98 CLIMATE AND EESOURCES OF UPPER INDIA. 



Silk, too, might be a staple product ; the only hindrance to its 

 production now being that the worms are dried up, baked to 

 death, by the dry heat of the hot weather. 



Under the system I have sketched out of improving the 

 climate by planting and proper cultivation of the soil, I believe 

 there would be no fear of a scarcity of rainfall or famine. A 

 scanty rainfall in any one year would not so injuriously affect 

 the country, as the amount of moisture held in the soil by 

 capillary attraction from the preceding year would be avail- 

 able for the support of crops ; and with it in reserve a very 

 small rainfall would suffice. The longer the system had been 

 pursued the less chance would there be of a scanty rainfall, 

 and the less would it be felt when it did occur. With a 

 flourishing state of agriculture we should hear no more of 

 famines, commercial stagnation, floods ravaging the country, 

 or of any of the evils which are now the results of irrigation 

 and surface-drainage. 



