6o JTOir / KILLED TILE T/f/A'/, 1 . 



a channel into another space. An allusion to this 

 custom of the gardener changing with his foot 

 the channel of a stream of water, furnishes the 

 King of Assyria in his threatening message, with 

 a very appropriate image : " With the sole of my 

 foot," says he, " I have dried up the rivers of 

 besieged places." (Deuteronomy xxv. 4), "Thou 

 shalt not muzzle the ox when he treadeth out the 

 corn," refers to a method of separating the cereal 

 grains from the ear common in India. The wild 

 beasts are still as troublesome as in Psalm Ixxx. 

 13, where we read " the boar out of the wood 

 doth waste it, and the wild beast of the field doth 

 devour it," for the wild hogs, elephants, buffaloes, 

 and deer make sad havoc in fields and orchards. 

 The farmer races in India, except such gardeners 

 as are near towns, rarely use manure of any 

 kind, but trust exclusively to the water of tanks 

 in wet cultivation, or to the natural rains in dry 

 cultivation. The latter is analagous to the tillage 

 of England, with this marked difference, that in 

 temperate England the farming operations can be 

 carried on all through the year, and the crops 

 are long on the ground ; but in India, the rain, 

 being periodical, may last for two, three, or four 

 months, and the whole work of the Indian farmer 

 must be carried on with grains and plants that 

 come rapidly to maturity, so as to be completed 



