64 CULTIVATION AND MANUFACTURE OF TEA. 



sun at the sides, all of which high artificial shade is subject to, 

 are avoided by this low frame-work. 



Mats are the best to cover the frame- work. In case of 

 accidental or incendiary fire they are not so objectionable as 

 grass, for they burn less and slower, but mats are expensive. 

 Any coarse grass (free from seed) will answer, and it should 

 be laid on as thin as will suffice to give shade. 



The beds may be watered, if there is no rain, a fortnight 

 after the seed is sown, and from time to time during the dry 

 season, whenever the soil at a depth of three or four inches 

 shows no moisture. 



The soil should also be kept free of weeds, and after the 

 plants are three or four inches high, the spaces between the 

 drills should be slightly stirred every now and then. 



After the seed has germinated, and the seedlings have, say 

 four leaves on them, the artificial shade should be taken away. 

 But it must be done gradually, taking off portions of the grass 

 first, so that the young seedlings may by degrees be inured to 

 the hot sun. 



Though cultivation, as described, by watering and opening 

 the soil at times is well, these should not be done much, or the 

 seedlings will be too large when the time comes to transplant 

 them. Large seedlings do not, as a rule, thrive as well as 

 moderate-sized ones, after being transplanted. 



Among the many very absurd mistakes made in the culti- 

 vation of the Tea plant, none exceeds the ridiculous way Tea 

 seed used to be sown in the Government plantations in the 

 North-western Himalayas. The seed was sown in drills, as I 

 have advised, but in six linear inches of the drills, where it is 

 right to put two or at most three seeds, perhaps thirty were 

 placed ! I do not exaggerate ; the drill, six inches deep, was 

 filled with them. Many and many lacs of seeds, in those 

 days worth many thousand rupees, were thus sacrificed. 

 Private planters in the Himalayas, taught by the Government 



