826 



BIOS. 



got ready for the planting out of the second crop, the young plants of 

 which are already growing upon nursery patches. In preparing the 

 fields for the second crop, the implement chiefly used in the locality 

 is the " lah-tak." This is a wooden roller, four or five feet long, and 

 twelve or fifteen inches in diameter, very deeply-grooved longitudi- 

 nally, so that its rectum would be a seven-pointed star, and mounted 

 in a wooden frame, in which the driver stands. The lah-tak is drawn 

 by a buffalo, over or through the wet land, the rollers revolving and 

 stirring the soft surface by the action of its grooves and ridges. The 

 second crop is planted out in the latter part of J uly or early part of 

 August, and is reaped in or about the first week of November. This 

 completes one year. In some cases the second crop is planted before 

 the reaping of the first crop, the young plants being placed among 

 those of the first crop. The planting out of the first crop in the 

 spring, and the harvesting of the second crop in late autumn, are 

 liable to interference from the chill blasts and driving rain of the 

 north-east monsoon. The frequent prevalence of wet weather in 

 winter is a well-known peculiarity of this region. In summer there 

 is sometimes an unfavourable continuance of dry weather. In the 

 plain of Banjka, and in the regions to the south, the seasons are 

 somewhat earlier, and there seems to be some difference in the mode 

 of procedure. The dry ground rice, grown without irrigation, locally 

 called " e-neap," or " i-liap," may be seen occasionally inland, and it 

 is said to be cultivated by the wild aborigines of the mountains. It 

 appears to be verj' fine rice, but to yield only one crop a year, and 

 not to succeed well if the weather be dry. There are flour-mills 

 worked by the overshot water-wheel. The wind-mill, which might 

 be very useful in China, seems to be unknown to the Chinese, as it 

 was to the ancient civilized nations of the west. 



A simple contrivance, called the "water-hammer" or "water- 

 pestle," is used for the pounding, to clean away the integument of 

 the rice. The pestle is fixed like a hammer-head in the end of a 

 beam which moves on an axis. The other end of the beam holds a 

 bowl or shallow bucket, into which falls a small stream of water. 

 When the bucket is full, its weight and the impulse of the falling 

 stream send it downward, raising the pestle ; but in sinking it pours 

 out its contents and passes out of the course of the stream. The 

 pestle then falls, bringing the bucket under the stream again, and so 

 the process repeats itself. 



Japan. — The surface of the paddy fields in Japan is estimated at 

 1,587,757 hectares; the annual yield is said to amount to 50,512,000 

 hectolitres, of a total value of 6,500,000Z. sterling, the average pro- 

 duce being about 3181 litres per hectare. 



The young rice plants are set out in the paddy fields in regular 

 rows of bunches towards the end of May or the beginning of June, 

 having been previously raised in some different place. The harvest 

 takes place in September or October. 



Rice wine, or sake, as it is locally called, forms the principal and 

 almost the only alcoholic beverage of Japan. It is made exclusively 

 of rice. In preparing the ferment the rice is washed, steamed during 

 several hours, and spread out on mats to lower the temperature ; after- 



