.388 



NEW ENGLAND FARMER 



JVSE la, 1!>»9. 



while the process of clearing went on and planta- 

 tions of sugar canes took the place of cotton. The 

 few attempts at the cultivation of the canes by the 

 Chinese exhibited such fine specimens, as to leave 

 but little donbl of its doing well under European 

 management. These are principally of two s-e- 

 cies, viz., the purple or red and the yellow, which 

 latter is identically the sarre as the Otaheite — the 

 juice of which was found afterwards of the density 

 of 8 1-2 of the Saccharometer and easily clarified 

 by the addition of the least quantity of lime water; 

 whilst it was hardly possible to affect a separation 

 of the mucilage and fecula in the juice of tlie red 

 canes by the agency of any quantity of lime and 

 heat. The plantations were made of the yellow 

 canes, and only a limited quantity was grown, and 

 for eating only, it was not without very considera- 

 ble difficulty that enough of plants could be obtain- 

 / ed, and the innst part of these, under different cir- 

 cumstances, would have been rejected as they 

 • would only sell the worst. 15ut as it was, they 

 were gladly bought even at the extravagant price 

 of one dollar per liundred. Poor as they were, they 

 were made still more useless by a habit not unfre- 

 queptly practised by the Chinese laborers, of se- 

 lecting the best for eating, and contenting them- 

 selves to plant what remained of the piece. It was 

 under these unfavorable circumstances that the first 

 twenty acres were planted in the beginning of 

 183C. In the following year, a selection of the 

 product of these canes served to extend the planta- 

 tions forty acres more. About this time tlie old 

 mode of planting, that is by inserting the plant in 

 ridges of ground thrown up for the purpose, was a- 

 bandoned fur the improved manner of depositing 

 two plants, about a foot long, side by side into 

 holes eighteen inches in length, sir in width, and 

 twelve in depth, and covered over with a thin layer 

 of dried grass or leaves to shelter them from the 

 Bun. To this change, and to the careful selection 

 of good plants, is owing the marked difference ob- 

 servable in the new from the old plantations, and 

 the far greater abundance and better quality of su- 

 gar which these yield. 



Having thus far proceeded it became necessary 

 to procure the implements for nianupilatioii ; and as 

 the settlement offers no resources whatever in ma- 

 chinery, or even mecjianics acquainted with what 

 is technically called plantation work, it was nec- 

 essary to send to Calcutta for a set of iron boilers, 

 and to set about making a water-wheel and a wood- 

 en crushing mill, in tlie mean time. The wheel 

 was made on the tub principle from an American 

 patent, and the mill on the ordinary horizontal plan, 

 both of which under the efficient superintendence 

 of the manager, on the property, were completed, 

 notwithstanding the difficulties and obstacles to 

 overcome. In order to obtain a supply of water 

 for the mill, a canal twenty feet wide and nearly a 

 mile long, was cut into a small stream which falls 

 into the Kalang and which in ordinary times af- 

 fords a sufficient power. This canal, and another 

 one previously made in conjunction with the owner 

 of an adjoining property to prevent the overflowing 

 of the Kalang during heavy rains, occasioned great 

 delay and expense. These were not the only cuts, 

 for the flatness of the grounds throughout made it 

 necessary that it should be intersected at short dis- 

 tances by deep drains to carry off' the rain. 



The term of twenty year leases offered by the 

 East India Company, not admitting of their tenants 

 laying out money in the erection of expensive and 

 permanent buildings, a boiling and a curing house 



of wood, and some other cheap sheds were put up 

 to answer present purposes, and will |)robably last 

 out this limited period, when, should ihe estate re- 

 vert to the Company, or go into other iiands, the 

 loss will be but trifling. The boiling house was 

 arranged after the latest improvements in the West 

 Indies, only that instead of a range of five, there 

 are but three boilers of wrought iron. The planta- 

 tions of canes not exceeding sixty acres, that nun.- 

 ber of coppers was. deemed sufficient for the pres- 

 ent, more particularly as tlie liquor is made to pass 

 through a filter composed of a thick blanket, a stra- 

 tum of six inches of coarse river sand and a cotton 

 cloth of a thick texture, which retain all the fecula 

 and mucilage, and sends the liquor into tlie teach 

 quite limpid. In the curing house, clay moulds 

 and crystallizers made of wood are used to drain 

 and to clay in. It required sometime to get the 

 Chinese potters in the way of making them of a 

 suitable size and form, and clay of a good kind is 

 to be had close at hand on the property. 



In January of the present year, everything being 

 in a state of readiness to commence the crop, the 

 greatest difficulty of all —the want of experienced 

 sugar-makers capable of directing the operations 

 of this manufacture were of the utmost imiwrtance. 

 Hut as on the island, I was the only person who 

 had the least knowledge of tlie business, and that 

 not practically, having only been an occasional 

 looker on during repealed visits on sugar estates 

 in the West Indies, it became necessary to put that 

 little knowledge in practice, and moreover to form 

 a whole set of raw hands and initiate them in the 

 business of tempering, skimming, boiling to proof, 

 potting, draining, and finally claying. It was 

 thought preferable to encounter this arduous task 

 rather than to undertake to bring Chinese sugar 

 makers to our mode of working — for so wedded are 

 they to their own manners and modes of doing 

 things that it is almost a hopeless attempt to intro- 

 duce a new system among them. The result has 

 confirmed this opinion, for in one weel;'s boiling, 

 the Klings [natives of the Corromendal coast] who 

 were taken from the field, were as expert mill-feed- 

 ers and boilers as if they had been long experienc- 

 ed in this business, and with this additional advan- 

 tage over tlie CJiinese, that they work cheerfully, 

 in and out of regular hours, in times of emergency. 



Having overcome all these difficulties it is satis- 

 factory to say that the soil and climate have prov- 

 ed as favorable as had been anticipated for the cul- 

 tivation of the cane; wherevef they have been at- 

 tended to properly the stoles have averaged ten 

 canes of good size and lenj^th, and which havebelSn 

 fit forcutting in one year.f/pm the time of planting. 

 Like all other plantt''^ canes in new lands, the quan- 

 tity of molasses compared to that of sugar has been 

 large. But the sugar itself, although made in iron 

 pans of the old form and over a nake,d fire, is of a 

 strong and large grain easily whitened by clay. 

 Therefore so far every expectation has been realiz- 

 ed in this new agricultural undertaking, and if in 

 compliance to your wishes I give publicity to a 

 private enterprize, it is with the view of assisting 

 others who may contemplate such works hereafter, 

 and perhaps to fix an epoch in the history of this 

 island, destined without doubt to be as renowned 

 for agriculture as it is now for commerce, whenever 

 those who hold in their hands its destmies shall 

 concede to it land regulations which shall encour- 

 age and not discourage European settlers. 



AGRICOLA. 



Singapore, 30th May, 1838. 



We publish the subjoined from the British Far- 

 mer's Magazine for April, as deserving attention. 

 We shall draw largely upon other parts of the es- 

 say. The fact that irrigation proved so highly ben- 

 eficial where copious top-dressing of barn manure 

 availed nothing, will arrest attention. The cause 

 assigned, that the ground had become poisoned and 

 unfitted for the growth of plants then upon it by 

 the accunmlated excretions of the plants, is a plau. 

 sible one ; and accords with De Candolle's theory 

 of vegetation, which certainly has much to sustain 

 it ' H. C. 



IRRIGATIO.\. 



The most ancient, as well as the most extensive- 

 ly employed system of liquid manuring, is that by 

 the use of river water, the weakest of liquid fertil- 

 izers. This was one of the early agricultural im- 

 provements, suggested by nature herself, in Ian- 

 guage too plain to be misunderstood by the most 

 indolent farmer : the grass of the banks of every 

 river, every mountain stream within the reach of 

 the winter-flood waters, told the farmer too plainly 

 of the advantages of an occasional watering with 

 river water, for him to be ignorant of the boon which 

 was thus offered for his ser\'ice; and, in conse- 

 quence, meadow watering or irrigation, has from 

 time immemorial, been employed in Italy, in Switz- 

 erland, in Germany, and in China ; it is extensively 

 adopted in many parts of Britain, and is much bet- 

 ter understood than it was formerly, although many 

 erroneous ideas are still entertained with regard to 

 its mode of operation, and the nature of the water 

 best adapted to various soils. 



Sir Hnn:phrey Davy was of opinion, that one 

 great advantage of a winter irrigation of meadow 

 land is derived from its covering the grass, and 

 protecting it from the injurious influence of severe 

 cold ; and he thus explains his opinion : " water is 

 of a greater specific gravity at 42" than at 32^, the 

 freezing point ; and hence, in a meadow irrigated 

 in winter, the water immediately in contact with 

 tlie grass, is rarely below 40 — a degree of tempe- 

 rature not at all prejudicial to the living organs of 

 plants. In 1804, in the month of March, I exam- 

 ined the temperature in a water meadow near Hun- 

 gerford, in Berkshire, by a very delicate thermome- 

 ter. The temperature of the »ir at seven in the 

 morning was 29^; the water was frozen above the 

 grass. The temperature of the soil below the wa- 

 ter, in which the roots of the grass were fixed, was 

 43^. In general those waters which breed the best 

 fish are the best fitted for watering meadows ; but 

 most of the benefits of irrigation may be derived 

 from any kind of water." 



Such was the opinion of Davy as to the shelter- 

 ing pow.-TS of water. His remarks were always 

 cautiously made, and it is to be lamented that his 

 agricultural opportunities for observation were so 

 few. He appears, however, never to have steadily 

 investigated the chemical composition of river wa- 

 ter, with regard to its uses in irrigation, and, in con- 

 sequence, knew little of the value of some of its im- 

 purities to Vegetation. Thus, if the river water 

 contains sulphate of lime (gypsum), which it un- 

 doubtedly does, if the water is hard, it must cer- 

 tainly, under ordinary circumstances, be on this ac- 

 count alone highly I'ertilizing to grass ; for, calcu- 

 lating that one part of sulphate of lime is contain- 

 ed in every two tliousand parts of water, and that 

 every square yard of dry meadow land absorbs on- 

 ly eight gallons of the flood water, then if will be 

 found that, by every flooding, more than one hua- 



