UPPER INDIA. 77 



reached, it seems unaccountable why the system of irrigation 

 is persisted in. 



That irrigation is not necessary in Upper India, is evident 

 from the following facts. 



I have stated that, in 1835, according to Government re- 

 cords, only one acre was irrigated to 126 unirrigated, of the 

 cultivated land in the Budaon district. Now the proportion 

 is one acre irrigated to three unirrigated. Three-fourths of 

 the land is cultivated without irrigation. From a return of 

 surveyed and assessed area in the North- Western Provinces 

 for 1868-69, of a total of 24,105,849 acres cultivated, 8,912,235 

 are returned as irrigated and 11,919,996 as unirrigated, details 

 of irrigated and unirrigated not being given for five districts, 

 the non-irrigated being in excess of the irrigated in the pro- 

 portion of about 4 to 3. 



These non-irrigated lands do yearly produce crops under a 

 most miserable and wretched system of cultivation. The crops 

 are poor, but that is owing to bad cultivation ; good crops 

 could not be expected under the circumstances ; the soil being 

 merely scratched two or three inches deep, the moisture in 

 the soil quickly dries up and the crop is poor. No attempt 

 has been made to teach a better style of agriculture, but irri- 

 gation only is recommended to supply water, to replace what 

 has been lost by negligent cultivation. 



If, then, under a wretched, defective system of farming, 

 crops can be produced without irrigation, in which system, 

 too, no attempts are made to retain the rainfall in the soil, 

 what may we not expect to effect when we apply a better 

 system, and do our utmost to retain the rainfall in the land ? 



I have mentioned that the more water is supplied to the 

 land by irrigation the more will the land require. 



I was formerly a believer in irrigation. I went to Budaon 

 in 1858, and had a fair-sized garden there; up till 1865 (when 



