260 TOBACCO 



world. There tobacco is only cultivated on the same 

 ground every seven or eight to ten years, and yet the 

 yield there is considerably less than in the Vorstenlanden. 



How, then, is it possible for the Vorstenlanden planter 

 to obtain such large crops from his land ? It is not by 

 the us-e of enormous quantities of manure, for many 

 estates, including the best and most productive, use no 

 artificial manures at all, and stable manure is rarely used. 

 As a matter of fact, the number of cattle kept on the 

 estates is seldom very great. On one estate of about 

 1,200 hectares, which is one of the richest in cattle, there 

 .are only about 250 kerbouws and 750 sapies, or together, 

 about 1,000 head of cattle. Further, only a small portion 

 of the dung is preserved as manure, as the people have 

 no actual stables. This is also evident from a con- 

 sideration of the figures showing the quantity of so-called 

 stable manure purchased by the estates from the natives. 

 The percentage of nitrog'en this contains varies enor- 

 mously. Very good manure may contain up to 1*29 per 

 cent, of nitrogen, but this is exceptional, most of it only 

 containing about 0*5 per cent, and often not above 

 0*2 per cent. ; one sample only showed 0*06 per cent, of 

 nitrogen. 



The principal cause of the exceptional yields is to be 

 found in the method of cultivation, viz., the growing of 

 tobacco and rice alternately. The rice crop does not 

 exhaust the soil; but, on the contrary, through the wet 

 sawah cultivation the land is undoubtedly immensely 

 improved, in spite of the fact that large crops of rice 

 are taken out of the ground. On good estates in the 

 Vorstenlanden, each rice crop may be relied on to produce 

 on an average about 3,500 kilograms per hectare. On 

 very good land the yield in the rainy season may be 

 much in excess of this figure, and may even be as much 

 as 5,500 kilograms per hectare. 



These enormous crops are not obtained just once a 

 year. On a certain piece of ground the planting during 

 a period of two years consists of: once tobacco, and 

 three times rice, about five months being taken up by the 

 very intensive preparation of the soil which precedes the 

 cultivation of tobacco. Of an actual " break," during 



