UPPEE INDIA. 89 



cotton does not require irrigation, as it is sown early in the 

 rains. I have grown it at the rate of upwards of 350 Ib. of 

 clean cotton to the acre without irrigation. There is an idea 

 prevalent that Indian cotton is an annual ; but this is a mis- 

 take. Where allowed to stand, and protected, it will bear 

 the second year, but the pods are small, being dried up by 

 the hot winds. Were the excessive dry heat of the hot winds 

 diminished, the plant would doubtless bear well the second 

 year. In exposed cotton-fields, as the plants break into leaf 

 in February and March, all are eaten down by cattle, and the 

 plant has no chance of surviving. Sugar-cane, too, in India, 

 is treated as an annual. In other countries, where there are 

 not such excessively dry seasons, it is allowed to stand for a 

 second or even a third year, the suckers thrown out from the 

 roots giving a second and third crop. 



Another proof of the power of loosened surface-soil to pre- 

 vent the too great loss of moisture, and to retain sufficient 

 in the subsoil for the purposes of vegetation, is furnished by 

 the "Sarkarra" grass. This grass (in appearance like the 

 " Pampas " grass we see in English gardens), which grows 

 ten or fifteen feet high, is often planted round fields on the 

 high land, to check the drifting of the sand. The sand accu- 

 mulates about the roots of the plants, and the grass, which 

 is cut down in the cold weather, throws out fresh shoots at 

 the commencement of the hot weather, and grows vigorously 

 through the season, from the moisture in the subsoil not being 

 able to rise by capillary attraction through the loose sand on 

 the surface. On the ridges round the irrigated fields where 

 there is a hard soil, it is rare to see this grass. The subsoil is 

 too dry for it. 



There might be some reasonable excuse for canals in parts 

 of the country where the annual rainfall is under ten inches, 

 but there irrigation should be made use of to encourage the 



