318 



BICE. 



from Calcutta is table rice. To the Mauritius, however, the exports 

 are ballam and moonghy, being in the proportion of 150 tons of ballam 

 and 75 of moonghy to 15 tons of table rice, and the same to Bombay 

 and the West Indies. To the Straits, to Java, to the Maldives and 

 Laccadives, to Ceylon, to Madras and the Coromandel Coast, and to 

 the Gulfs the export is almost entirely of ballam rice. 



First among the Indian cereals, of course comes paddy. There 

 are over 1400 dijfferent specimens of it in the Calcutta Museum. 

 Probably there does not elsewhere exist an equally extensive and 

 valuable collection of this cereal. Of paddy, or the rice grain, there 

 are in Bengal three well recognised classes — the Aus, the Amun, and 

 the Boro. They may be shortly distinguished as follows : 



The aus is sown between the middle of March and the middle of 

 April, and is cut in August and September. It does not grow in 

 water; is coarse, and is not largely produced. The amun is sown 

 between the middle of May and the end of June. It requires 

 showers of rain even in its early days, but the young plants should 

 be strong before the regular rains set in. It is cut in November and 

 December, and constitutes the staple crop of the country. The boro 

 is sown in January and February, or somewhat earlier ; is planted 

 out in low marshy places, and is cut in April and May. 



The number of varieties of paddy in the three different classes 

 together is something enormous, when compared with anything of the 

 kind to which we are accustomed in England. Ten or a dozen names 

 each would probably cover all the different sorts of wheat and bai'ley 

 with which the practical English farmer is brought in contact. But 

 there are already in the Calcutta Museum as many as 1104 names of 

 paddys, and though very many of these are merely local synonyms, a 

 large number unquestionably correspond to intrinsic and seasonal 

 distinctions. 



The obvious differences in the grain itself are indeed very remark- 

 able. In colour the specimens range from a bright golden hue, through 

 almost every gradation of tint, to black. And in regard to size they 

 vary from the dimension of a large mustard seed to those of a canta- 

 loup melon seed. Some two hundred or three hundred of the samples 

 of paddy in the museum have been tested by weighing ; and of these 

 the smallest furnished 203J paddy grains to the half drachm, the 

 largest 54J grains. 



The husked rice, or rice proper in the understanding of English 

 people, exhibits, necessarily, differences of size corresponding with 

 those of its parent grain. It also varies in tint from a pure white 

 colour to a dull red. The proportionate out-turn of rice to the un- 

 husked paddy from which it arises depends both upon the sort of 

 grain and the process of husking pursued ; probably also upon other 

 elements. Dr. Buchanan Hamilton says it amounts to a little more 

 than one half ; * and a writer in the ' Statistical Reporter ' gives the 

 proportion of " rice " to " paddy " at from half to two-thirds. 



It has not yet been ascertained what are the external conditions of 

 season, situation, and culture, which give the different sorts their 

 respective economic values ; and investigation on these points forms 



* Vol. ii. p. 824. 



