and Magazine of the Ceylon Agricultural Society. 



360 



SWAMP CULTIVATION. 



SOME EXPERIMENTS IN S. INDIA. 



The marshes or deltas of the Irawadi in Bur- 

 ma, of the Brahmaputra and Gauges in Bengal, 

 of the Godavery and Kistna and Cauvery on the 

 East Coast of india, and of the small and large 

 streams on the West Coast, give employment 

 and food to many millions of the inhabitants of 

 India, and they also bring great wealth to the 

 country, because the rice and jute and other pro- 

 ducts of the marshes are exported. It is no exag- 

 geration to say that the cultivation of swamps is 

 the most important and the most remunerative 

 work in the country. I am afraid, however, that 

 other lands have realised this fact better than 

 India. Scientific cultivation of swamp lands is 

 still in its infancy in this great country. Egypt 

 has been for thousands of years one of the 

 world's great granaries, because from an early 

 stage of her history the fellaheen or ryots of the 

 country have used the waters of the Nile for their 

 protected fields and have thus turned swamps 

 into gardens. What has been done in Egypt can 

 be done in India by co-operative effort. 



Perhaps nowhere else in the world have such 

 wonderful results in the cultivation of swamp 

 lands been achieved as in the deltas and adjoi- 

 ning lands cf the Elbe, the Weser and the Rhine, 

 orinSchleswig-Holstein, Frisia and Holland. . . . 

 India has not such high tides to contend with as 

 the residents of German marshes. Yet, so far 

 as 1 am aware, there is 



NOT ONE SINGLE SLUICE CONTROLLING THE 

 DRAINAGE WATERS 



of the many marshes of India. By the way a 

 scientist gave me some unique information about 

 the massive Holstein cattle, among which there 

 are the best milching cows in the world, some 

 cows yielding 65 to 70 quarts of milk a day. 

 Holstein cattle have large black patches, vary- 

 ing with white spots all over their satinlike 

 skin. I asked my scientific friend whence these 

 beautiful white spots are derived. He replied 

 that ages ago some herdsmen from India sought 

 to improve their stock. After years of wandering, 

 they reached Holland and Holstein. The black 

 herds that they saw there pleased them, and so 

 by interbreeding the white cattle of India with 

 the black Holstein cattle a now breed of cattle 

 was produced— the Holstein breed. Indian cat- 

 tle even now are sent to other lands for breeding 



Eurposes. Why may not the same thing have 

 een done ages ago ? 



Missionaries, as a rule, are very keen on im- 

 proving the condition of the people among whom 

 they live. A book might be written on the mate- 

 rial benefits conferred on India by them. I need 

 only allude to the great industries of the Basel 

 Mission. Ever since I first came to India, nearly 

 twenty-eight years ago, I have tried to do some- 

 thing to improve the condition of the poor and 

 needy. While a Missionary in Kurnool, more 

 than fifteen years ago, I introduced there the 

 weaving of a finer and more artistic pattern of 

 the Kurnool rugs. By this means the poor 

 weavers could earn better wages, and that in- 

 dustry continues to this day. Up in the Kistna, 



Guntur and part of the Nellore Districts mil- 

 lions of palmyra palms grow. The people always 

 used the old leaf-stalks for fuel, and were not 

 aware that they were virtually burning money. 

 By the kind help of a Herman businessman of 

 Madras, I was enabled to introduce 



THE PALMYRA FIBRE INDUSTRY 



into these districts, and the poor peoplp in 

 their villages on the sand dunes along thw c >a^t 

 have earned lakhs of rupees during the past 

 eight years, and the fibre industry has became 

 an established industry in this part of India, 

 with headquarters at Coconada. 



Some four or five years ago, when Sir James 

 Thomson was Acting Governor of Madras, Lord 

 Ampthill being the Acting Viceroy, it was ray 

 privilege to visit Sir James and talk with him 

 about the present Guntur District. I had 

 known Sir James when he was a popular Sub- 

 Collector in Guntur in 1882. During our con» 

 versation I told him about the 



RICH EXTENSIVE BAPATLA SWAMP, 



nearly twenty miles long and from two to 

 five miles wide. I asked him why Govern- 

 ment did not make that swamp product- 

 ive. His Excellency replied that India could 

 not spend so many millions on agricul- 

 tural, improvement as America does. Then 

 ho asked me how I would improve the swamp. 

 1 said that the way of success lies in proper 

 drainage works and in diking. This conver- 

 sation led His Excellency to propose to me that 

 I should try, on a small scale, what can be done 

 in swamp cultivation. I agreed to make 



AN EXPERIMENT ON A FIVE-ACRE PLOT. 



One of the lowest spots of the swamp was 

 chosen for the experiment by the D. P. W. 

 Engineer. I diked the same. Government 

 paying the cost, which was less than R300. 

 Many prophesied that I would fail, for they 

 said :— "You have only turned the five acres 

 into a tank and you can never raise a crop." I 

 felt sure that the experiment would succeed. 

 After planting the plot, heavy rains in the 

 uplands brought floods of water into the swamp, 

 and the same was turned into a large lake. The 

 growing crops on thousands of acres were badly 

 damaged or wholly destroyed, while my dikes 

 kept out the waters and my crop was saved. 

 Later in the year the conditions were reversed. 

 There was a drought. The water in the Kutna 

 River was insufficient to fill the canals and 

 many crops were in a poor state and all were 

 badly damaged for lack of water. We had 

 plenty of water stored iu the ditches around 

 our field, and, by lifting this water into our 

 field, we always had enough water for the 

 growing crop. It will be tiresome to enumerate 

 all the experiences of that year. Suffice it to 

 say that we reaped the best rice crop grown that 

 year near Bapatla. Drought had so injured the 

 crops on even the best of fields that the straw 

 of those fields was stunted in growth, while mine 

 was long and the heads were full of fine grain. 

 Everybody wondered that it was possible to 

 do such successful farming under such adverse 

 circumstances. 



Success made me venturesome, and I now 

 asked to be permitted to try the experiment 



47 



