MANILLA. 
287 
The different kinds of rice, and especially the upland, would no 
doubt be an acquisition to our country. At the time we were at 
Manilla, it was not thought feasible to pack it, for it had just been 
reaped, and was so green that it would not have kept.* Although 
* Since my return home, at the desire of that distinguished agriculturist, Colonel Austin, 
of South Carolina, I have sent for some samples of the different kinds, and under his care 
it will no doubt be well treated. 
The cultivator in the Philippine Islands is always enabled to secure 
plenty of manure; for vegetation is so luxuriant that by pulling the 
weeds and laying them with earth, a good stock is quickly obtained 
with which to cover his fields. Thus, although the growth is so rank 
as to cause him labour, yet in this hot climate its decay is equally 
rapid, which tends to make his labours more successful. 
The rice-stacks form a picturesque object on the field; they are 
generally placed around or near a growth of bamboo, whose tall, 
graceful, and feathery outline is of itself a beautiful object, but con¬ 
nected as it is often seen with the returns of the harvest, it furnishes 
an additional source of gratification. 
