Farmers of Forty Centuries; Or, Permanent Agriculture in China, Korea, and JapanKing, F. H. (Franklin Hiram)
Science
Farmers of Forty Centuries; Or, Permanent Agriculture in China, Korea, and Japan
King, F. H. (Franklin Hiram)
Agriculture -- China; Agriculture -- Japan; Agriculture -- Korea
Generally the liquid manures must be diluted with water to a greater
or less extent before they are "fed", as the Chinese say, to their
plants, hence there is need of an abundant and convenient water
supply. One of these is seen in Fig. 38, where the Chinaman has
adopted the modern galvanized iron pipe to bring water from the
mountain slope of Happy Valley to his garden. By the side of this
tank are the covered pails in which the night soil was brought,
perhaps more than a mile, to be first diluted and then applied. But
the more general method for supplying water is that of leading it
along the ground in channels or ditches to a small reservoir in one
corner of a terraced field or garden, as seen in Fig. 39, where it
is held and the surplus led down from terrace to terrace, giving
each its permanent supply. At the upper right corner of the
engraving may be seen two manure receptacles and a third stands near
the reservoir. The plants on the lower terrace are water cress and
those above the same. At this time of the year, on the terraced
gardens of Happy Valley, this is one of the crops most extensively
grown.
Walking among these gardens and isolated homes, we passed a pig pen
provided with a smooth, well-laid stone floor that had just been
washed scrupulously clean, like the floor of a house. While I was
not able to learn other facts regarding this case, I have little
doubt that the washings from this floor had been carefully collected
and taken to some receptacle to serve as a plant food.
Looking backward as we left Hongkong for Canton on the cloudy
evening of March 8th, the view was wonderfully beautiful. We were
drawing away from three cities, one, electric-lighted Hongkong
rising up the steep slopes, suggesting a section of sky set with a
vast array of stars of all magnitudes up to triple Jupiters;
another, old and new Kowloon on the opposite side of the harbor; and
between these two, separated from either shore by wide reaches of
wholly unoccupied water, lay the third, a mid-strait city of
sampans, junks and coastwise craft of many kinds segregated, in
obedience to police regulation, into blocks and streets with each
setting sun, but only to scatter again with the coming morn. At
night, after a fixed hour, no one is permitted to leave shore and
cross the vacant water strip except from certain piers and with the
permission of the police, who take the number of the sampan and the
names of its occupants. Over the harbor three large search lights
were sweeping and it was curious to see the junks and other craft
suddenly burst into full blazes of light, like so many monstrous
fire-flies, to disappear and reappear as the lights came and went.
Thus is the mid-strait city lighted and policed and thus have steps
been taken to lessen the number of cases of foul play where people
have left the wharves at night for some vessel in the strait, never
to be heard from again.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account