76 ON THE TOBACCO TRADE AND CULTIVATION 



Transplanting is effected when the shoots are about six inches long, 

 and have put forth three or four leaves. They are dug from the nur- 

 sery "beds with the douhle-pronged " digger," placed in a tub or basket 

 for removal to the field, and put into the ground in rows by the aid of 

 a dibble, or solely by the labourer's fingers, the earth being well pressed 

 round the roots. No drills are made by the plough, but the rows are laid 

 out with some regularity in the course of dibbling the single plants. 

 The distance left between each row and between the plants themselves 

 varies in different localities. At Drama, one foot ; and in the " golden- 

 leafed " district one foot-and-a-half 's interval is observed ; at Cavalla, 

 about six inches space only is left between the rows, and the same 

 interval between the plants. As soon as transplanted, the young plants 

 are watered by hand. Irrigation is not resorted to, although it would be 

 of service in dry seasons. The shoots are generally so vigorous that 

 they rarely fail to strike root and thrive with a single watering in ordi- 

 nary seasons. Reserved plants, however, are always kept in the nurseries 

 to replace such as die off. A mean between a wet and a dry season is the 

 most favourable to tobacco planting. Excessive moisture causes, it is 

 true, a greater development of stalk and leaf, but the increase in bulk is 

 more than counterbalanced by deterioration in quality. Drought, on the 

 other hand, deprives the plant of its proper nourishment. Extremes 

 equally weaken the leaf's substance, and lessen its oily richness of 

 llavour. 



Greater pains are bestowed on this culture than on other descriptions 

 of local husbandry. The plant is carefully tended during growth 

 lateral shoots or suckers are removed, and the growth concentrated in 

 one upright stem ; hand-hoeing is vigorously practised, weeds eradi- 

 cated, and the earth stirred up about the roots ; but some important 

 details are lost sight of. The stem is never topped, as it might be most 

 judiciously, in rainy seasons ; leaves, blighted or injured by grubs are 

 allowed to remain ; the lower leaves, which in the end are withered, 

 soiled, and valueless, are not removed, and the juices are thus diverted 

 from nourishing the more precious parts. 



A well and full grown plant has a strong, upright stem, about four 

 feet high and three-fourths of an inch in diameter, its skin somewhat 

 hairy and sticky to the touch. The foliage is handsome. Each plant 

 bears from ten to twenty green succulent leaves, ovate in form, and in 

 some plants " petiolate," that is to say, having an intervening " petiole," 

 or footstalk, by which they are attached to the stem ; and in others 

 " sessile," or sitting immediately on or clasping as it were the stem 

 without any supporting footstalk. The leaves grow in clusters of three 

 or four at intervals. The leaf of the Drama class is from seven to ten 

 inches long ; the Yenidgeh five to six inches, and often less. In rainy 

 seasons the plant reaches six feet in height, and the leaves are larger and 

 more numerous, but bulk is obtained at the cost of quality. 



The flowers grow in clusters at the top of the stalk. The peduncles 



