152 



HISTORY OF AGRICULTURE. 



Part I. 



numerous in the adjoining country. Among the birds, which are the same with those 

 of other parts of India, is one called the henza, the symbol of the Birman nation, as the 

 eagle was of the Roman empire. It is a species of wild fowl, called in India the 

 Bramin goose; but the natives of Ava do not deify this bird. 



940. The agriculture of Java has been noticed by Thunberg, and more fully described 

 by Sir Stamford Raffles. The climate, like that of other countries situated witliin about 

 ten degrees of the equator, presents a perpetual spring, summer, and harvest. The 

 distinction of weather is into wet and dry, never hot and cold, and rain depends on the 

 winds. The surface of the country is low towards the coast, but hilly in the interior ; 

 unhealthy about Batavia, but in most otlier parts as salubrious as any other tropical 

 country. The soil is for the most part rich, and remarkable for its depth ; probably, as 

 Governor Raffles conjectures, owing to its volcanic origin, 



941. Landed projierty in Java is almost exclusively vested in the king, between whom 

 and the cultivator there are no intermediate holders ; and the cultivator is without lease 

 or right beyond the will of the sovereign. The manner in which the king draws his 

 income from the whole surface of the country is by burdening certain '* villages or 

 estates with the salaries of particular officers, allotting others for the support of his 

 relatives or favourites, or granting them for the use of particular charitable institutions ; in 

 the same manner as before the consolidation act in Britain, the interest of particular loans 

 was paid upon the produce of specific imports." Tradesmen, government officers, 

 priests, and the government, are all alike paid in kind. . 



942. The crops raised by the farmer for home consumj)tion are chiefly rice and maize, 

 some wheat is also grown ; but the staple article is rice, of which one pound and a half 

 per day are considered sufficient nourishment for an adult. 



943. The crops raised by the colonists are coffee, sugar, cotton, tobacco, and a variety of 

 other productions of the East. One of the principal articles is coffee. The coffee plants 

 are first raised in seed-beds, then transplanted under an open shed for the sake of shade, 

 and then in about eighteen months removed into the garden or plantation, where they are 

 destined to yield their fruit. A plantation is laid out in squares, the distance of plant 

 from plant being commonly about six feet, and in the centre of each four trees is placed a 

 dadap tree, for the purpose of affording shade, which in Java seems necessary to the 

 health of the plants. They are never pruned, grow to the height of sixteen feet, and 

 will bear for twenty years ; but a plantation in Java is seldom continued more than ten 

 years. In general three crops of berries are produced in a season. 



944. The live stock of the Java farmer consists of the ox and buffalo, used in plough- 

 ing, and the horse for burden : they have a few sheep, and goats and poultry. 



945. The implements are the plough, of which they have a common or rice ground 

 sort, a dry-soil plough, and a garden or plantation plough, all of which are yoked to a 

 pair of buffaloes, or oxen, in the same manner. The harrow (fg. 124. a), on which the 



driver sits, is a sort of rake ; and they have a sort of strong hoe, which they use as a 

 substitute for a spade (b), and a lighter one, used as a draw hoe (c). Their knives for 

 weeding, pruning, and reaping 

 (fg. 1 25. a to/),are very curious ; 

 one of them (g) is used both 

 as an axe and bill, and another 

 (A) as a thrust hoe and prun- 

 ing hook. It is observed by Go- 

 vernor Raffles, that in reaping 

 they crop off " each separate 

 ear along with a few inches of 

 the straw ;"an " operose process' ' 

 which he was informed had its 

 origin in some religious notions. 

 Crops arc generally dibbled or 



