ABSTRACT
NOW that we have derived the time sequence of the various farming activities of the village from the agricultural calendar and have estimated the amount of labor required for each section of work, we may proceed to analyze the agricultural employment of the villagers. We have already seen that labor requirements are discontinuous and unevenly distributed over the year. The intense activity in the period from Ch’ing Ming (middle of April) to Mang Chung (middle of June) and the virtual lack of essential farm work in the period from Li Tung (middle of November) to Ching Che (middle of March) give rise to the peasants’ division of the year into two periods—the busy and the slack.
