RICE, the seed of Oryza sativa (Linn.), a beautiful tropical grass (Graminacea), believed to be originally a native of some part of India. It is now extensively cultivated in the East Indies, China, parts of Africa and Southern Europe,
Rice. and in tropical America. Rice is second in importance only to wheat as an article of human food, and forms the chief nutriment of at least a third of mankind. Marsden, in his History of Sumatra, says it is "the grand material of food on which a hundred millions of the inhabitants of the earth subsist." It is admirably adapted to the wants of the inhabitants of the tropics, as it is not so heating to the human system as any of the other cereals, and it is almost a cure for diarrhoea and dysentery, which are so prevalent in warm climates.
Rice was known to the ancients, and is described under the name of Opisæ by Theophrastus, Opisæ by Dioscorides, and Oryza by Pliny. The last-mentioned author, from the description given in his Natural History, appears to have been quite ignorant of the plant, or else mistaken in the grain altogether, for he describes it as a bulbous-rooted plant, with thick, fleshy leaves and purple blossoms. In its native country (India), rice has most probably been cultivated from the earliest times. It is naturally a marsh plant, and consequently requires a damp soil and a moist atmosphere; it is there usually cultivated in low lands, which are either naturally liable to be flooded, or which admit of easy and copious irrigation. There are, however, varieties cultivated which endure a much drier soil, and are adapted for hill culture. The upland or hill rice is smaller in grain and less valuable; but it is nevertheless cultivated in great quantities, the manure employed being chiefly the dung of animals mixed with wood-ashes. In India the varieties of rice are very numerous. No less than one hundred and sixty-one are enumerated in Moon's Catalogue of Ceylon Plants as being known in that island.
The finest rice in the world is that raised in North and South Carolina, in the United States, where the prevalence of swampy lands and a rich vegetable soil render its cultivation easy and very profitable. The rice of Carolina is remarkable for its pure white colour and large size; and as it contains a considerable proportion of gluten, it is most valued as an article of food. Rice in the husk is generally called paddy. In this state it is largely imported into Great Britain and husked at the rice-cleaning mills, which are now established in all our large ports: when kept in the husk, it is said to retain its vitality for many years.
The cultivation of this cereal is very much varied by the circumstances of the locality in which it is grown: in many places it is scattered over the land whilst still flooded, and as it sinks and settles in the mud it speedily germinates, and springs up as soon as the land is uncovered; in other places buffaloes are driven over the muddy surface as soon as the floods have retired, and a few grains are placed in each foot-mark, the rice often being made to germinate before being placed in the holes. Two crops of flooded rice are obtained annually in India; the first is cut in February and March, the second is reaped in October. The earlier one is by far the most valuable.
The quantity of rice consumed in this country, and in Europe generally, is very large; our imports in 1858 were, — of husked rice, 206,000 tons; and of unhulled rice, or paddy, 33,601 quarters.
Canadian Rice is the seed of Zizania aquatica, Hort. Kew (Nat. Ord. Gramineæ). It grows on the margins of shallow streams and running waters, and produces an abundance of wholesome farinaceous grain. It is called in Canada lake rice, tuscarora, or mahnomonee; and is found in shallow waters from Florida to the Canadian lakes. It is regularly harvested by the Indians, this work being chiefly performed by their squaws; but it is not gathered in any quantity by the white population, although it is esteemed a great delicacy. It has been tried in this country, and it is likely that it would succeed if it should become an object of demand; and as it is aquatic, it can be cheaply cultivated. (T. C. A.)