CULTIVATION OF INDIGO. 183 



him. This is not unfrequently the case. Wet days, or 

 the snows thawing on the hills from an unusual hot day, 

 fill up the beds of the Ganges or Burampooter, which 

 collect the rains of the surrounding countries, carry them 

 down on Bengal, and cover over the face of the country. 

 Should these floods commence early, the fate of the indigo 

 planter is sealed. The prospect he had on going to bed 

 of realizing a support for life, in the morning is converted 

 into the prospect of a residence in debtor s prison. Or he 

 may get up in the morning and see all lost by evening ; 

 or he may watch anxiously the rising for three or four 

 (lays ; his plant is not ripe to cut, nor can he obtain boats 

 even so, to convey it to his factory. 



Besides, there may be no rains for the October sowing, 

 nor none to save the April sowing all then is lost. 



Beyond these local reverses, which make the planter 

 consider himself a most fortunate man if he can get two 

 successive profitable seasons to pay off his heavy liabili 

 ties, and give him the means of retiring ; or even fortu 

 nate if he can get one good crop in three years to keep 

 himself afloat ; there are other causes, which make the 

 production of indigo in the East comparatively very ex 

 pensive. The planter, although so called, is not a plant 

 er, he is a manufacturer. The natives are the planters 

 and the only inducement to the natives to plant indigo for 

 the Englishman is, he gets money in advance for the 

 indigo plant which he is to deliver months afterwards. 

 That advance enables the native to accommodate him 

 self in other things, such as sowing paddy or plant 

 ing sugar-cane, on both of which he makes a profit ; on 

 the indigo plant he makes little or none, and, as seen, the 

 whole may be a loss, as the poor ryot of India is so des- 



