European despotism, was first introduced by the Dutch early in the eighteenth century, and has since formed one of the articles of their exclusive monopoly. The labour by which it is planted, and its produce collected, is included among the oppressions or forced services of the natives, and the delivery of it into the government stores, among the forced deliveries at inadequate rates. Previously to the year 1808, the cultivation of coffee was principally confined to the _Súnda_ districts. There were but comparatively few plantations in the eastern districts, and the produce which they were capable of yielding did not amount to one-tenth part of the whole; but, under the administration of Marshal Daendels, this shrub usurped the soil destined for yielding the subsistence of the people; every other kind of cultivation was made subservient to it, and the withering effects of a government monopoly extended their influence indiscriminately throughout every province of the Island.
In the _Súnda_ districts, each family was obliged to take care of one thousand coffee plants; and in the eastern districts, where new and extensive plantations were now to be formed, on soils and in situations in many instances by no means favourable to the cultivation, five hundred plants was the prescribed allotment. No negligence could be practised in the execution of this duty: the whole operations of planting, cleaning, and collecting, continued to be conducted under the immediate superintendance of European officers, who selected the spot on which new gardens were to be laid out, took care that they were preserved from weeds and rank grass, and received the produce into store when gathered.
A black mould intermixed with sand, is considered the best soil for the coffee plant. In selecting a situation for the gardens, the steep declivities of mountains, where the plant would be endangered either by the too powerful heat of the sun or an entire want of it, or where torrents in the rainy season might wash away the rich earth necessary for its growth, are avoided. The best situation for them is usually considered to be in the vales along the foot of the high mountains, or on the gentle declivities of the low range of hills, with which the principal mountains are usually skirted; and it is found that, _cæteris paribus_, the greater is the elevation of the garden, the longer is the period of its productiveness, and the finer is the berry.