The Dawson news. (Dawson, Ga.) 1889-current, 1909-01-20
pITIABLE ARE JAPAN POOR
~, TUE PEASANTS Exc OUT A
MISERABLE EXISTENCE IN
THE RICE FIELDS.

- ranan where hundreds of gen.
.+ione have lived on scraps of land
49, the mountains grudgingly leave
,1,ohle. every article Of taxed in
unity has been employed to draw
ns commensurate with the heavi-
y. Increasing population. Hills have
+,or 1aveled, mountains terraced into
soro1lel alleyways only wide enough
= hold a double row of plants and
s;rors so carefully banked up and
.andarIv petted into docility that
. .S are made to share their beds
With the rice planter.
O. nrecious is the arabic land that
.ocontIv when the government built
naw railroad across the main land
a Hondo hundreds of claims had to
10 satt1ed for the dots of ground pre-
or,ntad for the erection of telegraph
0na of the fertile valleys near the
hasa of Mount Full, when viewed
tron, an elevation, resembles nothing
- much as a piece of cloth figured
9th rectangular blocks of gold and
orean The rice fields are squared
ehout nv mud bikes, each in perfect
ordor and next to them, on slightly
Jigber around, are the patches of
Marley peas and millet, all arranged
with a precision almost mathemati-
caI While one field lies fallow for
N brief six months another next to
II is tended, with an individual care
Utmost beyond belief.
Each rice plant that is sunk in the
nnd of the flooded field receives al
most as much attention as the care
NFnIIy numbered fowls that roost each
LIGHT on the thatch of the farmers
Fnt Seed is not scattered broad
last: it is too precious for that. IN
cad it is pushed into the loan of a
Forcing bed by the finger of the
FARMER or his wife.
When the rice plants are three or
our inches high they are transplant
b to the paddy, groups of three or
onr plants in a hill. This is grill |
ne work. 1t means that the farmer, |
lis wife and his daughters, naked all
bf them save for a cloth about the
Faist, must bend their backs all day |
h the steaming fields during May |
nd early June wading in water and !!
heavy mud up to their knees, and
Sighting leeches constantly. /
When the stalks of grain and rice /
re above ground and flourishing |
omes the farmers dread-the tor
sential rains of the Naibubai (pho-
Aetically transcribed,) or summer |
let season. In an hour the work !
IN months may be fattened to the >
ground, bikes washed out and the !
vers roaring over the fields that had !
ncroached on their dry channels.
othing but a total loss of crops can
hsult from this onslaught of the !
bin.
Even with all conditions favoring
&c Japanese farmer mas to work |
De a serf to gather his harvest. |
De rows of grain are cut with a |
ckle, for no field is large enough !
accommodate a cutting and thresh-
IL machine, even though so ex-
nsiye an adjunct of farming on
Arge scale could be afforded.
wien me gram Is uIouSuC OuI VI
e field it is laid by handfuls on the |
ound in front of the farmers
puse, and there the heads are pulled !
M and the kernels, still bearded, !
&c caught on a piece of mating by |
e laborious process of pulling each |
ndful of grain through the close
teeCh Of a dentated iron knife.
Old women and children do this !
#prk, and it is usually the old wo-
En- who have to place the kernels |
wooden mortar and pound them !
@th a heavy mallet until the chaff |
Ioosened. Then the handfulS of |
zed kernels and grain are tossed |
the air over a piece OF mating
Rtlnuously until the wind has car