is
necessary until the rice is nearly ripe, which is naturally about August
or September. It is reaped with a short knife called _ani-ani_, with
which the reaper cuts off each separate ear with a few inches of the
stem; and the ears are then threshed by being placed in a hollow tree
trunk and there stamped with a _toemboekan_, a heavy piece of wood with
a broad end. The lands are ploughed, harrowed, and weeded by the men,
but the transplanting, reaping, and threshing is done by women.

A curious circumstance in rice-cultivation is the fact that side by side
the crops may be seen in each of the separate stages, planting and
reaping often going on simultaneously. Beside the rice, a crop of beans
or sweet potatoes is grown in the year, and the flooded terraces are
also utilized as fish-tanks, in which gold-fish are grown to the length
of a foot and a half and then eaten. They are brought to the market in
_water_, and so kept fresh, and, if not sold, are of course returned to
their "pastures" again.

The sawah plough is an interesting study. It is made in three
pieces--the pole (_tjatjadan_); the handle (_patjek_), which fits into
the iron-shod share (_singkal_). To this is attached a crosspiece or
yoke (_depar_), fitted with a pair of long pegs coming over the necks of
the oxen or buffaloes, and a crosspiece hanging under their necks and
fastened to the yoke by native cord. The ploughman holds the tail of
the plough with the left and the rod-whip (_petjoet_) with the right
hand. He drives and directs the big lumbering beasts by words or by a
touch of the rod. To make them go "straight on," he calls out, _Gio gio
kalen_; "Turn to the right" is _Ghir ngivo_; "To the left," _Ghir
nengen_; "Stop" is _His his_; and whenever they (or horses) incur the
displeasure of their drivers, they are invariably brought to a better
mind by hearing an unpronounceable exclamation something like _Uk uk_.

[Illustration: A BULLOCK CART. _Page_ 54.]

Another natural industry in which the Javanese are particularly skilful
is the making of mats. There are many varieties. A light sort of
floor-covering is made from the leaves of the wild pine-apple
(_pandan_); a stronger kind is the _tika Bogor_, or Buitenzorg matting,
which is made from the bark of a species of palm, and which is used to
cover walls and ceilings. Beside these, matting is made from rushes and
from the cane imported from Palembang, in Sumatra; while for the walls
of the houses