Ranching, Sport and Travel Part 1

Ranching, Sport and Travel.

by Thomas Carson.

INTRODUCTORY NOTE

This book is somewhat in the nature of an autobiography, covering as it does almost the whole of the Author's life. The main portion of the volume is devoted to cattle ranching in Arizona, New Mexico and Texas.

The Author has also included a record of his travels abroad, which he hopes will prove to be not uninteresting; and a chapter devoted to a description of tea planting in India.

RANCHING, SPORT AND TRAVEL

CHAPTER I

TEA PLANTING

In Cachar--Apprenticeship--Tea Planting described--Polo--In Sylhet--Pilgrims at Sacred Pool--Wild Game--Amus.e.m.e.nts--Rainfall--Return to Cachar--Scottpore--Snakes--A Haunted Tree--Hill Tribes--Selecting a Location--Return to England.

Having no inclination for the seclusion and drudgery of office work, determined to lead a country life of some kind or other, and even then having a longing desire to roam the world and see foreign countries, I had arranged to accompany a friend to the Comoro Islands, north of Madagascar; but changing my mind and accepting the better advice of friends, my start was made, not to the Comoro Islands, but to India and the tea district of Cachar. Accordingly the age of twenty-two and the year 1876 saw me on board a steamer bound for Calcutta.

Steamers were slow sailers in those days, and it was a long trip via Gibraltar, Suez, Malta, the Ca.n.a.l and Point de Galle; but it was all very interesting to me.

Near Point de Galle we witnessed from the steamer a remarkable sight, a desperate fight, it seemed to be a fight and not play, between a sea-serpent, which seemed to be about fifteen feet long, and a huge ray.

The battle was fought on the surface of the water and even out of it, as the ray several times threw himself into the air. How it ended we could not see. Anyway we had seen the sea-serpent, though not the fabulous monster so often written about, and yet whose existence cannot be disproved. The sea-serpent's tail is flattened.

At Calcutta I visited a tea firm, who sent me up to Cachar to help at one of the gardens till a vacancy should occur. Calcutta, by the way, is or was overrun by jackals at night. They are the scavengers of the town and hunt in packs through the streets, their wolfish yelling being a little disconcerting to a stranger.

It was a long twelve days, but again a very interesting journey, in a native river boat, four rowers (or towers), to my destination. I had a servant with me, who proved a good, efficient cook and attendant. It was rather trying to the "griffin" to notice, floating in the river, corpses of natives, frequently perched upon by hungry vultures.

The tea-garden selected for me was Narainpore, successfully managed by a fellow-countryman, who proved to be a capital chap and who made my stay with him very pleasant. Narainpore was one of the oldest gardens, on teelah (hilly) land and quite healthy. There I gave what little help I could, picked up some of the lingo, and learned a good deal about the planting, growth and manufacture of tea. Neighbours were plentiful and life quite sociable. Twice a week in the cold weather we played polo, sometimes with Munipoories, a hill tribe whose national game it is, and who were then the undoubted champions. The Regent Senaputti was a keen player, and very picturesque in his costume of green velvet zouave jacket, salmon-pink silk dhotee and pink silk turban. In Munipoor even the children have their weekly polo matches. They breed ponies specially for the game, and use them for nothing else, nor would they sell their best. Still, we rode Munipoor "tats" costing us from 50 rupees to 100.

They were exceedingly small, averaging not eleven hands high, but wiry, active, speedy, full of grit, and seemed to love the game. As the game was there played, seven formed a side, the field was twice as large as now and there were no goals. The ball had to be simply driven over the end line to count a score.

It may be remarked here that the great Akbar was so fond of polo, but otherwise so busy, that he played the game at night with luminous b.a.l.l.s.

These Munipoories were a very fine race of people, much lighter of colour than their neighbouring tribes, very stately and dignified in their bearing, and thorough sportsmen. Many of their women were really handsome, and the girls, with red hibiscus blossoms stuck in their jet-black hair, and their merry, laughing faces and graceful figures, were altogether quite attractive to the Sahib Log.

But to return to tea. Our bungalow was of the usual type, consisting of cement floor, roof of crossed bamboos and two feet of sun-gra.s.s thatch, supported by immense teak posts, hard as iron and bidding defiance to the white ants. The walls were of mats. Tea-gardens usually had a surface of 300 to 1000 acres; some were on comparatively level ground, some on hilly (teelah) land. These teelahs were always carefully terraced to prevent the wash of soil and permit cultivation. The plants were s.p.a.ced about three to six feet apart, according to whether they were of the Chinese, the hybrid, or the pure indigenous breed, the last being the largest, in its native state developing to the dimensions of a small tree.

I may as well here at once give a short sketch of the princ.i.p.al features of tea planting and manufacture, which will show what the duties of a planter are, and how various are the occupations and operations embraced. One must necessarily first have labour (coolies). These are recruited in certain districts of India, usually by sending good reliable men, already in your employ, to their home country, under a contract to pay them so much a head for every coolie they can persuade (by lies or otherwise) to come to your garden. The coolies must then bind themselves to work for you for, say, three to four years. They are paid for their work, not much it is true, but enough to support them with comfort; the men about three annas (or fourpence) a day, the women two annas (or threepence). As they get to know their work and become expert, the good men will earn as much as six annas a day, and some of the women, when plucking leaf, about the same. This is more than abundant for these people. They not only have every comfort, but they become rich, so that in a few years they are able to rest on their earnings, and work only at their convenience and when they feel like it.

They are supplied with nothing, neither food nor clothing; medicine alone is free to them. The native staff of a garden consists of, say, two baboos, or book-keepers and clerks, a doctor baboo, sirdars or overseers, and chowkidars or line watchmen. A sirdar accompanies and has charge of each gang of coolies on whatever branch of work. One is also in charge of the factory or tea-house.

Plant growth ceases about the end of October. Then cold-weather work begins, including the great and important operation of pruning, which requires a large force and will occupy most of the winter. Also charcoal-burning for next season's supply; road-making, building and repairing, jungle-cutting, bridge-building, and nursery-making: that is, preparing with great care beds in which the seed will be planted early in spring. Cultivation is also, of course, carried on; it can never be overdone. In the factory, some men are busy putting together or manufacturing new tea-boxes, lining them carefully with lead, which needs close attention, as the smallest hole in the lining of a tea-chest will cause serious injury to the contents.

When spring opens and the first glorious "flush" is on the bushes, there is a readjustment of labour. Pluckers begin to gather the leaf, and as the season advances more pluckers are needed, till possibly every man, woman and child may be called on for this operation alone, it being so important that the leaf flush does not get ahead and out of control, so that the leaf would get tough and hard and less fit for manufacture; but cultivation is almost equally important, and every available labourer is kept hard at it.

What a pleasure it is to watch a good expert workman, be he carpenter, bricklayer, ploughman, blacksmith, or only an Irish navvy. In even the humblest of these callings the evidence of much training, practice or long apprenticeship is noticeable. To an amateur who has tried such work himself it will soon be apparent how crude his efforts are, how little he knows of the apparently simple operation. The navvy seems to work slowly; but he knows well, because his task is a day-long one, that his forces must be economised, that over-exertion must be avoided. This lesson was brought home to me when exasperated by the seeming laziness of the coolie cultivators, I would seize a man's hoe and fly at the work, hoe vigorously for perhaps five minutes, swear at the man for his lack of strenuousness, then retire and find myself puffing and blowing and almost in a state of collapse.

If an addition or extension is being made to the garden, the already cut jungle has to be burnt and the ground cleared in early spring, the soil broken up and staked: that is, small sticks put in regular rows and intervals to show where the young plants are to be put. Then when the rains have properly set in the actual planting begins. This is a work that requires a lot of labour and close and careful superintendence.

Imagine what it means to plant out 100 acres of ground, the plants set only three or four feet apart! The right plucking of the leaf calls for equally careful looking after. The women are paid by the amount or weight they pluck, so they are very liable to pluck carelessly and so damage the succeeding flush, or they may gather a lot of old leaf unsuited for manufacturing purposes. In short, every detail of work, even cultivation, demands close supervision and the whole attention of the planter.

When the new-plucked leaf is brought home it is spread out to wither in suitably-built sheds. (Here begins the tea-maker's responsibility.) Then it must be rolled, by hand or by machinery; fermented, and fired or dried over charcoal ovens; separated in its different cla.s.ses, the younger the leaf bud the more valuable the tea. It is then packed in boxes for market, and sampled by the planter. He does this by weighing a tiny quant.i.ty of each cla.s.s or grade of tea into separate cups, pouring boiling water on them, and then tasting the liquor by sipping a little into the mouth, not to be swallowed, but ejected again.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLUCKING TEA LEAF.]

All this will give an idea of the variety of duties of a tea-planter. He has no time for shooting, polo, or visiting during the busy season. But at mid-winter the great annual Mela takes place at the station, the local seat of Government. The Mela lasts a couple of weeks, and it is a season of fun and jollity with both planters and natives. There were two or three social clubs in Silchar; horse and pony racing, polo, cricket and football filled the day, dinner and sociability the night; and what nights! The amount of liquor consumed at these meetings was almost incredible.

Nothing can look more beautiful or more gratifying to the eye of the owner than a tract of tea, pruned level as a table and topped with new fresh young leaf-shoots, four to eight inches high, in full flush, ready for the pluckers' nimble fingers.

At the end of one year I was offered and accepted the position of a.s.sistant at a Sylhet garden, called Kessoregool, the property consisting of three distinct gardens, the princ.i.p.al one being directly overseered by the manager, an American. He, of course, was my superior.

My charge was the Lucky Cherra Gardens, some few miles away. There I spent two years, learning what I could of the business, but without the advantage of European society; in fact, the Burra Sahib and myself were almost the only whites in the district, and as he was drunk quite half the time, and we did not pull very well together, I was left to my own resources. I found amus.e.m.e.nt in various ways. There was no polo, but some of the native zemindars (landed proprietors) were always ready to get up a beat for leopards, tigers, deer and pig. Their method was simply to drive the game into a net corral and spear them to death. The Government Keddas, under Colonel Nuttal, were also not far away in hill Tipperah, and it was intensely interesting to watch operations. Close to my garden also was a sacred pool and a very beautiful waterfall. This was visited twice a year by immense numbers of natives, some from great distances, for it was a famous and renowned place of pilgrimage. It could only be approached through my garden; and as there was no wagon road, the pilgrims were always open to inspection, so to speak; and they were well worth inspection, as among them were many races, all ages, both s.e.xes, every caste or jat; robes, turbans and cupras of every shape and colour; fakirs and wonder-workers, and beggars galore. Here, and on such an occasion only, could the sahib see face to face the harems of the wealthy natives, consisting of women who at no other time showed themselves out of doors. Being the only sahib present I had all the "fun of the fair" to myself, but always regretted the want of a companion to share it with me.

As to wild game, there were lots of jungle fowl (original stock of our familiar barn-door c.o.c.ks and hens), a few pigeons, Argus pheasants, small barking deer, pigs, sambur, barrasingha, metnas, crocodiles, leopards, tigers, bears and elephants; but I had little time for shooting and it was expensive work, the jungle being so thick that riding elephants were quite necessary. If keen enough, one could sit all night on a machan in a tree near a recent "kill," on the chance of Stripes showing himself; but it never appealed to me much, that kind of sport. If a tiger was raiding the cattle I would poison the "kill" with strychnine. In this way I secured several very fine animals, getting two at one time, so successfully poisoned that their bodies actually lay on the dead bullock. One time I shot an enormous python, some eighteen feet in length, which took several men to carry home. Monkeys were plentiful and of several kinds. I was very fond of wandering amongst the high-tree jungle and quietly watching their antics. In the dense forest there is little undergrowth, so that one can move about freely and study the extraordinary forms of vegetation displayed. Ticks and leeches are to be dreaded--a perfect nuisance. If you sit down or pause for a few moments where no leeches are in sight, suddenly and quickly they will appear marching on you, or at you, at a gallop.

The popular idea of a wealth of flowers in tropical jungles is a misconception. In tree jungle no flowers are to be found, or at any rate they are not visible. But if one can by some means attain an elevation and so be able to overlook the tree-tops, he will probably be rewarded with a wonderful display, as many jungle trees are glorified with crowns of gorgeous colours. There will he also discover the honey-suckers, moths, b.u.t.terflies, the beetles, and all the other insect brood which he had also vainly looked for before. The fruits are likewise borne aloft, and therefore at the proper time these tree-tops will be the haunt of the monkeys, the parrots, the bats, the toucans, and all frugivorous creation.

Of all fruits the durian is the most delicious. Such is the universal opinion of men, including A. R. Wallace, who have had the opportunity of becoming familiar with it. It is purely tropical, grows on a lofty tree, is round and nearly as large as a cocoanut. A thick and tough rind protects the delicacy contained within. When opened five cells are revealed, satiny white, containing ma.s.ses of cream-coloured pulp. This pulp is the edible portion and has an indescribable flavour and consistence. You can safely eat all you want of it, and the more you eat the more you will want. To eat durian, as Mr Wallace says, is alone worth a voyage to the East. But it has one strange quality--it smells so badly as to be at first almost nauseating; some people even can never bring themselves to touch it. Once this repulsion is mastered the fruit will probably be preferred to all other foods. The natives give it honourable t.i.tles, exalt it, and even wax poetical over it.

Of course we all know the mult.i.tudinous uses of the bamboo. This gra.s.s is one of the most wonderful, beautiful and useful of Nature's gifts to uncivilized man. And yet one more use has been found for it. In the East a new industry has sprung up, viz., the making of "Panama" hats of bamboo strips or threads. In texture and pliability these hats are said to even surpa.s.s the genuine "Panamas," are absolutely impervious to rain, and can be produced at a much lower cost.

The Looshais killed pigs, and even tigers, by ingeniously setting poisoned arrows in the woods, which were released by the animals pressing on a string. One of my coolies was unfortunate enough to be shot and killed in this way.

Growing on decayed tree stumps I frequently found a saprophyte (_hymenophallus_), much larger than its English representative, indeed a monster in comparison, and possessing a vile and most odious smell, yet attractive to certain depraved insects.

I made a very fine collection of b.u.t.terflies, moths and beetles, which, however, was entirely destroyed by worms or ants during its pa.s.sage to England. The magnificent Atlas moth was common in Sylhet and Cachar.

What an extraordinarily beautiful creature it is, sometimes so large as to cover a dinner-plate. I never was privileged to see it fly. It seemed to be always in a languid or torpid condition.

Thunderstorms occur almost daily during the wet season. By lightning I lost several people. In one case, whilst standing watching a man remove seedlings from a nursery bed, standing indeed immediately behind and close to him, there came a thrilling flash of lightning. It shook myself as well as several women who stood by. The man in front of me, who had been sitting on his haunches with a steel-ribbed umbrella over him, remained silent and still. At last I called on him to continue his work and pulled back the umbrella to see his face. He was stone dead.

Examination showed a small blackish spot where the steel rib had rested and conveyed the fatal shock.

The approach of the daily rainstorm, usually about noon, was a remarkable sight. Immense fan-shaped, thunderous-looking clouds would come rolling up, billow upon billow, travelling at great speed and accompanied by terrific wind. A flash of lightning and a crashing peal of thunder and the deluge began, literally a deluge. The rainfall averaged about 180 inches in seven months. At Cherrapunji, in the Ka.s.sia Hills, within sight of my place and only about twenty miles distant, the rainfall was and is the greatest in the world, no other district approaching it in this respect, viz., averaging per annum 450 inches; greatest recorded over 900 inches; and there is a record of _one_ month, July, of a fall of nearly 400 inches; yet all this precipitation takes place during the six or seven wet months, the rest of the year being absolutely dry and rainless. These measurements are recorded at the Government Observatory Station and need not be disputed. It may readily be supposed that the wet season, summer, with its high temperature and damp atmosphere, was very trying to the European, and even to the imported coolies. Imagine living for six continuous months in the hottest palm-house in Kew Gardens; yet the planter is out and about all day long; nearly always on pony back, however, an enormously thick solah toppee hat or a heavy white umbrella protecting his head. The dry, or cold season, however, was delightful.

Close to Lucky Cherra Garden was a tract of bustee land on which some Bengali cultivators grew rice and other crops. Our Company's boundary line in some way conflicted with theirs, and a dispute arose which soon developed into a series of, first, most comical mix-ups, and afterwards into desperate "lathi" fights. The land in dispute was being hurriedly ploughed by buffalo teams belonging to the Bengalis; to uphold our claim I also secured teams and put them to ploughing on the same piece of ground. This could only lead to one thing--as said before, terrific lathi fights between the teamsters. For several days I went down to see the fun, taking with me a number of the stoutest coolies on the garden.

The men seemed to rather enjoy the sport, though a lick from a lathi (a formidable tough, hard and heavy cane) was far from a joke. Finally the bustee-wallahs agreed to stop operations and await legal judgment.

After eighteen months I was suddenly left in sole charge of all the Company's gardens, the Burra Sahib having finally succ.u.mbed to drink; but I was not long left in charge, being soon relieved by a more experienced man. Shortly after I was ordered to Scottpore Garden in Cachar, the manager of which, a particularly fine man and a great friend of mine, had suffered the awful death of being pierced by the very sharp end of a heavy, newly-cut bamboo, which he seems to have ridden against in the dark. He always rode at great speed, and he too, in this way, was a victim of drink. The tremendously high death-rate amongst planters was directly due to this fatal habit.

Scottpore was a new (young) garden, not teelah, but level land, having extremely rich soil. The bushes showed strong growth and there were no "vacancies"; indeed it was a model plantation. Unfortunately, it had the character of extreme unhealthiness. Of my three predecessors two had died of fever and one as before mentioned. The coolie death-rate was shocking; so bad that, during my management, a Government Commission was sent to look into the situation, and the absolute closing of the garden was antic.i.p.ated. The result was that I was debarred from recruiting and importing certain coolies from certain districts in India, they being peculiarly susceptible to fever and dysentery. Almost every day at morning muster the doctor reported so and so, or so many, dead, wiped off the roll. Naturally the place suffered from lack of labour, a further draining of the force being the absconding of coolies, running off, poor devils, to healthier places, and the stealing of my people by unscrupulous planters.

On several occasions, when riding home on dark nights, have I detected white objects on the side of the road. Not a movement would be seen, not a sound or a breath heard, only an ominous, suspicious silence reigned; it meant that these were some of my people absconding, being perhaps led off by a pimp from another garden--and woe betide the pimp if caught. I would call out to them, and if they did not respond would go after them; but generally they were too scared to resist or to attempt further to escape; so I would drive them in front of me back to the garden, inspect them and take their names, try to find out who had put them up to it, etc., and dismiss them to the lines in charge of the night-watchman. You could not well punish them, though a good caning was administered sometimes to the men. Thus the plantation, instead of presenting a clean, well-cultivated appearance, had often that of an enormous hayfield; nevertheless the output and manufacture of tea was large and the quality good. All that I myself could and did take credit for was this "quality," as the prices obtained in Calcutta were the best of all the Company's gardens.

At Scottpore there was no lack of neighbours. My bungalow was on two cross-roads, a half-way house so to speak; consequently someone was continually dropping in. Frequently three or four visitors would arrive unannounced for dinner; the house was always "wide open." Whisky, brandy and beer were always on the sideboard, and in my absence the bearer or khansamah was expected, as a matter of course, to offer refreshments to all comers. The planter's code of hospitality demanded this, but it was the financial ruin of the Chota Sahib, depending solely on his modest salary.

At Scottpore I went in strong for vegetable, fruit and flower gardening, and not without success. Visitors came from a distance to view the flower-beds and eat my green peas, and I really think that I grew as fine pineapples and bananas as were produced anywhere. The pineapple of good stock and ripened on the plant is, I think, the most exquisite of all fruits. A really ripe pine contains no fibre. You cut the top off and sup the delicious mushy contents with a spoon.

In such a hot, steamy climate as we had in these tea districts, the rapidity of growth of vegetation is, of course, remarkable. Bamboos ill.u.s.trate this better than other plants, their growth being so much more noticeable, that of a young shoot amounting to as much as four inches in one night. It sometimes appeared to my imagination that the weeds and gra.s.s grew one foot in a like period, especially when short of labour. The planter usually takes a pride in the well-cultivated appearance of the garden in his charge; but how can one be proud if the weeds overtop the bushes? It may be appropriate here to note that eighty-five per cent. of the twenty-four hours' growth of plants occurs between 12 p.m. and 6 a.m.; during the noon hours the apparent growth almost entirely ceases.