7574. RICE, Upland vs. Swamp.—
I
first became informed of the existence of a
rice which would grow in uplands without any
more water than the common rains, by reading
a book of M. de Poivre, who had been Governor
of the Isle of France, who mentions it as
growing there and all along the coast of Africa
successfully, and as having been introduced
from Cochin-China. I was at that time ( 1784-89 )
in France, and there happening to be there
a Prince of Cochin-China, on his travels, and
then returning home, I obtained his promise
to send me some. I never received it, however,
and mention it only as it may have been sent,
and furnished the ground for the inquiries of
Dr. De Carro, respecting my receiving it from
China. When at Havre on my return from
France, I found there Captain Nathaniel Cutting,
who was the ensuing spring to go on a
voyage along the coast of Africa. I engaged
him to enquire for this. * * * He procured
and sent me a thirty gallon cask of it. * * *
I divided it between the Agricultural Society of
Charleston and some private gentlemen of
Georgia, recommending it to their care, in the
hope which had induced me to endeavor to
obtain it, that if it answered as well as the
swamp rice, it might rid them of that source
of their summer diseases. Nothing came of the
trials in South Carolina, but being carried into
the upper hilly parts of Georgia, it succeeded
there perfectly, has spread over the country,
and is now commonly cultivated; still, however,
for family use chiefly, as they cannot made it
for sale in competition with the rice of the
swamps.—
To Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse. Washington ed. v, 393.
(W.
1808)
