covering them with combs. When these worms are once used to the trees of any district, they never leave them, unless something extraordinary drives them away. The wax produced is hard, shining, and considerably dearer than that of bees.

978. The Sésamum orientale and the Ricinus communis, or castor-oil plant, are cultivated for the esculent oils extracted from their seeds. They appear to have some method of depriving the castor oil of its purgative qualities, but Dr. Abel thinks not completely.

979. The camphire tree (Laurus Camphora) grows to the size of our elms or oaks. The camphire is procured by boiling the fresh-gathered branches of the tree, and stirring the whole with a stick, till the gum begins to adhere to it in the form of a white jelly. The fluid is then poured off into a glazed vessel, and left to concrete. "The crude camphire is then purified in the following manner. A quantity of the finely powdered materials of some old wall, built of earth, is put as a first layer at the bottom of a copper basin; on this is placed a layer of camphire, and then another of earth, and so on till the vessel is nearly filled; the series being terminated with a layer of earth: over this is laid a covering of the leaves of the plant Po-tio, perhaps a species of Méntha. A second basin is now inverted over the first, and luted on. The whole thus prepared is put over a regulated fire, and submitted to its action for a certain length of time; it is then removed and suffered to cool. The camphire is found to have sublimed, and to be attached to the upper basin, and is further refined by repetitions of the same process." (Narrative, &c., 179.)

980. The oak is as much prized in China as in other countries, and is styled the tree of inheritance. There are several species in general use for building, dyeing, and fuel; and the acorns are ground into a paste, which mixed with the flour of corn is made into cakes.

981. The maidenhair tree (Salisburia adiantifolia) is grown for its fruit, which Dr. Abel saw exposed in quantities; but whether as a table fruit, a culinary vegetable, or a medicine, he could not ascertain. Kæmpfer says, the fruit assists digestion.

982. The cordage plant (Sida tiliæ folia) is extensively cultivated for the manufacture of cordage from its fibres. The common hemp is used for the same purpose, but the Sida is preferred. A species of Musa is also grown in some places, and its fibres used for rope and other purposes.

983. The common cotton, and also a variety bearing a yellow down, from which, without any dyeing process, the nankeen cloths are formed, are grown in different places. The mulberry is grown in a dwarf state, as in Hindustan.

984. The ground nut (Arachis hypoga a), the eatable arum (Arum esculentum), the Trapa bicórnis, the Scirpus tuberosus, and Nelumbium, all producing edible tubers, are cultivated in lakes, tanks, or marshy places.

985. The Nelumbium, Dr. Abel observes, with its pink and yellow blossoms, and broad green leaves, gives a charm and productiveness to marshes, otherwise unsightly and barren. The leaves of the plant are watered in the summer, and cut down close to the roots

on the approach of winter. The seeds, which are in size and form like a small acorn without its cup, are eaten green, or dried as nuts, and are often preserved in sweetmeats; they have a nut-like flavour. Its roots are sometimes as thick as the arm, of a pale green without, and whitish within; in a raw state they are eaten as fruit, being juicy and of a sweetish and refreshing flavour; and when boiled are served as vegetables.

986. The Scirpus tuberosus, or water chestnut (fig. 130.), is a stoloniferous rush, almost without leaves, and the tubers are produced on the stolones. It grows in tanks, which are manured for its reception about the end of March. A tank being drained of its water, small pits are dug in its bottom; they are filled with human manure, and exposed to the sun for a fortnight; their contents are next intimately blended with the slimy bottom of the tank, and slips of the plant inserted. The water is now returned to the tank, and the first crop of tubers comes to perfection in six months. (Rox. Coromandel.)

987. The millet (Hólcus) is grown on the banks of rivers, and attains the height of sixteen feet. It is sown in rows, and after it comes up Panicum is sown between, which comes to perfection after the other is cut down.

988. Among the many esculent vegetables cul

quantity consumed of it over the whole empire is, according to all authors, immense; and, Dr. Abel thinks, it may be considered to the Chinese what the potato is to the Irish. It is cultivated with great care, and requires abundant manuring, like its congeners of the Brássica tribe. Boiled, it has the flavour of asparagus; and raw, it eats like lettuce and is not inferior. It often weighs from fifteen to twenty pounds, and reaches the height of two or tree feet. It is preserved fresh during winter by burying in the earth; and it is pickled with salt and vinegar.

989. Almost every vegetable of use, as food, in the arts, or as medicine, known to the rest of the world, is cultivated in China, with, perhaps, a very few exceptions of equatorial plants. The bamboo and cocoa-nut tree, as in Hindustan, are in universal use: indigo is extensively cultivated; sugar also in the southern provinces, but it is rather a luxury than an article of common consumption. It is used mostly in a coarse granulated form; but for exportation, and for the upper classes, it is reduced to its crystallised state. Tobacco is every where cultivated, and in universal use, by all ages, and both sexes. Fruits of every kind abound, but they are mostly bad, except the orange and the lee-tchee (Dimocárpus Litchì), both of which are probably indigenous. The art of grafting is well known, having been introduced by the missionaries; but they do not appear to have taken advantage of this knowledge for the improvement of their fruits. They have also an art which enables them to take off bearing branches of fruit, particularly of the orange and peach, and transfer them, in a growing state, to pots, for their artificial rocks and grottos, and summer-houses. It is simply by removing a ring of the bark, plastering round it a ball of earth, and suspending a vessel of water to drop upon it, until the upper edge of the incision has thrown out roots into the earth.

990. The live stock of Chinese agriculture is neither abundant nor various. The greater part of their culture being on a small scale, and performed by manual operations, does not require many beasts of labour: their canals and boats supply the place of beasts of burden: and their general abstemiousness renders animals for the butcher less necessary. They rear, however, though in comparatively small number, all the domestic animals of Europe; the horse, the ass, the ox, the buffalo, the dog, the cat, the pig; but their horses are small and ill-formed. The camels of China are often no larger than our horses; the other breeds are good, and particularly that of pigs. The kind of dog most common in the south, from Canton to Tong-chin-tcheu, is the spaniel with straight ears. More to the north, as far as Pekin, the dogs have generally hanging ears and slender tails.

991. The Chinese are exceedingly sparing in the use of animal food. The broad-tailed sheep are kept in the hilly parts of the country, and brought down to the plains; but the two animals most esteemed, because they contribute most to their own subsistence and are kept at the cheapest rate, are the hog and the duck. Whole swarms of the latter are bred in large barges, surrounded with projecting stages covered with coops for the reception of these birds, which are taught, by the sound of the whistle, to jump into the rivers and canals in search of food, and by another call to return to their lodgings. They are usually hatched by placing their eggs, as the ancient Egyptians were wont to do, in small ovens, or sandbaths, in order that the same female may continue to lay eggs throughout the year, which would not be the case if she had a young brood to attend. The ducks, when killed, are usually split open, salted, and dried in the sun; in which state they afford an excellent relish to rice or other vegetables.

992. The wild animals are numerous. Elephants are common in the south of China, and extend as far as the thirtieth degree of north latitude in the province of Kiangnau and of Yun-nau. The unicorn rhinoceros lives on the sides of the marshes in the provinces of Yun-nau and Quan-si. The lion, according to Du Halde and Trigault, is a stranger to China; but the animal figured by Neuhoff, under the name of the tiger, seems to be the maneless lion known to the ancients, described by Oppian, and seen by M. Olivier on the Euphrates. Marco Polo saw lions in Fo-kien: there were some at the court of Kublai Khan. The true tiger probably shows himself in the most southerly provinces, where there are also various kinds of monkeys; the long-armed gibbou or Símia longimanus; the Sunia influens, or ugly baboon; and the Símia Sylvanus, which mimics the gestures and even the laughter of men. The musk animal, which seems peculiar to the central plateau of Asia, sometimes goes down into the western provinces of China. The deer, the boar, the fox, and other animals, some of which are little known, are found in the forests.

993. Several of the birds of the country are distinguished for beauty of form and brilliancy of colour; such as the gold and silver pheasants, which we see often painted on the Chinese papers, and which have been brought to this country to adorn our aviaries; also the Chinese teal, remarkable for its two beautiful orange crests. The insects and butterflies are equally distinguished for their uncommon beauty. Silkworms are common, and seem to be indigenous in the country. From drawings made in China, it appears to possess almost all the common fishes of Europe; and M. Bloch, and M. de Lacepede

(Cyprinus auratus), which, in that country, as with us, is kept in basins as an ornament, is a native of a lake at the foot of the high mountain of Tein-king, near the city of Tchang-hoo, in the province of Tché-kiang. From that place it has been taken to all the other provinces of the empire and to Japan. It was in 1611 that it was first brought to England.

994. The fisheries of China, as already noticed, are free to all; there are no restrictions on any of the great lakes, the rivers, or canals. The subject is not once mentioned in the Leu-lee; but the heavy duties on salt render the use of salt-fish in China almost unknown. Besides the net, the line, and the spear, the Chinese have several ingenious methods of catching fish. In the middle parts of the empire, the fishing corvorant (Pelicànus piscator) is almost universally in use; in other parts they catch them by torchlight; and a very common practice is, to place a board painted white along the edge of the boat, which, reflecting the moon's rays into the water, induces the fish to spring towards it, supposing it to be a moving sheet of water, when they fall into the boat.

995. The implements of Chinese agriculture are few and simple. The plough has one handle, but no coulter; there are different forms: some may be drawn by women, (fig. 131. a), others are for stirring the soil under water (6), and the largest is drawn by a single buffalo or ox (c). Horses are never employed for that purpose. The carts are

131

low, narrow, and the wheels so diminutive as often to be made without spokes. A large cylinder is sometimes used to separate the grain from the ear, and they have a winnowing machine similar to that which was invented in Europe about a century ago. The most ingenious machines are those for raising water for the purposes of irrigation. A very ingenious wheel for this purpose has been figured by Sir George Staunton: but the most universally used engine is the chain-pump, worked in various ways by oxen, by walking in a wheel, or by the hand; and next to it buckets worked by long levers (fig. 132.), as in the gardens

round London, Paris, Constantinople, and most large cities of Europe. For pounding oleiferous seeds they have also very simple and economical machines, in which pestles on the ends of levers are worked by a horizontal shaft put in motion by a water-wheel. (fig. 133.) The chief thing to admire in the implements and machines of India and China is their simplicity, and the ease and little expense with which they may be

constructed.

996. The operations of Chinese agriculture are numerous, and some of them curious. Two great objects to be procured are water and manure. The former is raised from rivers or wells by the machines already mentioned, and distributed, over the cultivated surface in the usual manner, and the latter is obtained from every conceivable source.

997. The object of their tillage, Livingstone observes, 66 appears to be, in the first instance, to expose the soil as extensively as possible; and this is best effected by throwing it up in large masses, in which state it is allowed

132

to remain till it is finally prepared for planting. When sufficient rain has fallen to allow the husbandman

to flood his fields, they are laid under water, in which state they are commonly ploughed again, in the same manner as for fallow, and then a rake, or rather a sort of harrow, about three feet deep and four

feet wide, with a single row of teeth, is drawn, by the same animal that draws their plough, perpendicu. larly through the soil, to break the lumps, and to convert it into a kind of ooze; and as the teeth of th rake or harrow are not set more than from two to three inches apart, it serves, at the same time, very effectually to remove roots and otherwise to clean the ground. For some purposes, the ground thus pre pared is allowed to dry; it is then formed into beds or trenches; the beds are made of a convenient size for watering and laying on manure. The intermediate trenches are commonly about nine inches deep, and of the necessary breadth to give to the beds the required elevation; but when the trenches are wanted for the cultivation of water plants, some part of the soil is removed, so that a trench may be formed of the proper dimensions.

998 For these operations they use a hoe, commonly ten inches deep, and five inches broad, made of iron, or of wood with an iron border, and for some purposes it is divided into four or five prongs. By constant practice the Chinese have acquired such dexterous use of this simple instrument, that they form their beds and trenches with astonishing neatness and regularity. With it they raise the ground which has not been ploughed, from the beds and trenches, by only changing it from a vertical to a horizontal direction, or employing its edge. It is also used for digging, planting, and in general for every purpose which a Chinese husbandman has to accomplish.

The collection of manure is an object of so much attention with the Chinese, that a prodigious number of old men, women, and children, incapable of much other labour, are constantly employed about the streets, public roads, and banks of canals and rivers, with baskets tied before them, and holding in their hands small wooden rakes, to pick up the dung of animals, and offals of any kind that may answer the purpose of manure: this is mixed sparingly with a portion of stiff loamy earth, and formed into takes, dried afterwards in the sun. It sometimes becomes an object of commerce, and is sold to farmers, who never employ it in a compact state. Their first care is to construct very large cisterns, for containing, besides those cakes and dung of every kind, all sorts of vegetable matter, as leaves, roots, or stems of plants, with mud from the canals, and offals of animals, even to the shavings collected by barbers. With all these they mix as much animal water as can be procured, or common water sufficient to dilute the whole; and, in this state, generally in the act of putrid fermentation, they apply it to the ploughed earth. In various parts of a farm, and near the paths and roads, large earthen vessels are buried to the edge in the ground, for the accommodation of the labourer or passenger who may have occasion to use them. In small retiring-bouses, built also upon the brink of the roads, and in the neighbourhood of villages, reser. yours are constructed of compact materials, to prevent the absorption of whatever they receive, and straw is carefully thrown over the surface from time to time, to prevent evaporation. Such a value is set upon the principal ingredient, called ta-feu, for manure, that the oldest and most helpless persons are not decried wholly useless to the family by which they are supported. The quantity of manure collected by every means is still inadequate to the demand.

1000. Vegetable or wood ashes, according to Livingstone, are esteemed the very best manure by the Chinese. The weeds which were separated from the land by the harrow, with what they otherwise are able to collect, are carefully burnt, and the ashes spread. The part of the field where this has been done is easily perceived by the most careless observer. Indeed the vigour of the productions of those parts of their land where the ashes have been applied is evident, as long as the crop continues on the ground. The ashes of burnt vegetables are also mixed with a great variety of other matters in forming the compositions which are spread on the fields, or applied to individual plants.

11. The plaster of old kitchens is much esteemed as a manure; so that a farmer will replaster a cookhouse for the old plaster, that he may employ it to fertilise his fields.

12. Of night-soilta-feu, the Chinese have a high notion: and its collection and formation into cakes, by incans of a little clay, clay and lime, or similar substances, give employment to a great number of indi vid They transport these cakes to a great distance. This manure in its recent state is applied to the ruots of cauliflowers, cabbages, and similar plants, with the greatest advantage.

lot. The dung and urine of all animals are collected with great care; they are used both mixed and Reparately. The mixture is less valuable than the dung, and this for general purposes is the better the Oder it is. Horns and bones reduced to powder, the cakes left after expressing several oils, such as of the ground-nut, hemp seed, and the like, rank also as manures. Small crabs, the feathers of fowls and ducks, Boot, the sweepings of streets, and the stagnant contents of common sewers, are often thought sufficiently valuable to be taken to a great distance, especially when water carriage can be obtained.

164 Lime is employed chiefly for the purpose of destroying insects; but the Chinese are also aware of its fertilising properties.

1. The Chinese often manure the plant rather than the soil. The nature of the climate in the southern part of the empire seems to justify fully this very laborious but economical practice. Rain commonly falls in such quantities and with such force as to wash away all the soluble part of the soil, and the manure on which its fertility is supposed to depend; and this often appears to be so effectually done, that nothing meets the eye but sand and small stones. It is therefore proper that the Chinese husbandman should reserve the necessary nourishment of the plant to be applied at the proper time. For this purpose reservoirs of the requite dimensions are constructed at the corner of every field, or other convenient places.

1006. With the seed or young plant its proper manure is invariably applied. It is then carefully watered in dry weather night and morning, very often with the black stagnant contents of the common sewer; as the plants advance in growth the manure is changed, in some instances more than once, till their advance towards maturity makes any further application unnecessary.

1007. The public retiring-houses are described by Dr. Abel, as rather constructed for exposure than concealment, being merely open sheds with a rail or spar laid over the

reservoir.

1008. The mixture of soils is said to be a common practice as a substitute for manure : "they are constantly changing earth from one piece of ground to another; mixing sand with that which appears to be too adhesive, and loam where the soil appears to be too loose," &c.

1009. The terrace cultivation is mentioned by Du Halde and others, as carried to great perfection in China: but the observations of subsequent travellers seem to render this doubtful. Lord Amherst's embassy passed through a hilly and mountainous country for many weeks together: but Dr. Abel, who looked eagerly for examples of that system of cultivation, saw none that answered to the description given by authors. Du Halde's description, he says, may apply to some particular cases: but the instances which he

observed lead him to conclude that terrace cultivation is in a great measure confined to their ravines, undulations, and gentlest declivities.

1010. Rows, or drills, are almost always adopted in planting or sowing; and for this purpose the lands are laid flat, and not raised into ridges with intervening furrows. They are said to be particular in having the direction of their rows from north to south, which, other circumstances being suitable, is certainly a desirable practice. Before sowing, seeds are generally kept in liquid manure till they germinate. Barrow frequently saw in the province of Keang-see a woman drawing a light plough with a single handle (fig. 131. a), through ground previously prepared; while a man held the plough with one hand, and with the other cast the seed into the drills.

1011. Forests of immense extent exist on the mountains of the western districts of China, and abound in almost every species of tree known in Europe, and many others unknown. Besides timber and fuel, these forests supply many valuable products, as barks, gums, oils, and resins, used in the arts. Rose wood, ebony, sandal wood, iron wood, and a great variety of others are sent to Europe for cabinet work. The Chinese aloe has the height and figure of an olive tree. It contains within the bark three sorts of wood; the first, black, compact, and heavy, is called eagle-wood; it is scarce; the second, called calambooc, is light like rotten wood; the third, near the centre, is called calamba wood, and sells in India for its weight in gold; its smell is exquisite, and it is an excellent cordial in cases of fainting or of palsy.

1012. The national agricultural fête of the Chinese deserves to be noticed. Every year on the fifteenth day of the first moon, which generally corresponds to some day in the beginning of our March, the emperor in person goes through the ceremony of opening the ground; he repairs in great state to the field appointed for this ceremony. The princes of the imperial family, the presidents of the five great tribunals, and an immense number of mandarins attend him. Two sides of the field are lined with the officers of the emperor's house, the third is occupied by different mandarins; the fourth is reserved for all the labourers of the province, who repair thither to see their art honoured and practised by the head of the empire. The emperor enters the field alone, prostrates himself, and touches the ground nine times with his head in adoration of Tien, the God of heaven. He pronounces with a loud voice a prayer prepared by the court of ceremonies, in which he invokes the blessing of the Great Being on his labour, and on that of his whole people. Then, in the capacity of chief priest of the empire, he sacrifices an ox, in homage to heaven as the fountain of all good. While the victim is offered on the altar, a plough is brought to the emperor, to which is yoked a pair of oxen, ornamented in a most magnificent style. The prince lays aside his imperial robes, lays hold of the handle of the plough with the right hand, and opens several furrows in the direction of north and south; then gives the plough into the hands of the chief mandarins, who, labouring in succession, display their comparative dexterity. The ceremony concludes with a distribution of money and pieces of cloth, as presents among the labourers; the ablest of whom execute the rest of the work in presence of the emperor. After the field has received all the necessary work and manure, the emperor returns to commence the sowing with similar ceremony, and in presence of the labourers. These ceremonies are performed on the same day by the viceroys of all the provinces.

SUBSECT. 9. Of the present State of Agriculture in Chinese Tatary, Thibet, and Bootan.

1013. Chinese Tatary is an extensive region, diversified with all the grand features of nature, and remarkable for its vast elevated plain, supported like a table by the mountains of Thibet in the south, and Allusian chain in the north. This prodigious plain is little known; its climate is supposed to be colder than that of France; its deserts to consist chiefly of a black sand; and its agriculture to be very limited and imperfect. Wheat, however, is said to be grown among the southern Mandshurs.

1014. Thibet or Tibet is an immense tract of country little known. It consists of two divisions, Thibet and Bootan. The climate of Thibet is extremely cold and bleak towards the south, for though on the confines of the torrid zone it vies in this respect with that of the Alps of Italy. That of Bootan is more temperate; and the seasons of both divisions are severe compared to those of Bengal.

1015. With respect to surface, Bootan and Thibet exhibit a very remarkable contrast. Bootan presents to the view nothing but the most misshapen irregularities; mountains covered with eternal verdure, and rich with abundant forests of large and lofty trees. Almost every favourable aspect of them, coated with the smallest quantity of soil, is cleared and adapted to cultivation, by being shelved into horizontal beds: not a slope or narrow slip of land between the ridges lies unimproved. There is scarcely a mountain whose base is not washed by some rapid torrent, and many of the loftiest bear populous villages, amidst orchards and other plantations, on their summits and on their sides. It combines in its extent the most extravagant traits of rude nature and laborious art.