ON THE DISTRIBUTION OF FORESTS IN INDIA. 95 



brought about by the storms of the monsoon, and the cloudy and 

 rainy weather which follows, is delightful. It is not the vegetation 

 only which revives; the whole animated nature feels the pleasant 

 change. This relief is denied to the arid region. Here, in the north- 

 west corner of India, the temperature continues to rise higher and 

 higher with the sun, and the result is, that in June, July, and 

 August, the highest mean temperature is found in the arid zone of 

 India. Thus Multan has a mean temperature of 77° during what is 

 termed the hot season in other parts of India, and of 92° during 

 June, July, and August; and at Jacobabad, in Sindh, the mean tem- 

 perature during these months is as high as 96°. Where, however, 

 sufficient water is supplied by irrigation, these high temperatures 

 stimulate vegetation in a remarkable manner. The station of Jacob- 

 abad is a striking example of the effect of water supply in that 

 climate. It was founded in 1844 by General Jacob, in the midst of 

 a barren, treeless desert. A canal was led to it from the Indus, and 

 now the plain is a dense forest of babool and other trees, upwards of 

 sixty feet high, sheltering the houses and gardens of the inhabitants. 

 A ride of a few miles takes you into the desert which skirts the hills 

 of Beloochistan, a level plain of splendid, fertile, alluvial soil, but 

 hard, naked, and barren, like a threshing floor, without shrub, herb, 

 or grass, except in the vicinity of the canals, where vegetation is 

 rich and luxuriant. 



In the Himalayan hills, vegetation rests in winter as it does in 

 Europe, and in the vast tracts of those mountain ranges the forester 

 finds himself surrounded by forms similar to, and in a few cases 

 identical with, the trees and shrubs of Europe. The climatic condi- 

 tions are analogous, though not identical. At the higher elevations 

 the year divides itself into the four seasons with which Ave are fami- 

 liar in Europe, but the main supply of moisture is in summer, and 

 the summer rains are preceded by a long dry season, which is much 

 warmer than the spring is in Central Europe. In the outer ranges, 

 the rains are heavy, but the whole falls in torrents within a few 

 months, and has not, therefore, the same effect upon vegetation as 

 the uniformly distributed moisture of our own climate. There are 

 other points of difference in the climate of the higher Himalayan 

 ranges and of Central Europe, and this explains that some of the 

 hardiest Himalayan trees, which grow at an elevation of 12,000 feet, 

 within a few thousand feet of the line of perpetual snow, such as the 

 silver fir (Pinus Webbiana), refuse to thrive in Great Britain and on 

 the Continent. Even the Deodar (Cedrtis deodara) and the blue 



