BRITISH BORNEO. 77 
jungle, situated at a distance from the sea, so that no salt 
breezes may jeopardise the proper burning qualities of the 
future crop, and as devoid as possible of hills. Then, a point 
of primary importance which will be again ered to, 
engage your Chinese coolies, who have to sign agreements for 
fixed periods, and to be carefully watched aiterw wards, as it 1s 
the custom to give them cash advances on signing, the repay- 
ment of which they frequently endeavour to avoid by slipping 
away just before your vessel sails and probably engaging 
themselves to another master. 
Without the Chinese cooly, the tobacco planter is helpless, 
and if the proper season is allowed to pass, a whole year may 
be lost. The Chinaman is too expensive a machine to be 
employed on felling the forest, and for this purpose, indeed, 
the Malay is more suitable and the work is accordingly given 
him to do under contract. Simultaneously with the felling, a 
track should be cut right through the heart of the estate by 
the natives, to be afterwards ditched and drained and made 
passable for carts by the Chinese coolies. 
That as much as possible of the felled jungle should be 
burned up is so important a matter and one that so greatly 
affects the individual Chinese labourer, that it is not left to the 
Malays to do, but, on the completion of the felling, the whole 
area which is to be planted is divided out into ‘ fields,” of 
about one acre each, and each ‘‘field” is assigned by lot toa 
Chinese cooly, whose duty it is to carefully burn the timber 
and plant, tend and finally cut the tobacco on his own divi- 
sion, for which he is remunerated in accordance with the qua- 
lity and quantity of the leaf he is able to bring into the drying 
sheds. Each “‘ field,” having been cleared as ‘carefully as may 
be of the felled timber, is next thoroughly hoed up, and a small 
“nursery” prepared in which the seeds provided by the 
manager are planted and protected from rain and sun by 
palm leaf mats (ajangs) raised on sticks. In about a 
week, the young plants appear, and the Chinese tenant, as | 
may cali him, has to carefully water them morning and even- 
ing. As the young seedlings grow up, their enemy, the worms 
and grubs, find them out and attack them in such numbers 
that at least once a day, sometimes oftener, the anxious planter 
