30 STABLE MANAGEMENT. 



doubt hay of a very tolerable quality can be made 

 in India ; in fact, I have done so, but usually the 

 grass is cut after the plant has flowered, the seed 

 ripened and shed, when it is what is known as " the 

 sap being down," and then it is dry and with little 

 nourishment in it. It is generally also allowed to 

 lie out too long after it has been cut in a hot, power- 

 ful sun, which utterly bakes it up. The grass 

 should be cut when the seed is green and the sap 

 well up in it, and should not be allowed to remain 

 too long drying. I have generally found that from 

 eight to ten hours of the Indian sun was enough, so 

 that grass cut in the morning should be stacked at 

 night ; it will then not be utterly dried up, and in 

 the stack will undergo the process of fermentation 

 that gives the characteristic smell to English hay. 

 There is a certain amount of difficulty in doing this. 

 The grass flowers and seeds at the end of the hot 

 weather, about September, when the monsoon rains 

 are on, and these sometimes last for days together. 

 It is, therefore, sometimes difficult to get a fine day 

 to cut and save the hay in before the seed is shed ; 

 and before the dry weather again sets in the sap has 

 gone down, and there is but little nutriment left in 

 the grass. It is not a bad plan to sprinkle some 

 salt over each layer of hay as the stack is made up ; 



