The leaf is rolled by a line of men on each side of such a table (4-1/2 feet is a good width for it) passing up from man to man, from the bottom of the table to the top. The passage of each handful of roll from man to man is regulated by the man at the end, who, when the roll in his hand is ready (that is, rolled enough), forms it into a tight compressed ball (a truncated shape is the most convenient) and puts it away on an adjacent stand. When he does this, the roll each man has passes up one step. The roll is ready to make up into a ball, when it is in a soft _mashy_ state, and when in the act of rolling it gives out juice freely. None of this juice must be lost, it must be mopped up into the roll, again and again in its passage up the table, and finally into the ball, when made up. There will be some coarse leaves in the roll which cannot be twisted. These, if left, would give much red leaf in the Tea. They should be picked out by, say, the third or fourth man from the head of the table, for it is only when the leaf has been partly rolled that they show. The man who picks out the coarse leaf should not roll at all. He should spread the roll, and pick out as much as he can, between the time of receiving and passing it on. In no case allow roll to accumulate by him, for if so kept it hardens and dries, and gives extra work to the last rollers to bring it into the mashy state again. Besides which I rather think, any such lengthened stoppage in the rolling helps to destroy Pekoe ends, and is certainly injurious to the perfect after-fermentation, inasmuch as it (the fermentation) partly takes place then. This finishes the rolling process. Each man as stated can do 30 lbs., but there is further work for him to be now described. _Fermenting._--The balls accumulated are allowed to stand until fermented. I look on this being done to the right extent and no more, as perhaps the most important point in the whole manufacture. Some planters collect the roll after rolling in a basket, and there let it ferment, instead of making it up into balls for that purpose as described. I much prefer the ball system for the following reasons:--When a quantity is put into a basket together and allowed to ferment a certain time, what was put in first is naturally more fermented than what was put in last, the former probably over, the latter under-done. The balls, on the contrary, can be each taken in succession _in the order they were laid on the table_, and thus each receive the same amount of fermentation. I think further the twist in the leaf is better preserved by the ball plan, and also that a large quantity in a basket is apt to ferment too much in the centre. It is impossible to describe, so that practical use shall be made of it, _when_ the balls are sufficiently fermented. The outside of the ball is no good criterion. It varies much in colour, affected by the extent the leaf was withered.[48] You must judge by the inside.