35S THE HIGHLANDS OF CENTEAL INDIA. 



is charmed by the approach of a second spring, and it requires 

 no slight effort to believe himself still in a tropical country. The 

 atmosphere has been kept humid by the moisture from the 

 broad sheets of water retained by the upland streams, which 

 descends nightly in dews on the open valleys. The old 

 trasses of the prairie have been burnt in the annual conflagra- 

 tions, and a covering of youug verdure has taken their place. 

 Now and then the familiar note of the cuckoo* (identical 

 with the European bird), and the voices of many birds, in- 

 cluding the deep musical coo of the grand imperial pigeon, 

 heighten the delusion. But for the bamboo thickets on the , 

 higher hills, whose light feathery foliage beautifully supple- 

 ments the heavier masses of the sal that cling to their skirts, 

 the scene would present nothing peculiar to the landscape of 

 a tropical country. 



The climate of these uplands is very temperate for this part 

 of India, showing a mean of about 77 of the thermometer 

 during the hot season. The variation between the temperature 

 of day and night is however considerable, ranging from about 

 50 to 100 as extremes during the hot season under canvas. 

 It would of course be much more equable in a house, and the 

 range is also far less on the higher plateaux than in the lower 

 valleys. In the cold season (which corresponds to our wintej) 

 it generally descends at night to freezing-point in the open air, 

 rising in a tent no higher than 65 or 70 in the middle of the 

 day. 



The country can scarcely be said to be populated at all, 

 except within a short distance of Mandla itself, where the 

 rich soil has been cultivated by an outlying colony of Hindus 

 from the Lower Narbadd valley. Mandla* was at one time the 

 seat of one of the Gond-Eajpiit ruling dynasties, and the 



* Cuculus canorus. 



