t 228 ] 



CHAPTER XXIII. 



PADDY HUSKING. 



T3ADDY is safer to store in godowns for a long time than 

 rice. But even rice can be stored free from weevils 

 and other pests if carbon bisulphide is used, say lib. for 

 every 20 maunds of rice stored in air-tight vessels, such as 

 jdlds tarred inside and out and covered with shards sealed up 

 with cowdung paste after the jdlds have been filled with rice. 



292. The husking of paddy should be deferred for 7 or 8 

 months after harvest, but if steaming is done very little 

 breakage takes place even in the case of new rice. As a 

 precaution against famine, the storing of new paddy for about 

 8 months before husking and sale of rice are undertaken, 

 should again come into fashion, as it used to be in olden 

 times. 



293. The ordinary .method of husking paddy with dhenkis 

 or pestles and mortars, is too well known to need description. 

 Of all the mechanical appliances in use in the New and the 

 Old worlds, the Rice Huller and Polisher manufactured by 

 the Engelberg Huller Co. of Syracuse, New York, has at- 

 tained the most well-deserved popularity. There are several 

 mills in Southern India and in the Punjab where this 'Huller 

 and Polisher' is in use, and two of these machines have been 

 lately set up at Manicktald near Calcutta. The Rice Huller 

 and Polisher manufactured by Messrs. S. Howes and Co. of 

 London is a machine which scarcely differs from the Engelberg 

 Rice Huller and Polisher; and Ghatak's Rice Huller is only 3 

 cheap and inefficient imitation of these machines. With 

 Ghatak's hand-power (or foot-power) paddy-husking machine, 

 fine paddy has to be put through the mill at least 12 times 

 before complete husking takes place. 



