5O Cultivation, Manuring, Measuring, etc. 



harmless individuals after all, and not by any means 

 so fierce as they appear. 



On this work of digging deep down and well 

 depends, in a great measure, the future health and 

 growth of the indigo plant, and it cannot be too 

 carefully supervised. A gang of badmashee coolies 

 from badmash, a rogue or rascal will so scamp 

 the work if not thoroughly well looked after, that, 

 though the land will look, on the surface, to be well 

 and properly dug, it will in reality be hardly dug 

 up at all ; and if the Assistant will dismount and 

 scrape away the top-soil, he will find that the men 

 have hardly dug four inches in depth, whereas they 

 should have dug to the full depth of the kodal, (or 

 digging implement used). If an assistant gets his 

 tumnee well done, the rest of his cultivation is com- 

 paratively easy, but if an assistant's tumnee is scamp- 

 ed over in the first instance, it will be a never- 

 ending and constant source of worry and anxiety 

 to him, and his future cultivation will never look 

 thoroughly well done ; and, as to manuring it after- 

 wards, if necessary, it is only throwing half the 

 manure and labour away to attempt it. 



I may here mention that, in the English or Irish 

 acceptation of the term, a spade is an implement un- 

 known to the native of India ; he cannot with his 

 bare feet use it, for though the sole of his foot is 



