30 EXPEDITION TO JAPAN. 



chiefly occupied by sugar-cane, beans, millet, and some wheat. The latter is, curiously enough, 

 nearly restricted to the higher and poorer lands. Sweet-potatoes, which is the food for the 

 laboring classes, are cultivated everywhere, and as secondary or intermediary crops. 



Sugar-cane, {saccharum offldnarum). — Considerable quantities of this are grown, principally 

 in the southern portions of the island. Like everything else, it is cultivated in small divisions, 

 seldom exceeding an acre in extent. It is set very close — about a foot or less apart — and pre- 

 sents a very dense appearance in all its stages. Whether the soil is stirred at all after planting, 

 or the weeds (if any) merely hand-picked, is not known. It is gathered by being chopped 

 down with the sickle or hook, the leaves and tops stripped off, and then carried in bundles to 

 the sugar-mills — one, two, or three of which are located together near a highway. The cane 

 is small and short — the effect, doubtless, of close planting — perhaps averaging three-quarters 

 or an inch in diameter, and some four feet in length. 



The mills deserve mention ; they are simple, but effective. They consist of three cylinders of 

 hard wood, held in an upright position by a timber frame. These are a foot or so in diameter, two 

 feet high, and placed in a row with a mortise and wedge on either side to graduate the distance 

 between them and the pressure. The central one has a wooden axle or shaft extending through 

 the frame, some six feet high, to which is attached a curved lever of fifteen feet, by which the- 

 mill is easily worked. One bull or horse is the moving power, and he walks in a circle about 

 thirty feet in diameter. This central cylinder has a row of cogs (hard wood) near its upper 

 end, which play into mortises (instead of corresponding cogs) cut into the other two. This 

 constitutes the whole apparatus, with conduits to lead the juice to a tub or receiver, placed in a 

 hole near by. The cane is passed between the central and right roller ; and before its escape, 

 being seized on the opposite side and twisted together like a rope, is passed back between the 

 central and left roller. This double operation seems to press it thoroughly, and to deprive it 

 of its juices effectually. The juice is sweet, and appears to be very saccharine. It is boiled in 

 adjoining temporary houses, in thin iron pans of eight or ten gallons. Fuel is used here, as 

 everywhere else, very economically. The refuse cane is carefully piled away to dry, and is, 

 doubtless, used as fuel. The yield I am unable to conjecture, but it is, probably, a very fair 

 one. How it is used is equally uncertain ; not for tea, as that is never sweetened, but probably 

 in preserves or dulces for the upper classes, and, perhaps, for export to Japan. It is inferred 

 that sugar is scarce, at least among the people, from one of our interpreters sending to ask 

 some from us, when in a large village or town; such request of foreigners being very un- 

 common. 



Wheat {triticum vulgare). This is produced to the same extent or less than rice. It is of 

 two varieties, bearded or awned, and smooth-headed or awnless. It was (February 1st) in every 

 stage of growth, from being ripe and ready for the sickle, down to its mere sprouting and start- 

 ing out of the ground ; indeed, preparation for additional planting was going on, by gathering 

 the everlasting sweet-potato, and leaving the land ready for wheat. This is planted by dib- 

 bling, chiefly, at intervals of six or eight inches, next by drilling, and occasionally by broad- 

 casting. The young wheat was affected in many patches by two diseases — one, a yellow appear- 

 ance, arising from the death of the ends of the leaves, occasioned by cold or even frosty nights, 

 succeeded by warm or hot days ; the other, a crippled appearance, some of the stems or stalks 

 growing uninjured, but many being dwarfed, and spreading or tillering at the ground, which 

 was recognised at once as being caused by the fly. This was searched for as far as opportunity 

 allowed, but was not found. The larva of the black fly (as is believed) was found in the form 



