104 THE KICE CROP 



As there are channels to conduct water to every rice-field, 

 small canoes are largely used to bring the rice, both before and 

 after it has been threshed, to the margin of the higher grounds 

 and nearer to the roads. At the village just mentioned, which 

 is like a large island surrounded by a sea of rice-plain, there is 

 one point where a number of these channels meet and form quite 

 a port ; and a very animated scene it presents at harvest-time, 

 as canoe after canoe, piled up with heaps of rice in the husk, or 

 with sheaves of it still unthreshed, comes up to the landing- 

 place to discharge its cargo. 



In a very few weeks' time the watery covering of the plain is 

 hidden by another green crop, but not of so bright and vivid a 

 tint as the fresh-planted and growing rice. This is the kolikoly, 

 or after-crop, which sprouts from the roots of the old plants. 

 This is much shorter in stalk and smaller in ear than the first 

 crop, and is often worth very little ; but if the rains are late, so 

 that there is plenty of moisture, it sometimes yields a fair 

 quantity, but it is said to be rather bitter in taste. 



In cutting the rice the Malagasy use a straight-bladed knife ; 

 and, as the work proceeds, the stalks are laid in long curving 

 narrow lines along the field, the heads of one sheaf being covered 

 over by the cut ends of the stalks of the next sheaf. This is 

 done to prevent the ears drying too quickly and the grain 

 falling out before it reaches the threshing-floor. This last- 

 named accessory to rice-culture is simply a square or circle of 

 the hard red earth, kept clear from grass and weeds, sometimes 

 plastered with mud, and generally on the sloping side of the 

 rising ground close to the rice-field. Here the sheaves are piled 

 round the threshing-floor like a low breastwork. (Occasionally 

 the rice is threshed in a space in the centre of the rice-field, mats 

 being spread over the stubble to prevent loss of the grain.) No 

 flail is used, but handfuls of the rice-stalks are beaten on a stone 

 fixed in the ground, until all the grain is separated from the 

 straw. The unhusked rice is then carried in baskets to the 

 owner's compound and is usually stored in large round pits with 

 a circular opening dug in the hard red soil. These are lined 

 with straw, and the mouth is covered with a flat stone, which is 

 again covered over with earth ; and in these receptacles it is 

 generally kept dry and uninjured for a considerable time. 



In most years the end of April and the beginning of May are 



