THE SUPPLEMENT TO THE 



Tropical Agriculturist and Magazine of the C. A. 8. 



No. 3.] MAKCH, 1908. [Vol. II. 



PADDY (RICE) CULTIVATION 

 IN CEYLON. 



As bearing on the Reports which the Govern- 

 ment promised during last Session, to obtain 

 from the different Revenue Officers, on the Con- 

 dition and Prospects of Rice Cultivation in 

 their several districts aud provinces, we have 

 come upon an extremely interesting letter 

 written by the late Sir Alexander Ashmore in 

 1890, when a comparatively unknown Assistant 

 Agent in the island. It was signed " A." and 

 addressed to the Editor of the Ceylon Observer, 

 and upon the " pigeon-hole proof copy " which 

 has lately turned up, we find our endorsement 

 made at the time as follws:— "Is this not a 

 very clever letter by young Ashmore of the 

 CCS. ? " No year is given on the letter ; but 

 by reference to our files, we find it was 1890 

 or some 14 months before Paddy Rents were 

 abolished. It is a production which can- 

 not fail to be read with interest not only by 

 every member of the Civil Servive and every 

 intelligent Ceylonese interested in rice cultiva- 

 tion ; but also by all who recall the striking 

 ability and vigorous personality of the late 

 lamented Lieut. -Governor of the Colony. It 

 will be found below. 



In our editorial referenco to tho above, on 

 the day of its appearance, we spoke of " the 

 very timely and apposite arguments of 'A.' 

 He knows all about his subject, he regards it 

 from every-day experience and noi as an out- 

 sider, and he turns the tables on local theorists 

 by explaining the actual facts connected with the 

 grain-growing industry over a large part of the 

 country, in a way that deserves tho careful 

 consideration of all interested in the question 

 from His Excellency the Governor downwards. 

 We trust 'A.''s letter will receive such con- 

 sideration. 1 ' It will be observed that " Mr." 

 Ashmore in 1890 took quite a cheerful, not to 

 say optimistic, view of Paddy Cultivation in 

 Ceylon as fairly remunerative to the people in- 

 terested ; and yet, curiously enough, he and 

 Mr. LeMosurier were perhaps the only two 



Civil Servants who approved, and personally 

 aided, Governor Havelock a year later in carry- 

 ing out the wishes of Lord KnutBford in ar- 

 ranging for the abolition of the "Paddy Rents,'' 

 the common plea used being the very small 

 return from, if not tho unremunerativoness of, 

 the industry. 



PADDY CULTIVATION IN CEYLON. 



Nov. 6th. 



To the Editor of the " Ceylon Observer.' 

 Sir,— A controversy has been for long carried 

 on and still continues as to whether the culti- 

 vation of rice is a remunerative or an unremu- 

 nerative industry. In a recent issue of your 

 paper was printed a contribution thereto by a 

 public servant who claims to have proved by an 

 account of four experiments, over three of which 

 he lost money, that tho cultivation is a profit- 

 able one ; while other persons have on other 

 occasions published accounts of experiments by 

 which they have purported to show that the 

 cultivation of rice is the shortest and easiest 

 road to ruin, or, as the case may be, the readiest 

 route to the heaven of Mr Andrew Carnegie. 



The present writer, who has never sown a 

 grain of rice or turned a watercourse or cheated 

 a renter, ventures very respectfully to submit 

 to tho parties to this controversy that they are 

 shooting wide of the ma.rk if what they wish to 

 find out is not what the returns should be, but 

 what to the ordinary unlearned agriculturist 

 they actually are. In so far as the question is 

 of other than academic interest, it is interesting 

 only as the results will enable us to gauge and 

 estimate the condition of the ordinary native 

 inhabitant of the country. The question is in- 

 teresting not as an agricultural but as a politi- 

 cal problem, and as such it is solved by demons- 

 trations which employ factors that are outsid e 

 the lines of native usage. The Government 

 Agent of the Eastern Province has tried his 

 experiment with an English plough in his hand 

 and an agricultural primer in his pocket ; other 



