RICE
Rice is the most important crop grown in Siam. It is almost the sole
food of everyone, from the King to the poorest peasant. Horses, cattle,
dogs, and cats are fed on it; beer and spirits are made from it; it is
eaten boiled, fried, stewed, and baked, in curries, cakes and sauces; it
is used at all festivals in connection with certain superstitions; and
both the opening and the closing of the season of cultivation are marked
by special holidays. A rich man invests his money in rice-fields; the
law courts spend most of their time settling quarrels about the
ownership of rice-land; and when a man has nothing else to talk about,
he talks about the next rice crop, just as in England we talk about the
weather. Most of the boats passing up and down the river carry rice;
most of the big steamers that leave the port are taking this valuable
and important food product to other lands.
The whole of the land in the country is supposed to belong to the King,
but anybody who wishes to plant rice may go into the jungle and clear a
space of ground by burning down the long grass and the trees. For this
land the farmer pays no rent, and after a time he can claim it as his
own. He pays to the Government, however, a tax upon the land which he
cultivates. The farms are small, averaging about eight acres: such a
farm will comfortably support a family of four or five.
When the ground has been cleared, the farmers wait for the rain, which
falls in torrents, and in due course makes the ground soft enough to
permit of ploughing. The plough is made of wood, and consists of a bent
stick stuck in a pointed wooden block. The plough cuts a shallow furrow
about two inches deep and five or six inches wide. It is drawn by
buffaloes, formidable-looking beasts with immense spreading horns, which
sometimes measure as much as eight or nine feet from tip to tip,
measured round the curve.
When the field has been ploughed, it is harrowed with a square harrow
made of bamboo and provided with a number of straight wooden teeth. The
result of ploughing and harrowing the wet ground is to churn it up into
a kind of porridgy mess of slimy grey mud.
Rice can only be grown where there is abundance of moisture. In Siam the
peasants depend for their water-supply upon the heavy rains, and then
upon the rise of the rivers after the rains have ceased. The floods not
merely provide water, but when they subside they leave behind them a
deposit of mud so rich and fertile that manuring is not necessary.
There are forty different kinds of rice, of which about six are widely
cultivated in Siam. The natives divide all the known varieties into two
classes, which they call "field rice" and "garden rice."
Field rice is grown in places where there is an exceptionally heavy
rainfall. The seed is scattered broadcast on the fields, and left to
grow without much more attention. As the water rises, the rice grows at
the same pace, and so always keeps its head above the surface. The rate
of growth of one variety is almost unbelievable. Plants have been known
to grow as much as a foot in twelve hours, and the final length of the
stalk is often as much as ten feet.
Garden rice is carefully sown and tended. The seeds are first sown as
thickly as they can grow, in well-watered patches. They soon sprout, and
grow rapidly. When they are a few inches high they are pulled up and
made into bundles of a hundred or so, neatly tied together. The mud is
removed from the roots by a skilful kick which is given to the bundle as
it is drawn from the soil. The bundles are taken to the fields by men,
women, and children, and transplanted in long rows. The fields have been
covered with water and trampled into a thick mud by the hoofs of the
buffaloes. The young shoots are handed to the women and girls, and they
push the roots down into the soft mud, working very cleverly and
rapidly. A good worker can plant an acre in this way in about three
days.
The method of reaping the rice depends on the state of the fields. If
the floods have gone, the rice is reaped with the sickle and bound into
sheaves. The sheaves are dried in the sun and then taken away in
buffalo-carts or in bullock-wagons. But if the fields are still under
water, the people row out in boats and canoes, cut off the ripe heads
with a sickle, and drop them into small baskets placed in the bottom of
the boat. The reapers are very careless, and drop much of the ripe grain
into the water. The rice is dried in bundles, placed on frames that have
been erected in the fields. The birds are kept away by boys, who are
armed with long whips. On the end of the lash they stick a pellet of
mud. When they crack the whip the mud flies off, and so clever are they
at this form of slinging that they rarely miss the bird at which they
aim. When the water has all gone from the fields, the long stalks that
have been left standing are burned.
The threshing is done by buffaloes on a floor which is specially
prepared by covering it with a paste made of soil, cow-dung, and water.
After a few days the plaster sets into a hard, firm covering to the
ground. A pole is fixed in the centre, and two buffaloes, yoked side by
side, are made to walk round and round the pole, all the while treading
the grain under their feet. The threshing takes place on moonlight
nights, and is the occasion of much merriment. The children never dream
of going to bed. They play in the heaps of straw, or dance round the big
bonfires to the sound of fiddles, tom-toms, and drums. Their parents
chat and joke the long night through, and in the shadows the red ends
of their cigarettes gleam unceasingly, while the pale green fire-flies
flit to and fro, and seem to wonder what it is all about. When the
threshing is over, the farmer gives a feast to his neighbours to
celebrate the event. His heaps of grain are spread evenly over the
threshing floor, the straw is piled up in little stacks, and around all
is twined the usual white thread to keep away the evil spirits.
To winnow the rice, it is thrown into the air by means of a wooden
spade, or poured from one wide, shallow basket to another. The wind
blows through the mixture of grain and chaff and carries the chaff away.
The grain is stored in large baskets made of cane and plastered outside
with mud. The rice is usually milled at home. The grain is placed in a
big hollow in a block of wood. There is a long lever, bearing at one end
a heavy wooden hammer. A girl jumps on the other end of the lever and so
lifts the hammer. She hops off again, and the hammer falls upon the rice
in the hollow block and smashes it up. For hours the women and girls
jump patiently on and off the long handle, and in any small village you
can hear the steady thump, thump, thump of the hammers from morning to
night.