160 



HISTORY OF AGRICULTURE. 



Part I. 



(Cyprinus auratus), which, in that country, as with us, is kept in basins as an ornament, 

 is a native of a lake at the foot of the high mountain of Tein-king, near the city of 

 Tchang-hoo, in the province of Tch<5-kiang. From that place it has been taken to all the 

 other provinces of the empire and to Japan. It was in 1611 that it was first brought to 

 England. 



994. Thejisheries of China, as already noticed, are free to all ; there are no restrictions 

 on any of the great lakes, the rivers, or canals. The subject is not once mentioned in 

 the Leu-lee ,- but the heavy duties on salt render the use of salt-fish in China almost 

 unknown. Besides the net, the line, and the spear, the Chinese have several ingenious 

 methods of catching fish. In the middle parts of the empire, the fishing corvorant 

 (Felicanus piscator) is almost universally in use; in other parts they catch them by torch- 

 light ; and a very common practice is, to place a board painted white along the edge of 

 the boat, which, reflecting the moon's rays into the water, induces the fish to spring 

 towards it, supposing it to be a moving sheet of water, when they fall into the boat. 



995. The implements of Chinese agriculture are few and simple. The plough has one 

 handle, but no coulter ; there are different forms : some may be drawn by women, (Jig. 

 131. a), others are for stirring the soil under water (6), and the largest is drawn by a 

 single buffalo or ox (c). Horses are never employed for that purpose. The carts are 



low, narrow, and the wheels so diminutive as 

 often to be made without spokes. A large 

 cylinder is sometimes used to separate the grain 

 from the ear, and they have a winnowing ma- 

 chine similar to that which was invented in 

 Europe about a century ago. The most 

 ingenious machines are those for raising water 

 for the purposes of irrigation. A very ingenious 

 wheel for this purpose has been figured by 

 Sir George Staunton : but the most univer- 

 sally used engine is the chain-pump, worked in 

 various ways by oxen, by walking in a wheel, 

 or by the hand ; and next to it buckets worked 

 by long levers (fig. 132.), as in the gardens 

 round London, Paris, Constantinople, and most large cities of Europe. For pounding 

 oleiferous seeds they have also very simple and economical machines, in which pestles on 

 the ends of levers are worked by a horizontal shaft put in motion by a water-wheel. 

 (Jig. 133.) The chief thing to admire in the implements and machines of India and 

 China is their simplicity, and the ease and little expense witli which they may be 

 constructed. 



996. The operations of Chinese agriculture are numerous, 

 and some of them curious. Two great objects to be pro- 

 cured are water and manure. The former is raised from 

 rivers or wells by the machines already mentioned, and dis- 

 tt-ibute'd. over the cultivated surface in the usual manner, and 

 the latter is obtained from every conceivable source. 



997. TAe object qf their ti'llage, 'Livingstone observes, '* appears to be, in 

 the first instance, to expose the soil as extensively as possible ; and this is 

 best effected by throwing it up in large masses, in which state it is allowed 

 to remain till it is finally prepared for planting. When sufficient rain has fallen to allow the husbandman 



133 



132 



to flood his fields, they are laid under -water, in which state they are commonly ploughed again, in the 

 same manner as for fallow, and then a rake, or rather a sort of harrow, about three feet deep and four 



