THE MAHADEO HILLS. 129 



He really made a sad buDglc of it at first, having no 

 conception of tlie business ; and I had to set one of my 

 peons, who had followed the plough before he donned 

 the badge of office, to help him. In a little while, 

 however, several of the Korkiis became quite au fait at 

 ploughing ; and an acre or so of fine soil in the old bed 

 of the tank was soon fenced in, deeply ploughed, and 

 prepared for gardening operations at the commencement 

 of the rainv season. 



For the next few weeks, my spare time was 

 pleasantly passed in exploring the neighbourhood of the 

 hills and their productions. I visited the Sal forest in 

 the Deldkdri valley to the east of Puchmurree. It was 

 one of the few forests in this part of the country which 

 had till then escaped destruction at the hands of the 

 timber-speculator or the dhya-cutting aborigine, being 

 inaccessible to the former from want of roads, and 

 unsuited from its level character and the size of the trees 

 to the operations of the latter. It, however, afi'ords an 

 example of one of the great difficulties of growing large 

 timber in the dry upland regions of Central India. 

 Though the trees bore every appearance of being fully 

 mature, their size was by no means first-rate, the largest 

 averaofins" no more than six or eiQ:ht feet in stirth, while 

 most of them, when subsequently cut down, Avere found 

 to be almost useless from heart-shake and dry-rot. It 

 belonged to the Thakiir of Puchmurree and another 

 chief ; and I soon after concluded a lease of it for 

 Government w^ith them, and laid out a road connecting 

 it with the open country. The view looking upwards to 

 the Puchmurree heights from the Denwa valley, or 

 across from the opposite Motiir hills, is exceedingly 

 fine, the rich reds of the sandstone scarp mellowing into 



