December i, 1887] THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
385 
CEYLON UPCOUNTEY PLANTING EEPOltT. 
7th November 1887. 
The weather is all that can be desired either 
for tea flushing or planting. It is pretty much of 
a model N.-E. ; only it is S.-W. so often that one 
hardly knows to which monsoon the credit is really 
due. Everything seems to be growing well, 
especially cinchona, which at date is simply dis- 
gustingly vigorous. Now that the unit of quinine 
has only got l$d to fall, the end cannot be very 
far off. If tho world is to trade in cinchona at 
all, and if the tondency is still to be downward, 
bark will require to become a deal more sensitive than 
it has been. It won't do to have telegrams out tell- 
ing ua that there has been a fall of 4d or 
W in the unit of quinine : the market will 
havo to bo receeding in thirty-seconds, and 
advancing in sixty-fourths, if the growers are to 
i be kept in any heart of hope at all, and the 
game to continue. To ray mind the most hopeless 
feature in connection with the future of quinine 
i« the magnanimous action on the part of the 
Colombo analysts of reducing the cost of analysis 
to about a half. When it has cumo to that — well 
if it does not look like rats walking out of a 
sinking ship I don't know. I would not like to 
seem to appear ungrateful for the relief afforded ; 
what distresses me is the utter blankness of the 
horizon which must havo induced to such a step. 
There has been no preparing of the public mind; 
wo have seen bark recede bit by bit, and quinine 
follow suit; but a plunge from E20 to E10-50 is 
simply heroic. When the history of the romance 
of cinchona culture in Ceylon comes to be written, 
the action of the Colombo analysts should make a 
brilliant page. 
Caoao is opening up, but the crop to be gathered, 
while fair in some places, is said to be very short 
in others. The trees are, however, in good heart 
and looking very healthy. 
What coffeo crop there is in the lower districts 
is not going to close quite so soon as seemed at 
first. Even with the favourable weather wo have 
been enjoying there is a good deal of hanging 
back. There have been neither rush nor push, 
nothing in fact to disturb in any way the digni- 
fied leisure and easy stylo of working, which is 
so much enjoyed by the Tamil labourer and so 
well suits him, Husk colFeo, which at the opening 
of the season was keenly competed for by the 
enterprising Moorman, is now allowed to languish 
somewhat, and the extraordinary tales of money 
dropped in early sales circulate and grow, and 
choke oil tho timid. Peppercorn. 
PADDY CULTIVATION. 
ACCORDINO TO IMPROVED METHODS — TRANSPLANTATION — 
MANURING — PADDY CULTIVATION IN THE N01U H-W Ksl- 
nm PROVINCE — THE SUPREME court on paddy CULTIV- 
ATION — AN AORKEMKNT TO CULTIVATE PADDY LANDS ON 
ANDA SHOULD HE NOTARIALLY BXECUTF I. 
The subjoctof paddy cultivation is one that uiuy 
appropriately bo said to hnve been well threshed out. 
It will be admitted that it is ns risky an industry as 
the culture of any other product which is exposed to 
the ravages of pest and other direful influences. Tho 
cultivation being mainly dependent on tho Mipply of 
water, in districts where there are no tanks ornversto 
afford means ot irrigation, the cultivation mu»l necess- 
arily depend on tho rainfall, and tho hardships pro- 
ductive ot a drought cannot bo overestimated. Sup. 
posing tho conditions are favourable ami there is a 
sufficient water supply to raise a crop, there is another 
dilVtrulty — one »s insurmountable a.s the other — to con- 
tend against, namely, tho failure of crop from the at- 
tack of flies. This overcome, t he foUuiiate cultivator 
may safely expect tH ro.ip tho result of his industry 
and toil. Of course whero from want of water, tho 
M 
cultivator contents himself with what h known as the 
dry process of cultivation, and amongst the Datives as 
kekulan, the risk he runs is perhaps greater, for if 
there is an utter absence of rain, the crop will be dam- 
aged by drought, or if the monsoonish rain sots io, it 
will be destroyed by tho superabundance of water. The 
position, of thegoiya is certainly very trying. Under 
these circumstances however much one may deprecate 
the conservatism of the ordinary native cultivator for 
not improving his ways in conformity with modern in- 
stances, the difficulties which attend the cultivation of 
his staple food are such as to make the most enthusiastic 
supportor of the improved methods chary of undertak- 
ing to cultivate his paddy laud in accoi dance therewith. 
The transplanting of the paddy plant from a nur- 
sery into a field is not a novel practice. It dates back to 
a remote period • but it is novel to the extent that while in 
the past transplanting was resorted to only in case of 
supplying vacancies in the growing crop of a field, after 
the weeds were rooted out, the new method, presumably 
unattempted before, recommends the transplantation 
of a whole field from a nursery prepared for the pur- 
pose, which not only saves the hitherto unwarrant- 
able wastage of seed paddy, but increases the yield 
to a surprisingly large extent. 
The experiments initiated by Mr. Green with im- 
proved appliances and according to the new method 
have been attended with the success tboy are deserv- 
ing of that ii iu a limited area, but whether they ran 
be tried with equal success on a larger scale without ia 
the majority of cases with serious loss to the experiment- 
alist is a question which admits of much discus-ion. 
So far as the new ploughs are concerned tho objec- 
tion raised by the native cultivator to use them is 
on the score of expense which their purchase would 
entail, and that their cattle cannot draw them. 
This is an objection which might be got over after 
the lapse of time, but, the recommendation of trans- 
planting paddy land from a prepared nursery is one 
that will take a longer time to commend itself to the 
native yoiya. 
With reference to the statement by a Galle corres- 
pondent in one of your impressions, th.it cattle manure 
is used in the North-Western Province in the cultic 
ation of paddy, it is necessary to say that it is not 
correct. Cattle or any manure has never betn used, 
and the cultivator urges as his reason for this abstention 
that if once they introduce manure into their fields, 
it will have to be continued, and in the coureo of 
time it will form an indispensable ingrc lient, not to 
speak of the expense its use would entail. 
According to tho practice which obtains in the North- 
Western Province, an l which is to a great extent 
in accordance with that which prevails in other pirts 
of the island, a landowner gives out his field to bo 
cultivated on nnda, that is by an implied agreement 
for a (-hare, ft the owner takes no part or contri- 
butes in no way towards the cultivation, he gets as 
his share a one-fourth (Jborv anda) of the crop, tho 
remaining three-fourths going to tho cultivator. In 
case the proprietor supplies the seed paddy for sowing, 
or otherwise helps in the cultivation either by taking 
a personal part in the operations, or by supplying the 
cattlo for ploughing, he is entitled to a half share 
of tho produce or hari anda. This co-operative system 
— which has existed beyond the recollection of man — 
bus worked harmoniously and woll and has tended to 
the encouragement and advancement of the cultivation 
of paddy as well as other grain on chena I mds and 
the pecuniary payment for labour, which is bpyoud 
tho means of the majority of the landowners, has beon 
obviated. 
However, though this system has been in existence 
for ever so many centuries and is as old as tbe in- 
dustry of paddy cultivation itself, the Colli Otive uris- 
dom of the Ifon'ble thv Judges of tho Supreme Court 
has discovered a legal (law in the implied agreement 
that is entered into between the hmdowi ■ r a I 
\\wffoij/a by which tho latter undertake* toriiltivate the 
field of tho former for n share. I'p to this time 
the highost judicial tribunal in the land KCOgniied 
tho long established custom prevalent among tho 
native population that »ucb an agreement uf.d 
