FARMING IN CHINA

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 2181, 24 July 1889, Page 2

FARMING IN CHINA

Consul Oxunham, reporting npon the atate of ftgrionltnra la the neighbourhood of Ohm Klsnsr, shows how the plodding and persevering Industry of the peasant of Ohma has ifhotaally solved the vexed problem of how to maintain the maximum number of people on the mlnimam amoaat of land. While one oaase of auooeas is pat down to the warm Ban of a Chinese tamtner, a very Urge proportion is due to the equlUble relation hp between landlord and tenant, and the fact that the land is never allowed to lie f «Uow, even for a month. Thuaj over ground whioh can ba watered enough for rioe, as soon as the orop U reaped m November the field is sown with wheat. This appears above ground In a month or less, and is ready to out by May. As loon a« thla is gathered In, the ground Is ploughed up and Irrigated, and the young rioe plants transplanted fr m their seed plots. Everywhere there is the same eagerness to get all that oan ba gathered from the toll, the fertility of whloh is maintained by incessant manuring. The home of the oultivator may be equalld Indeed, but his fielda will be garden-like m thmr neatness. Of coarse where »o maoh depends upon the products of the farm, a long-continued drought or a widespread Inundation must necessarily produce a terrible disaster, suoh as those whloh ifljlot tbe the Celestial Empire now. But comparatively alight failures are to some extent compensated for by the system of land tenure. The landlord receives as payment a fraotlon of the orop; but this fraotlon varies, being larger ia times of plenty and diminishing to nothing In very poor yean. When the distress Is m any way acute the Empor himself remits tho land tax, and the landlords oan bat follow h.B august example. The principle is that first of all tin peasant gets his living from the soil, and tbe rent and taxes are a seoondary consideration,