AGRICULTURAL INDUSTRIES. 39 



and other crops can be made to correspond with the rainy season ; 

 on the coast of Coromandel, for instance, it occurs on this account 

 in winter. 



The northern limit of rice-culture reaches lat. 45° at certain 

 points in the Old World — for example, in the valley of the Po ; in 

 America, it remains ten degrees further south. In the southern 

 hemisphere it goes only a little over the tropical line — in Madagas- 

 car, for instance. For Japan, the Tsugaru-strait, in lat. 41^° N., 

 forms the northern barrier. 



Wherever its main conditions are perfectly carried out, rice re- 

 wards the farmer's labour better than any other cereal, and bears 

 from 30 to 40 bushels (at from 20 to 25 kg.^) per acre, or 40*5 per 

 are. In Japan one Tan (300 Tsubo, or 10 are) of the best rice- 

 land brings a return of 2-4 koku (4'36 hi.) of hulled rice, corre- 

 sponding to 58 hi. of paddy, or 58 hi. to the ha, while the average 

 yield per ha. is equal to 27*5 hi. of hulled rice, or 36-6 hi. of paddy. 

 In Northern Italy, where rotation is the rule, and uninterruped 

 rice-culture a rare exception, fresh land bears in the former case, 

 when circumstances are favourable, 70 hi. per ha., and in the latter, 

 40 hi. The greater bearing-capacity is here to be ascribed to 

 rotation and broad-cast sowing, and in part also to the greater 

 fertility of soil. 



Rice was cultivated in the monsoon region of Asia far back in 

 antiquity ; and although all certain traces of its origin are lost, 

 the Buddhist peasantry of China and Japan regard it as a direct 

 gift of the gods. But this much is certain — that, like so many 

 other useful plants, it was disseminated abroad from India. The 

 history of ancient China points to this in unmistakable manner, and 

 not less so the circumstance that from the Sanskrit name vnhi como. 

 the Iranic brisi and the Graeco-Latin oryza, from which last word, 

 again, all Romanic, Germanic, and Slavic names for it are easily 

 derived.- The Russian calls it either riss or saratschmskoe pscheno 

 — that is, " Saracen millet." 



At present rice is grown throughout nearly the whole monsoon- 

 region, — all over Japan, except in Yezo and the Kuriles ; in Corea, 

 China, all the Malay islands, in Hindostan, Farther India, in the 

 Tarim-basin (for example, at Yarkand, and at Kabul nearly 2,000 

 meters above sea-level), in Persia, Armenia, and Mesopotamia, and 

 (so far as is possible with their neglected systems of irrigation) in 

 Arabia. Madagascar, probably in consequence of Malay immigra- 

 tion, was early acquainted with this plant, which furnishes there, to 

 this day, enough for the chief article of food and to spare for the 

 Mascarenes besides. Until after contact with Europeans, bread 

 was as unknown here as in Eastern Asia. Arabs first brought rice- 

 culture to the eastern coast of Africa and into the region of the 



^ Kg. = kilogram ; gr. = gramme, 



2 See de CandoUe : " L'origine des Plantes Cultivdes," p. 310; and Hehn : 

 " Culturpflanzen und Hausthiere." 



