November i, 1889.] THE TROP1CKL At3WCI3LTUR1ST« 
349 
Two prospectors who were sent to look for gold 
returned after six days absence in Sungei Pa. at 
and Sungei Mnnad. The sample from the latter 
river was similar to the gold brought bv the gold 
liarty from Segama whilst the sample from Bimgei 
Pakat was like a very fine powdfr mixed with a 
blank sand of a great fineness. — British North Borneo 
Herald, Oct. 1st. 
♦ 
RABBITS FOR THE NTLGTRIS. 
(From the South of India Observer.) 
We have already mentioned the fact f bat some 
seventy rabbits have arrived from Australia for the 
purpose of being let loose on the Hills. 
A more ingenious device for worrying the already 
Borely beset planters could not well have been con- 
ceived. Surely the man to whom occurred the above 
atrocious idea must have been bereft of his senses. 
The fearful example of the abandoned lands in 
Australia, and the enormous amount expended to put 
down the fearful rabbit post seems never to have 
been read by him. nor could he have ever calculated 
the number of rabbits produced bv a single pair in 
the course of few ypars and yet we are to be cursed 
with over thirty pairs ! Even in B gland where the 
population is far more dense and the price obtained 
for rabbits very remunerative, there is consider- 
able difficulty occasioned in keeping them within 
bounds. Rabbit proof wire netting is everywhere 
advertised : can it be that the above atrocious sugges- 
tion is the emanation of somebody intereated in wire 
fencing ! Or is it as food for the Jackals that some 
enthusiastic Jack hunter's mind gave birth to the 
horrid conception ! Let once the rabhifg get a fair 
hold of the country, and good bye to tea, coffee and 
cinchona and firewood plantations ; to say nothing of 
orchards. Rabbits not only graze down all green 
produce, tainting the land to such an extent that cattle 
will not feed after them on it, but they bark trees by 
hundreds and thousands in the most mischievous 
manner, not even sparing the Scotch fir ! 
"We say a Meeting of tbe Game Association 
should at once be called to reconsider this most 
serious matter. In a thinly populated country like 
India, it will be impossible to keep down the in- 
crease of the rabbits, and at present the Burghors 
have as much as they can do to bold their o wn 
against wild piers and hares, which latter have 
greatly increased under the protection of *he Game 
Ac f : no less than eight were seen at oop time by 
a planter strolling over his own field in the B'flr- 
gher country is not this proof that thev can 
increase in security ? What more i° wanted for the rab- 
bit, ? And if tbe Burghers have this added pest to their 
other burdens, it will not be surprising if ore fine day 
they resolve to abandon the villages and migrate to My- 
sore. Alreadvthey bemoan th"ir hard fate with uncertain 
monsoons, short crops, and the inevitable tax collector, 
to say nothing of the yearly deteriorating soil. It 
will take now only the rabbits to add the last straw 
to their burdens. Should the Burghers go, then the 
Collector may pack up bis portmanteau and follow. 
So serious do we consider the matter that should tbe 
Game Association be unwilling to reconsider its action, 
we think that Government should interfere. It 
were far better to let loose a few tigers than the 
aforesaid rabbits : tbe former would kill a few 
head of cattle and ty, e n the gallant members of 
the Game A=seeiat ; ort would kill then and th'-re 
would be an end of it ; bnt who shall kill the 
rabbits ! They have been powerless to do it in 
Australia though hundreds of hunters have heen let 
loose on them to shoot, trai. and poison ; and finally 
a reward of £00.000 has been offered to anyone 
who can invent a plan bv wh'oh to stop this 
scourge. Tn the hopes of gaining this splendid sum 
tho all conquering Pasteur came to the resetip, and 
suggested his infallible (?) pl^n. which a'a= ! like all 
tho rest has proved a failure. Tho a'love well known 
facts ataro us in face, and vet in spite of this dire 
experience thore has been found a man, or men, 
cap%bU of introducing a plague wbi.-h has depopu- 
lated vast an-ss of country and ruined thousands. 
There is a story current that rabbits once sunk an 
island. 
Forest officers will have a fine time of it ■ they will 
rave nothing to conserve, it goats re bad, rabbits are 
fifiy times worse It will not talre manv yea-s for 
the Fo est Department to have nothing; left to conserve; 
If goats could destroy the Forests of St. Helena; what 
cannot rabbits effect ? Rabbit proof fencing answered 
verv fairly in England, but in 'his country who can 
afford ; t in the first place, and : n tbe second the rome 
results will follow as in Australia, whe-e the rabb'ts 
simply bnrrowe I under the fence and came through 
tho other side bee use thefa was nothinr lpft to eat 
on the outside! We have heard if n. any mad scbemes 
in our day, but this is by far the maddest i f them 
all! 
A Ceylon contemporary thinks the rabbit has too 
many enemies in India, to permit it becoming the 
plague it has been in Australia, and that probably 
it will be kept under, if not destroyed bv these hostile 
factors. It mcy be so; but suppose this does not prce 
the case? Why hazard the introduction of a curse 
on the probability of its not proving *uch ? [Rabbit 3 , 
it seems, have alrpady been let loose more th<u once 
in the h ; ll oount' y of Ceylon, and have never been s -en 
again : their enemies are too numerous for them to 
multiply as in Australia. — Ed.] 
The Robber Trade in Psra apnears inclined to 
demand a share of the aid so generously extended to 
agriculture by the govornment in other parts of the 
empire, and the demand is just. Business is evide' tly 
in a very unsatisfactory condition at Para.- Rio News. 
Chinese Floating Gardens. — In a recent num- 
ber of the China Review Dr. Macgowan describes the 
manner in which floating fields and gardens are 
formed in China. In the month of April a bamboo 
raft 10ft. to 12ft. long and about half as broad 
is prepared The poles are lashed together with 
interstices of an inch between each. Over this a 
layer of straw an inch thick is spread, and then 
a coating two inches thick of adhesivp mud taken 
from the bottom of a canal or pond, which receives 
tho seed. The raft is moored to tbe bank in still 
water, and requires no further after tion. The 
straw soon gives way and the soil al=o, the roots 
drawing support from the water slone. In about 
20 days the raft becomes covered with the creeper 
(ipomcea rep'ans), and its stems find roots are 
gathered for cooking In autumn its small white 
petals and yellow stamens, nestling among the 
round leaves, present a very pretty appearance. In 
some plaoes marshy land is profitably cultivated in 
this manner. Besides these floating vegetable 
gardens there are also floating rioefields. Upon 
rafts constructed as above weeds and adherent mud 
were placed as a flooring, and when the rice shoots 
were ready for transplanting they were placed in 
the floating soil, which being adhesive and held 
in place by weed roots, the plants were maintained 
in position throughout the season. The rice thus 
planted ripened in from (50 to 70, in place of 100, 
days. The rafts are cabl d to the shore, floating 
on lakes, pools or sluggish streams. These floating 
fields served to avert famines, •• hether by drought 
or flood. When other fields were submerged and 
their crops sodden or rotten these fliatel and 
flourished, and when a drought prevailed they 
subsided with the falling water, and while the 
soil around was arid advanced to maturity. Agricul- 
tural treatises contain plates represen'ing rows f 
extensive ricefhlds moorod to sturdy trees on the 
banks of rivers or lakes which existed formerly in 
the laoustrine regions of the Lower Yangteze and 
Yellow River. — London Times. 
