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The rules which govern its initiation are the same as in the case of the latter. The work is begun—as all matters of importance should be in accordance with the tradition—with a béseumélah (= Arab, bismillah, "In the name of Allah"). The first handful of seed is scattered in a westerly direction, the point toward which the faithful turn their faces at the time of prayer.
After the seed is strewn, the earth is raked over it with a large wooden rake (chreuëh). This implement has no handle in the centre. A piece of wood is fixed vertically to either end and the tips of these two pieces are united by a third placed horizontally. This last is called the handle (gò), and is held by the driver, the rake being drawn by a buffalo harnessed to it in the same way as to the plough.
Rice sown according to the tabu system is called padé teunabu (scattered padi or rather padi obtained through scattering) or padé duëʾ ("sitting padi," i. e. such as does not require transplanting). About two or three months after sowing, the sprouting padi must be thinned out (lhaïh, seumeulaïh) where it is too thick, and supplemented where it is sown too thin. This task falls in or about keunòngs 5 and 3.
In this method of sowing the extirpation of weeds (eumpòë) is both tedious and trying. The ground is already dry at the time of the sowing and first sprouting of the seed, and so quickly becomes quite hard, rendering it impossible to get rid of the weeds without first turning up the soil in which they grow with a tukōy (a kind of small pachul or changkul).
The pula method.The second method, which is adopted in a portion of the highlands, and occasionally in the lowlands, in the IV Mukims and with certain modifications in swampy districts such as the VII Mukims Buëng, consist of two parts. These are 1°. the preparation of a nursery bed (lheuë),[1] in which the seed (bijèh) is strewn (tabu) to obtain seedlings or padé seuneulōng. The padi obtained in this way is called padé peunula or planted padi in opposition to the above-named padé teunabu or sown padi.
- ↑ Malay sěmai. The method here described is that always resorted to by the Malays in wet rice cultivation. They clear the weeds out with an implement called a tajak, which resembles a golfer's lofting iron with the iron part enormously exaggerated and the handle made shorter and stouter. The weeds are left on the ground to rot and form a kind of manure. The plants when taken from the sěmai are dibbled with the hand into water-covered ground at intervals of about 6 inches. (Translator).
