he people give all other straw to their cattle, yet they burn
that of maize as unfit for fodder. In Nepaul the stalks, with the
leaves attached, often twelve feet long, cut by the sickle, are used
as fodder for elephants, bedding for cattle, and as fuel. The maize
crop within the hills of Nepaul suffers much from the inroads of
bears, which are very numerous in these regions, and extremely partial
to this grain. The average return from this crop is seldom below fifty
seers, ranging frequently far above it.[42] Maize is increasing in
cultivation in Java, and some of the Eastern islands. It is found to
have the advantage there over mountain rice, of being more fruitful
and hardy, and does not suffer from cold until the mean temperature
falls to 45 deg. of Fahrenheit, and no heat is injurious to it.
Several varieties of it are known, but for all practical purposes
these resolve themselves into two kinds: one, a small grain, requiring
five months to ripen, and a larger one, which takes seven to mature.
In some provinces of Java it yields a return of 400 or 500 fold. Mr.
Crawfurd found, from repeated trials, that in the soil of Mataram, in
Java, an acre of land, which afforded a double crop, produced of the
smaller grain 8481/2 lbs. annually.

RICE.

This is one of the most extensively diffused and useful of grain
crops, and supports the greatest number of the human race. The
cultivation prevails in Eastern and Southern Asia, and it is also a
common article of subsistence in various countries bordering on the
Mediterranean. It is grown in the Japan Islands, on all the sea coasts
of China, the Philippine and other large Islands of the Indian
Archipelago, partially in Ceylon, Siam, India, both shores of the Red
Sea, Egypt, the shores of the Mozambique Channel, Madagascar, some
parts of Western Africa, South Carolina, and Central America. Three
species only are enumerated by Lindley:--_Oryza sativa_, the common
rice, a native of the East; _O. latifolia_, a species having its
habitat in South America; and _O. Nepalensis_, common in Nepaul. But
there are a host of varieties known in the East; these, however, may
for all practical purposes, be resolved into two kinds--the upland or
mountain rice (_O. Nepalensis_, the _O. mutica_, of Roxburgh), and the
lowland or aquatic species (_O. sativa_).

_Zizania aquatica_ is exceedingly prolific of bland, farinaceous
seeds, which afford a kind of rice in Canada and North-West America,