8o WONDERS OF THE TROPICAL FORESTS, 
Where, ia Java, for instance, you see to-day long-legged 
lierons ^nively stalking over the inundated plaiu parti- 
tioned by small dykes, or a yoke of indolent buffaloes 
slowly wading through the mud, you will three or four 
months later be cbarinod by the view of a gracefully 
undulating corn-field, bearing a great resemblance to 
our indigenous barley. Cords, to which scarecrows are 
attached, traverse the field in every direction, and con- 
verge to a small watch-house erected on high poles. 
Here the attentive villager sits, Hke a spider in the 
centre of its web, and by pulling the cords, pots them 
from time to time into motion, when- 
ever the wind is nnwilling to undertake 
the office. Then the grotesque and 
noisy figures begin to rnstle and to 
caper, and whole iiocks of the neat 
little rice-bird or Java spaiTow rise 
on the wing, and hurry off with all 
jAVAWARBow, the haste of guilty fright. After 
another mouth has elapsed, and the 
waters have long since evaporated or been withdrawn, the 
harvest takes place, and the rice-fields are enlivened by a 
motley crowd, for all the \allager.s, old and young, are busy 
reaping tbe golden ears* 
The rice-fields offer a peculiarly charming picture when, 
as in the mountain valleys of Ceylun, they rise in terraces 
along the slopes. " Selecting an angular recess where 
two hills converge, the Kandyans construct a series of 
terraces, raised stage above stage, and retiring as they 
ascend along the slope of the acclivity, up which they 
are carried as high as the soil extends- Each termce is 
furnished with a low ledge in front, behind which the 
requisite depth of water is retained during the germina- 
tion of the seed, and what is siiperflnoiis is permitted to 
trickle down to the one below it. In order to carry on 
this peculiar cultivation the streams are led along the 
level of the hills, often from a distance of many miles 
