AGRICULTURAL INDUSTRIES. 41 



grain, but is the most digestible of all. It is on this account 

 peculiarly suited to children and old people, and is given to such 

 and to sick persons in China and Japan, even in regions where it 

 is regarded as a luxury which the healthy peasant and artisan may 

 only exceptionally enjoy, as, for example, in the Chinese provinces 

 of Honan, Shensi, and Shansi, and in the mountain districts of 

 Japan. 



The attention which the farmer of Eastern Asia, especially of 

 Japan, bestows upon his rice-field is worthy of the highest recog- 

 nition. At the season of tilling he adds to his bee-like industry 

 that cheerfulness of disposition which enables him to perform this 

 severe and dirty labour with ease and rapidity. The work begins 

 in April with the laying out of one corner of the rice-field as a 

 seed-bed. To this end the ground is first dug over with a long- 

 handled hoe, then levelled and surrounded with a little smoothed 

 and hardened wall of earth, from 25 to 40 cm. in height and thick- 

 ness. A small gutter or irrigation-channel is brought into connec- 

 tion, when possible, so that the bed can be flooded when necessary. 

 A favourite manure is the slime dug up from a neighbouring 

 canal, if one is near. The seed-bed is covered with this to a depth 

 of about 20 cm. In default of such slime, ashes must serve, and 

 other quick-working fertilizers, such as stamped beans, compost, 

 and faecal matter. Next, the dam is broken at some point and 

 water admitted, until the bed is covered to a depth of about 6 cm., 

 when the seed, borne in a flat winnowing basket, is scattered over 

 its surface with the hand. This seed is most carefully selected. 

 In many cases it is kept under water several days beforehand. 

 The grains of rice sink quickly and lie pretty close together on 

 and in the mud at the bottom. In four or five days they sprout. 

 Among other uses, the water serves to protect the fresh seed from 

 birds. It soon evaporates or sinks into the ground and must be 

 replaced, in case no rain falls, with a new supply from the ditch. 

 As a rule, however, the seed-bed is flooded only at night and left 

 dry by day. Thus it is protected against cold, while enjoying the 

 warming influence of the sun. 



In most parts of Japan the sowing of rice takes place towards 

 the end of April or in the beginning of May, and the time for 

 transplanting is from about thirty to forty-five days later. In 

 certain districts, — for example, in the provinces of Mino and 

 Shinano (south-west of Tokio, in the interior of Hondo), — it is 

 customary to begin cultivation from two to four weeks later,^ in 

 others, as at Kochi, in Tosa (on the island of Shikoku), as much 

 earlier. This depends partly on climatic causes, according as the 

 temperature of earth and water requisite for the development of 

 rice is attained late or early in spring. But a more important 

 reason for this variation in time is, that in fertile depressions, like 



^ In Shinano the thirty-third day before Range (July 2) is sowing-time. 



