January i, 1883.] 



THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 



55' 



land is run over with a " bucklier," a blade of sharp iron 

 attached to a block of wood and drawn between the rows 

 by oxen, so clearing the laud of all weeds. This is once 

 repeated, and the operation of tilling the soil ceases. The 

 fruit ripeus about February or Jlarch, and yields from 

 six to eight raauuds per acre, the price per mauud vary- 

 ing from R3-12 to 4 in Bombay. Of the larger descrip- 

 tions sent, the lesser is the red, and the larger the white 

 variety. Both attain to pretty respectable proportions, 

 fifteen to twenty feet in height, and if watered iu the 

 hot months will live and produce for years. These prefer 

 the better class of soils, rich black or brown, or loamy. 

 The seeds are put down by the villagers at the commence- 

 ment of the rains, sometimes very thinly, amoui^ the 

 kun-eef crops, more often in the minute plots around their 

 huts. ' Some trees in the Government garden here, in- 

 differently attended to, yielded last year (their third season) 

 over 200 lb. per tree, they are remarkably fine specimens 

 of the middling variety of my seed, and the hue of stem, 

 leaves, capsules and seed is red. They produce two crops — 

 one now and the other in March. I have a plot of 100 

 plants, 6 feet apart. They were put down a month ago, 

 have had a good many showers and little manure, and 

 each now stands over six feet, with a stem of the thick- 

 ness of your wrist, and leaves two feet wide. Now, sup- 

 pose a person inteuded to cultivate 50 acres of large castor 

 plant. The land, possessing two wells, must, as I have 

 already stated, be of a good description and ^ three feet 

 in depth at least of good soil. It must, prior to the 

 seeding, be well ploughed and weeded, and lie ready for 

 three months at least, and in this time if it receives a 

 few good showers or could be flooded twice, so much the 

 better. In the commencement of June furrows at inter- 

 vals of 8 feet should be run with ploughs straight across 

 the land, and last year's cowdung be freely scattered 

 therein. The seed should, about the 15th of June be sown 

 iu the furrows, the plough being worked into these again. 

 The sower following the plough drops one seed at every 

 eight feet, not stopping to cover the seed, as this oper- 

 ation is already being performed by the "buckher" which 

 is being driven across the furrows. Germination will com- 

 mence iu from six to eight days. The seed must be well 

 picked, and even then a good percentage will not sprout ; 

 when after 10 or 15 days other seeds should be put down 

 in their places. Should these succeed, if a spell of dry 

 weather come when the plants are tender, say of two to 

 three leaves, insects, ants and caterpillars are sure to 

 attack them and destroy a good many. These should be 

 rapidly replaced with seed, aud this process can be pur- 

 sued till the end of August. "When the plants are 15 or 

 20 days old, the earth round the roots should be loosened, 

 and manured with manure which you have previously 

 stacked all about the land. Only dry cowdung should be 

 freely applied, one man or woman easily mauipulating from 

 3 to 400 plants daily. The only animals which eat castor 

 leaves are deer and goats. Now the only work is to 

 "bnckher" the land when weeds arise. Two of these 

 operations, one a mouth after the other, are generally all 

 that is required. The "buckher" will accomplish from 

 three-fnurtlis to one acre daily. What a senseless and 

 expensive system the mode of weeding tea by coolies in 

 Assam is. One man with a hoe does 40' x 50' of light, 

 and 20' « 20' of deep cl'^aring, when a "buckher" drawn 

 by a single bull, will easily do what I have just stated, 

 one acre of light and a half of heavy. Then the coolie 

 operation costs the planter R4 per acre, while the "buck- 

 her" will achieve this for four annas. In September the 

 red variety will yield the first crop, say 22 lb. per tree, 

 and in February both the red and white \v\l\ give their 

 full crop. Not to injure the trees you will have to erect 

 stands out of the fallen timber from which the pickers 

 break the capsules. These are then carted away and stacked 

 and cattle tread out the seed. The average yield per 

 plant the first year will exceed 6 lb., the second 10 lb., 

 and the third 15 lb. The latter, provided the field is well 

 watered in the hot months. And I have heard of trees 

 under these conditions giving a good outturn again in June- 

 July. This paper has already become too long, and ther© 

 is no room for details of expenditure. But if you allow 

 one man for 4 acres and six pairs of bulls for the 50 

 acres, besides for tools, manuring, harvesting and rent, 

 the cost ought not to exceed per annum 16 rupees per 



acre — say Rl.OOO for the whole. Your produce the fii-st 

 year will be, taking the acre to contain 650 plants (5 per 

 cent margin allowed) at 5 lb. per plant, siiy 40 maun Is 

 per acre or R160 for the 50 acres, that is, ilSjOOU wirh 

 an expenditure of 111,000. The third year the expenses 

 will not increase, but the outturn will be worth K24,0(X). 

 This result does appear incredibly absurd, but it is never- 

 theless very near the mark. H. T. T. 

 Berar, October 3, 1882. 



GARDENS IN INDIA. 



(Concluded from p. 545.) 



In addition to the gardens mentioned at p. 545, there 

 are the private gardens of Europeans living iu ludia. Now, 

 it might be supposed that in a climate aud soil so favour- 

 able to horticulture, these would bo first-cla.ss, but such 

 is not the fact. Anglo-Indians are ever on the move, and 

 they don't care to go to the trouble aud expense of lay- 

 ing down gardens for the people who come after theni ; 

 still, iu some places, the gardens — which are commonly 

 called "compounds" — are fair enough. Desperate expe- 

 dients, however, are necessary to make English vegetables, 

 which are the things most affected, flourish well. Thus, 

 one will see an amateur gardener— a colonel or commis- 

 sioner perhaps — gravely sticking little pegs of bamboo into 

 his Cauliflower stems, to prevent them emulating Jack's 

 Beanstalk, and running up too quick; or a lady in her 

 early morning deshabille carefully placing a lump of rock- 

 salt at the roots of each Asparagus plant, in the hope 

 that so much kindness will induce the " grass " to grow. 

 But gardening in India is not nice work for those who 

 like to work themselves. Hideous grubs and insects are 

 turned up with each dig of the garden khife with which 

 we work, and sometimes the mallee " or native gardener 

 is a worshipper of the cobra, in which case that serpent 

 becomes dangerously familiar, taking up his haunt near 

 the well, and turning up perhaps when least expected. 

 Squirrels devour one's Peas, and white ants eat everything; 

 and, as the rule, English vegetables, except those grown 

 at a great elevation on the hills, are tasteless, and scarcely 

 worth the trouble bestowed upon them. 



\yith regard to fruits, there are few of the indigenous 

 kinds which are worth growing or can be improved. Man- 

 goes take too long to grow to be worth cultivation in an 

 Anglo-Indian's garden ; whatever is done to improve this 

 fine fruit is done by natives ; but the Indian Mango has 

 still a huge and inconvenient stone, whereas the " high 

 caste" Mauritius Mangoes are said to have had their stones 

 improved right away. One ingenious English gardener, 

 indeed, attempted to grow very fine Mangoes, by bury- 

 ing all the dead pariah dogs that are killed once a year 

 at the root of hie trees, but with what result is unknown. 

 Mulberries, in some places, grow in hedges, but the fruit 

 is poor. Guavas are capable of the "higher cidt," but 

 they are altogether iu the hands of the natives. Oranges, 

 except in some places, are also poor, and no attempt seems 

 to be ever made to introduce the finer kinds as those of 

 St. Michael, Malta, or Seville. Melons are very fiur. but 

 a Melon garden in India is a very different thing from 

 a Melon frame at home In the cold weather, when the 

 Indian rivers have rim down, and leave great wast'^s of 

 sand exposed, the Melon gardener plants his seed broad- 

 cast. Ey-and-bye the whole surface beeoraes a vast I\Ielon 

 bed, and in the hot weather the fruit is solrl at the equiv- 

 alent of Id. or less each. The Melons of Ouddapah, in 

 the Madras Presidency, are famous, but as the rule, In- 

 dian Melons, like all Indian fruits, want new "blood" in- 

 troduced, for the seed is too often worn out. The Persian 

 Melons, green-fleshed, are delicious and easily grown, but 

 are seldom seen. But it is a rule in India that whatever 

 was good enough for a man's forefathers is good enough 

 for himself, consequently there is little horticultural pro- 

 gress. Pine-apples grow freely on the west coast of India, 

 sometimes under the shade of the immense Cocoa-nut 

 groves of those parts, but are much inferior in size and 

 flavour to the Pines of the Straits of Malacca. The Pine- 

 apples of Singapore are perhaps the finest in the world ; 

 they are planted on the hillside in much the same way 

 as they plant Tea on the Nilgiris, and are to be purchased 

 at a merely nominal price — one weighing several pounds 

 can be had for a cent, or the hundredth part of a dollar ; 



