202 Notes oil Natural History in India. [Sess. 



country ; but all the land not occupied by the great transverse 

 furrows is, at most seasons of the year, a sea of cultivation. 

 In October or November the following plants are sown : 

 wheat, barley, Cicer arietinum, and Ervuni lens. The wheat 

 and barley are almost identical with those grown in Britain. 

 Cicer arietinum is a low herb with pinnate toothed leaves. 

 The pod contains one or two seeds, which are fancifully com- 

 pared to a ram's head. Ervum lens is the ervalenta and 

 revalenta of the shops. It also is a herb, but has pinnate 

 leaves ending in a tendril, and two or rarely three seeds. 

 Both are much eaten in India, Italy, Greece, and Palestine. 

 They are mentioned together in 2 Sam. xvii. 28 — "Beans, 

 and lentiles, and parched pulse." In India they are grown to 

 perfection in Banda county, and large quantities are exported 

 across the Jumna to districts where the alluvial soil is of 

 Himalayan origin, and therefore better suited for cereals than 

 for pulses. In the Banda district the crops mentioned above 

 — wheat, barley, pulse, and lentils — are reaped in April. 

 Sometimes a crop of cucumbers is taken from the ground in 

 May and early June ; but in all cases, as soon as the autumnal 

 rains begin, which fall in July, August, and September, advan- 

 tage is taken of the first temporary break to sow cotton and 

 the millets, which are reaped at varying periods from Septem- 

 ber to February, the last reaped being Penicillaria in February. 

 Both in spring and autumn the cultivation is a sight for a 

 farmer. ISTot a weed is ever to be seen : not even East Lothian 

 wheat is as clean as are all the crops in Banda. No manure 

 is required, and no irrigation is obtainable. If, as now and 

 then happens, the autumn rains are deficient, the result is 

 famine. In reaping the wheat and barley, the farmers of 

 Banda do not cut it like farmers in Europe, or in the rest of 

 India. They do not shear the corn — they merely cut off the 

 ears, and leave the stalks to wither. They then burn the 

 stalks, and plough them into the land. This is the only 

 manure given to the soil. Very frequently two plants are 

 sown together, in Belgian fashion — generally wheat and pulse, 

 or barley and pulse. They are supposed not to interfere with 

 each other's growth, and thus to enable the land, in the same 

 season, to yield two crops instead of one. The most con- 

 spicuous crop of Banda has not yet been mentioned — the 



