82 CLIMATE AND KESOURCES OF 



of their roots being speedily dried up from evaporation, the 

 soil having been but shallowly cultivated. 



Having succeeded in cultivating the greater part of my 

 garden without irrigation, I sold one pair of bullocks ; the 

 remaining pair had but little to do in the way of raising water. 

 My men were not perpetually at work at the well ; they had 

 time to look after the more necessary operations of the garden, 

 and it has been in better order than it used to be in before. 



As the vegetables were used I had the ground dug up; 

 the difference that had taken place in the texture of the soils 

 where the jowar crop had been buried was most remarkable. 

 The soil, of the description known as " muttiar," a stiff, clayey 

 soil, sticky when wet, and almost as hard as stone when dry, 

 and which was very hard and difficult to dig and break up in 

 preparation for the jowar, had become quite free-working and 

 friable. I forgot to mention, regarding the plot on which I 

 planted the potatoes, that in the hot weather, previous to 

 digging up the soil, I had burnt some of the surface-soil and 

 spread the ashes over the land. There might have been two 

 cubic yards of ashes spread over between oOO and 400 square 

 yards of land. The whole of the land, which had been green 

 manured, was now in the condition of a light loam, the potato 

 plot which had had the ashes being the easier to work. 



Besides these experiments in the garden, I tried a patch of 

 potatoes in a field. The soil here was merely deeply dug. 

 There was no crop buried in it. The sets were planted deeply, 

 at eight or nine inches ; many did not come up, but those that 

 did looked very healthy till killed by frost. On digging up 

 the potatoes, the number of tubers to each plant was great, 

 but they were small, the haulm having been killed by frost in 

 December, after which there would be no further growth. 



Culinary vegetables require a greater amount of moisture, 

 than cereals ; and here I succeeded in growing them without 



