30 REPORT — 1851. 



long banks of electric clouds make their appearance over the mountains in the East 

 [the Deccan Ghauts]. Towards the end of the month sheet-lightning appears from 

 these clouds, then brilliant lightning, and iu time the monsoon opens from them. 

 These masses are frequently magnificent at sunset, but they seldom appear before 

 mid-day, and are rarely visible very long after sunset. In February and March the 

 ground is so parched that the powers of vegetation appear exhausted ; and though a 

 small portion only of the trees and shrubs are deciduous, they all look so shrivelled, 

 brown and stumpy, that it is difficult to believe they will vivify again. About the 

 middle of April, however, there is all at once a magical burst of verdure and vitality 

 amongst ligneous plants, as if some new stimulant had been suddenly given, and the 

 forest trees are radiant with flowers, the foot or more long pendent bunches of the 

 yellow flowers of the Cassia fistula, and the bright red flowers of the Erythrina 

 fulgens being most conspicuous. The delicious mango ripens towards the end of 

 the hot weather, and its turpentine is useful in the cutaneous diseases, boils and 

 entozoa, which then prevail. The author then speaks of the changing seasons upon 

 the habits of birds, — very graphically describes the storms of thunder and lightning, 

 precursors to the setting-in of the monsoon, and the setting-in of the monsoon itself; 

 with its consequences ofdeluges of rain and greensward ; the lightof a cloudy English 

 day instead of intolerable glare, and a fall of 10° or 12° in the temperature ; cloth and 

 woollens being substituted for cotton and muslin fabrics. He notices the almost mira- 

 culous appearance of the multitudinous gigantic yellow frogs, before unseen ; notices 

 that boots, shoes and other articles of leather are covered with mildew in the course 

 of twenty-four hours in the houses, and that paper and clothes are damp and clammy. 

 Thousands of small fish, after the first rain-fall, are found in puddles, whether on 

 the plains or on the hill tops, and they appear and disappear with the rains, never 

 exceeding the length of the fore-finger. The rank growth and decay of vegetation 

 evolves immense quantities of carbonaceous gases, which impregnating the water, 

 dissolve the shells and calcareous matter everywhere about ; and as the rains draw ofi^ 

 and the water evaporates, lime is thrown down, cementing together gravel and 

 other matters into a kind of concrete building-stone. A rain-table for thirty years 

 is then given, showing that the annual fall has varied from 122 inches to 34 inches, 

 the annual average being 76 inches ; but this is for the monsoon only, as an account 

 of the fall of rain between November and June has never been kept. The natives 

 consider the force of the rains to be over by the first full moon in August, and a 

 festival is kept in consequence, and half-deck vessels then venture to sea. The 

 breaking up of the monsoon is in October, when the sun is in the constellation 

 " Hust," or the Elephant ; but as the terminal storms come to Bombay from over 

 the Island of Elephanta, Europeans call them the Elephanta. About 3 p.m. vast 

 masses of clouds appear piled upon each other, vivid lightning follows, then a 

 deluge of rain, and at last the sky is left destitute of a cloud. This occurs for 

 three or four times, and then the cold and afterwards the hot seasons set in, and 

 rain is sometimes not seen for months. During the squalls of March and April 

 the barometer usually falls or becomes irregular, and during July it sinks very 

 low; but the bursts in the beginning of June and October which herald iu and close 

 the monsoon, seem purely electrical, neither the pressure nor the humidity of the 

 air being materially aftected by them. Dr. Buist then notices the var^ang phases of 

 the Elephanta in each year, from 1840 to 1850 inclusive. It will suffice to mention 

 that in 1847 the Elephanta was almost abortive in October, but from the 1st to the 

 5th of November, there was a fall of 3^ inches of rain, to the great discomfort of 

 those who had gone upon the assurance of the usual regularity of the seasons, into 

 their fair-weather abodes. At neither Madras nor Calcutta is the separation be- 

 twixt the rainy and fair seasons, anything like so distinct as it is at Bombay ; nor at 

 either place is there anything corresponding in violence or sublimity to the outburst 

 about the 6th of June, or the magnificent though brief Elephanta. Some November 

 dust-storms are then described, of which that of the 1st of November 1850 is a 

 type : — "At 4 o'clock in the afternoon dark lurid clouds began to collect over the 

 Ghauts and roll oft' toward the zenith, in the teeth of the sea breeze. Heavy rain 

 began to fall all along the line of the Ghauts, about half-past 4 o'clock. At 5 p.m. 

 exactly, the storm burst upon the roadstead and fort of Bombay, and then we had 



