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370 Fusan more and more of the hill area was being made to contribute materials for green manure for the cultivated fields. The foreground of Fig. 211 had been thus treated and so had the field in Fig. 212, where the man was engaged in tramping the dressing beneath the surface. In very many cases this material was laid along the margin of the paddies; in other cases it had been taken upon the fields as soon as the grain was cut and was lying in piles among the bundles; while in still other cases the material for green manure had been carried between the rows while the grain was still standing, but nearly ready to harvest. In some fields a full third of a bushel of the green stuff had been laid down at intervals of three feet over the whole area. In other cases piles of ashes alternated with those of herbage, and again manure and ashes mixed had been distributed in alternate piles with the green manure.

Fig. 212.—Rice paddy covered with oak leaves and grass brought down from the hills, one half of which has been tramped beneath the surface by the laborer at work.

In still other cases we saw untreated straw distributed through the fields awaiting application. At Shindo this straw had the appearance of having been dipped in or smeared with some mixture, apparently of mud and ashes or possibly of some compost which had been worked into a thin paste with water.