CH. Ill] POPULATION AND LABOUR 13 



the north of Ceylon. Getting a very large crop of rice in 1903, 

 the villagers sat down to eat it, and grew not a blade until 

 1905, when their seed rice was almost all that they had left; 

 this was sown, and was attacked by a bad outbreak of the 

 " arakkodiyan" caterpillar, with the result of famine in these 

 villages, whose inhabitants had practically done not a stroke 

 of work for two years. Famine having come, of course the 

 Government was called upon to help them out of their 

 difficulties. 



Ignorance, often of the most pronounced kind, is another 

 prominent quality among the poorer tropical natives, as among 

 the poorer folk in other countries. Poverty, in the sense of lack 

 of any money with which to buy things, is also a very strongly 

 marked feature in ordinary village society, though poverty in 

 the sense of actual dearth of things to eat and to wear is 

 fortunately much less common, and in the more equatorial 

 countries like Ceylon and Java is almost non-existent. 



Other obstacles to any agricultural progress are the remark- 

 able conservatism of the people, and their slavish adherence to 

 ancient custom, their fondness for home, and consequent un- 

 willingness to move into new districts where they might have 

 a better chance in agricultural matters, and their prejudice 

 against anything that smacks of novelty. All these matters 

 will be considered again below. 



On the other hand, it must not be assumed that all the 

 agricultural characters of the tropical races are necessarily bad, 

 though they may be far inferior to the white races or to the 

 Chinese. The manner in which they are willing to continue 

 the cultivation of rice and many other products, though " there 

 is no money in them," is on the whole distinctly commendable 

 within reasonable limits and the leanings towards coopera- 

 tion that many eastern races at any rate exhibit are in the 

 highest degree praiseworthy, and to be fostered to the utmost. 

 Cooperation in agriculture is becoming one of the most import- 

 ant factors in its progress in Europe and America. In Ceylon, 

 to take an example, the villagers often cooperate in the care of 

 their rice fields, sowing each man's field in turn, or reaping it 

 in turn, instead of each man having to do all his own work. 



