8o4 
THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
it not that water to any amount can be procured 
in every garden and at a moderate depth, it would 
be impossible to grow oranges in Jaffa. The whole 
neighbourhood seems to cover a river of vast breadth, 
percolating through the sand en route to the sea, 
Hundreds of Persian wheels working night and day 
produce no sensible diminution in the supply of 
life-giving water. 
Several varieties of the orange, such as the round 
Peladi, the Blood Orange, the Mandarin, &c., thrive 
along the coast of Syria, but the oval and almost 
pipless kind known as the Jaffa Orange is only 
produced in Jaffa itself and its vicinity; and this 
peculiarity, according to the native gardeners, must 
be attributed to the quality of the brackish water 
used in its irrigation. Until about thirty years ago 
this oval form was quite unknown, when a native 
gardener, quite by chance, through careful attention 
to his trees, succeeded, much to his own astonish- 
ment no doubt, in improving his Beladi or Spanish 
variety of orange into the Sharauti, by which name 
the Jaffa kind is known in the vernacular. By sel iug 
grafts from his improve 1 variety to other garden 
propi letors, he was instrumental in substituting the 
Sha auti f u’ the Beladi orange throughaiU Jaffa. 
It is a remarkable fact that all uttempts hitherto 
nvade at growing the oval orange elsewhere than at 
Jaffa have not been successful ; even at Sidon and 
Tripoli oil the Syrian coast, where the climate and 
soil seem precisely of the same nature as at Jaffa, 
all experiments in this direction have failed. 
Tne method of laying out a garden in .Jaffi is as 
follows. The laud- having been carefully selected and 
purchased— preference being always given to a red 
sandy ssil — the owner will get in his workmen an i 
start them on levelling and working up the ground. 
This is very throughly done; ihe levelling of the 
earth being important with a view to ihe future 
irrigating of the orange trees. The ground is in the 
first in-tince well ploughed, and then with the oi>- 
ject of effectually removing every particle of weed, 
the workmen use their hoes to turn up the soil to 
a depth of fully three feet. This expeoaive process 
is very necessary, as the presence of even the 
smallest root of a weed will prove injurious to the 
trees and be difficult to remove later on. While this 
work is going on the proprietor will have fixed upon- 
the spot where the well is to be sunk, and have 
commenced operations. The depth at which water 
is found varies materially in different gardens, and 
ranges from about twelve to sixty feet beb'w the 
surface; consequently the cost of . sinking his well 
is always more or less a matter of speculation to the 
proprie or. The deeper wejls are, however^, the ex- 
ception and not the rule. The system jOf irrigating 
is by Persian wheels, simple in construction, cheap, 
quickly made and repaired ; and exjoerience haS 
shown that they are much better adapted for the 
pur))ose intend d than the steam pump. The whole 
of this simple machinery is quickly specified and des- 
luib. d. A wiio. cog-wheel is kept going horizontally 
, -1 mull, with a sweep; this lurus a larger one pei- 
peuuicularly, which is directly above the month of 
the well. Over this revolve two thick ropes, and upon 
these are fastened small wooden buckets ; one side 
descends while the other rises carrying the buckets 
with them, these descending empty, tho.-^e ascending 
full ; and as they pass over the top they discharge 
the water into a trough which conveys it into an 
adjoining tank. The quantity of water discharged 
within the twenty-four hours depends on the speed 
at whicli the mule is kept going, and also, of course, 
on the depth of tiio well. An average sized garden 
requiies the constant labour of three to four mules 
to provide the necessary amount of water, the animals 
belli" relieved about every three hours. 
The ground prepared and manured, the P.n-sian 
wheel fixed, and accomodation — of the simplest kind 
of course — being provided for the gardener and the 
mules, the propi ietor now proceeds to buy young 
lemon trees about a year old. Tlie.se aie meant to 
be used as sto ;ks upon which tlie or.uige slips are 
later 0i grafted; and of them there is always 
a fair supply available in the nurseries of the older 
[June r. 1898. 
gardens. These lemon trees are now planted, under 
the sunervision of the head-gardener, at a distance of 
four yards apart, and the most suitable time for this 
opeiation is during the months of March and April, 
before the great heat has set in. A hedge of cactus 
or prickly pear is planted at the same time round 
the garden, which in a few years' time grows inlo 
ail impenetrable mass, preventing the intrusion of 
man or beast. 
The young lemon trees will now thrive without 
much further attention, except that they must be 
carefully irrigated ; this is done by a system of small 
masonry troughs nmuiiig iu all directions through 
the garden, and fed from the tank adjoining the 
w'ell. The garden is generally divided into four 
equal parts, each part being irrigated within the course 
of two days, so that every tree receives its share 
of water every eighth day in rotation ; and tin; is 
con:;idered ample. A small trench is dug round each 
tree sufficiently large to hold its requirement of w.iter, 
and as the tree grows and needs a larger siipplv, the 
trenail is enlarged; the amount of water that will 
evoiitually be required must therefore be calculated 
on the bi-sis of the irrigation necessary when the 
trees are six years old, and may be said to have 
reached maturity. If the garden is a full-sized one 
and contains about six thousand trees, it will be 
necessary to sink either two wells or one well suffi- 
ciently wide to admit a double set of buckets, thus 
raising double the quantity of a single set iu the 
Same space of time. 
Daring the winter months the g.trden is left to 
itself, the garden employing his time iu taking the 
mules to graze, thus saving the cost of feed. The 
winter (or rather rains) over, the garden is weeded, 
manure is worked into the soil, and the trenches 
round the trees are remade and enlarged. Irrigating 
commences about the end of June, and lasts till 
the end of October or middle of November. 
In order to recoup himself or his outlay while 
the trees are growing, the proprietor will sometimes 
arrange with his gardener to grow vegetables in 
the empty spaces between the young trees, givini^ 
him the seed and one-third to one-half the produce 
of the vegetables in lieu of wages. This system is 
however, not considered economical in thelonorun' 
as the trees, which are purposely grown in close 
proximity to each other, really require the whole 
of the soil; and their development and productiveness 
is retarded by the growing of vegetables. 
The young lemon trees ate allowed to grow fer 
two summers before the orange slip is grafted upon 
them ; this operation is performed iu the autumn by 
the head-gardener, who is an adept at this work. 
After the fourth summer, calculating from the time" 
the lemon stock was planted, a few oranges may 
appear on the trees;-. and during the following two 
years the whole of the expenses of a garden will as a 
genefti-l rule, be covered by the sale of the orange crops. 
It is generally assumed that after the fourth vear 
,a gu'den becomes self-supportiug ; but it will require 
tvvu years longer before a return in capital outlay 
can be expected. After the sixth year, however a 
garden that has been well attended to will not ouiy 
pay all expenses, but give a handsome return as 
well. The fortunate proprietor will now also have 
the further satisfaction of kuowin.g that the market- 
able value of his prope'rty represents prbbahly mo-e 
than double the whole of his outlay. This will give 
an idea how profitable orange-growing in Jaff i, really 
is, to those who can afford to wait a few years for 
a return, on capital. To the native of Jaffa only 
onai'form,,t)f investment has a charm — the height tf 
his ambition' is to own a ‘Biarah,’ the technical term fer 
an orange-ga len; unfortunately for him, however, be 
as frequenuV as not .launches , upon tbe enterpri e 
without htv i)g tufioient capital to see it through 
successfully, with uie result that he is compelled to 
borrow monsy at a ruinous rate of interest in order 
to rneet his current expenses, and finally has to pa t 
with bis property before he has seen any of i a fruit. 
This explains wny most of the garden property is 
iu the hands of the money-lending class, who have had 
very little trouble in growing the trees. 
