56 AGRICULTURE IN THE TROPICS [PT. II 



owner spends little, but the land tends to become steadily im- 

 poverished. 



In India, on the other hand, the problem is quite different. 

 The cheapening of sugar by the competition of beet-sugar, and 

 other causes, have enormously increased the local consumption, 

 though they have thrown India out of the export trade. The 

 local demand is mainly for the coarse unrefined gur or jaggery, 

 which can be produced more cheaply than any imported sugar. 

 The cane, which is grown in small areas, and often in rotation 

 with wheat, rice> pulses, and other crops, is crushed between 

 wooden rollers and the juice boiled down till it will condense 

 on standing. 



Sugar (Saccharum officinarum) grows best on rich porous 

 clays and on alluvial soils at sea level, and does not mind the 

 near neighbourhood of the sea. It will not succeed in the hills. 

 It sets no seeds as a rule, and is propagated by cuttings, which 

 are nowadays usually planted about five or six feet apart. In 

 from 12 to 14 months (in the West Indies) the shoots from 

 these cuttings are ripe for harvesting, when they form bunches 

 of waving stems, about 6 12 feet in height, and looking not 

 unlike gigantic grasses, as indeed they are. 



They are cut close to the ground with cutlasses, and brought 

 into the factory. Owing to their enormous weight the problem 

 of carriage assumes great importance in sugar cultivation. On 

 large estates in the West Indies and elsewhere, they are gener- 

 ally brought in by light railroads or tramways laid down in the 

 fields, sometimes worked by horses, sometimes by locomotives. 

 In the Malay Peninsula, on the other hand, the laud lies very 

 low, and small canals have been made throughout it, upon 

 which the cane can be hauled in barges, at a great saving in 

 cost. This, I was informed by the manager of the largest com- 

 pany engaged in sugar cultivation there, gives the estates 

 a very measurable advantage over those of the West Indies, 

 in which he was for several years engaged in the cultivation of 

 sugar. 



In British Guiana, it is stated that 30 tons of cane per acre 

 are regarded as a good crop, and yield 25 tons of juice, but this 

 evaporates to about 36 cwt. of sugar. Even so, it is evident 



