THE TROPICAL AGRICULTURIST. 
418 
[December i, 1891. 
rotnrnfl so small a yield compared with the cultivated 
varieties. Tiice is the grain food most preferred by 
half the human race, fn the Indian peninsula it is 
the principal food of 1(X),00U/X)0 of the people ; so 
strongly are they impressed with the superiority of 
rice as a food that in Southern India a peasant will 
indicate hfs well-to-do or iinpoverislied condition by 
telling you that he eats rice twice a day, or once only, 
or not at all. But the poorest pooplo rarely taste it ; 
they oat varieties of millet, raggy dori, or other 
cheaper foods. 
Tradition teaches that rice is the most ancient food 
of India, and as such it is invostod with almost a 
sacred character. It is used in many of the sacrifices 
and other religious ceremonies. One of the purifactorv 
rites after birth is feeding the Hindoo infant with 
rice during six months. Tno Hindoo household must 
daily perforju the live acts of worship, the fourth of 
which is scattering rice grains at his door, with the 
prayer : ** Om to aft the Visradf.eGS, to (he vniveesal <jodify 
meiif heaBts^ birds, rejitilee, etc.” After death comes the 
most important rite of all, called “Araddha,” which 
is offering the pinda or ball of rice, accompanied witli 
prayers and liuationa to the departed spirit. The 
participation in thia rice is accepted as evidence of 
kinship, and gives a title to a share of the deceased’s 
ancient written account of the cultivation 
and trade in rice, as far as I have been able to ascer- 
tain, may be found in the bhoo-King or Chinese olassios, 
translated in Medhurst’s Ancient (’Inna, which dea- 
criboa the drainage and irrigation works constructed by 
the Emperor Yu, on the Yangtse rivei*, about 23r)fi li. C., 
a few years before the date usually given to the 
Noachian deluge. It describes the mode of collecting 
revenue from tJie paddy lands, as follows To the 
distance of 600 le (MO milos) from the Koyal City was 
the land of feudal tenure; for the first 100 le (28 niileab 
the revenue consists of the entire plant of the grain ; 
for the second I(J0 lo, they had to pay the gram and 
half the straw; for the third llMJlo, they had to Iming 
the grain in the oar, w hile all these rendered feudal 
Borvico; for the fourth 100 le, they paid tho grain in 
the husk, and for the tifth ino lo, they brought tho 
rice olexuiod. ’ 
A moat ingenious mode of coUeciing the revenue 
where tho cost of carriage is ho great, and the roads so 
bad, as they are in China to the present day. 
Coming nearer home, rice may certainly take its 
place among the cereals cultivated in Ancient Egypt 
and Syria. Pliny, the naturalist, does not give it m 
his list of Egyptian plants, but Wilkinson considers 
there is abundant reason for Buppoalng it was cultivated 
in the Delta. This is confirmed by illustrations taken 
from a tomb at Thebes, some 300() B. C. Wilkinson 
supposes that it represents tlie pulverizing of certain 
BUDstances in a mortar. If it be compared with the 
process of rice cleaning as carried on in China at tho 
present day, there can bo no doubt but that it represents 
the same process as it was practised in Ancient 
Egypt nearly 5000 years ago. It is done by pounding 
the rice in wooden or stone pots, w ith a pointed pestle 
or beater; tho pot is kept full of grain, bo that tho 
skin ia removed by tho continued tritunition and 
friction of one grain against another, without pul- 
verizing or breaking them. Another process is 
worked by the foot, which is tho mothod preferred 
in Bunna, Japan, and parts of China. Tliooperation 
is referred to in Proverbs xxvii, 22: “Though thou 
shouldst bray a fool in a mortar among wheat (gi'ain ?) 
with a pestle, yet will not his folly depart from him,” 
or as the same idea is rendered in one of our own 
proverbs, “Folly is more than skin deep.” There is 
no sense in the transhition as given in the Duthorized 
version. 'J’ho word translated “ wheat ” means 
literally “pounded grain," and, undoubtedly, refers 
to the ‘decorticating process, which, according to Pliny 
and Herodotus, was applied to rico and barley but 
not to wheat. , 
Pliny’s description of tlie rice plant seems to show, 
though he knew the grain, IiG had never seen it actually 
rowing, the description is so wide from the mark. 
n his trexitiso on tno food plants of India he says : 
“ But the most favorite food of all these is rice, from 
which they prepare ptisan (pearled grain) similar to 
property. 
The m 
most 
that prepared from barley in other parte of the 
world, llie leaves of rice arc fleshy, very like those 
of the leek, but broader; the stem is a cubit (18 inches) 
high, the bloHsom purple, and root globular, like a 
pearl in shape” (B. 18, cap. IB). Ho goes on to say 
that “Hippocrates, one of tno famous writers of 
medical science, has devoted a whole volume to tho 
praises of ‘ ptisan,’ tho mode of preparing which is 
universally known.” 
The cultivation of the plant in Europe was, accord- 
ing to Captain Ihurd Smith, introduced by tho Moors 
into Spain in the elcvcntli century, and from Ihenco 
into Italy a century later. Gibbon considers that it 
was cultivated in Spain before the Christian era, and 
that the rice was imported from Spain which was 
used for making the wedding cake in the simxfio con- 
farreation ceremonies of tho old Homan Hepnblic. 
Bo this as it may, it is certain that it was not culti- 
vated to any large extent in Italy until quite modern 
times. 
Hice cultivation has always been lioavily taxed, and 
in some of tho states absolutely prohibited, owing to 
tho malaria rising from the swampy lands. Since 
Italy became a kingdom and legislation on the subject 
has become more uniform and less capricious, tho 
cultivation of this, the most profitable crop to the 
farmer, Iuih ho extended in tho rico meadows of Lom- 
luirdy and other similarly situated low lying lands 
that tho Italian rice crop of 1880 amounted to no 
less than n(Ki,()0() tons, and it is Bnnually increasing in 
amount. TJio cultivation of rice in Georgia and 
Carolina, w'hich have produced the finest seeds in the 
world, only commenced about the year 1790. 
In a piuiiphlet published in London, in 1701, on 
“ J'hc Importance of British Plantations in America,’' 
it is mentioned as a recent circuniBtanco. that “a 
biigautine from tio island of Madagascar hapteiiod to 
put into CharlcBton, having a little rico seed left, 
which the captain gave to a gentleman named Wood- 
ward. From part of this ho nad a very good crop, but 
bo was ignorant for some years how to clean it. It 
was soon dispersed over the province, and by frequent 
experiinents and observations they found out ways of 
producing and manufacturing it to so great jierfectiou 
that it is Ihoughi to exceed any other in value." Mr, 
Dubois, the treasurer of the East India Company, 
sent n fnrtlier supply of soed a few years afterward. 
By careful selection of tho seed, and cultivation in 
trenches on a suitable soil, tho (.’arolina seed has 
become so famous that it has been exported to Java, 
Italy, ^ladras, and other countries. The finest Indian 
varieties are grown from American seed. 
Since the American war and the abolition of slavery, 
as the free negroes object to working in the swampy 
rice liunds, associated as they arc with fever and 
malaria, rice cultivation is becoming less cacli year, 
and tho e.xport trade of Carolina rico to bluropo in 
spite of all attempts to bolster it up witli protective 
duties, has practically ceased. Tho American millcM 
are losers rather than gainers by the duty imposed for 
protecting the trade, which is now two and one-half 
cents peT nound. or over 100 per cent, ad valorem on 
imported cleaned rice, thus causing the Americn-a 
consumer to pay double for bis rice. As the crop 
raised is smaller every year, ho has not only no rico to 
export, but must import tho balance of his supply 
from the Englmh, or other markets. Were the uiity 
removed, tho more expensive Carolina rico would 
again bo largely exported to Europe, and be replaced 
by a still greater import of Burmese rico for tlio 
American home trade, to tho benefit of cultivators, 
niillera, shippers, and all concerned; a remarkable 
instance of inpuw done to a trade by the duties intended 
to protect it. 
It is dilficiUt to trace tho time when rice was first 
imported into great Britain. Shakespeare mentions 
it as luxury. The clown in Winter’s Tale 
says: — “Three pounds of sugar, five pounds of cur- 
rants, rice ; what will this sister of mine do with rice ? 
But niy father hath niado her mistrosa of the feast, 
and she lays it on.” The supply then camo from Italy. 
It was superseded early in the eighteenth century by 
rice from our American colonies and India. We did 
not begin to mill rice for ourselves to any appreciable 
extent until the early part of the present centtury 
