171 



boxes, or baskets, with light rich earth for sowing the follow- 

 ing seeds : cabbage, knolkhol, celery, parsley, beet, lettuce, and 

 sea-kale. If the seed is fresh and good, the cabbage will be up 

 in five or six days. Great care is requisite both for watering 

 and protecting the plants from birds, which at this season eat 

 every sort of young green vegetable they can get at : covering 

 the boxes or baskets with dry thorns is the most efficient method 

 of protecting them. The boxes or baskets should for the first 

 fortnight be kept under a shed or verandah, and from heavy 

 rain. 



In the garden you may, towards the latter end of the month, 

 put down French beans, cucumbers, vegetable marrow, lettuce, 

 peas, radishes, and various sorts of Native vegetables, also Jeru- 

 salem artichokes. 



Bain generally falls towards the latter end of the month, and 

 the average at Aurungabad may be calculated at two inches. 

 The thermometer ranges in the shade from 90 to 100 deg. The 

 nights are mostly cool, as the hot winds cease soon after sunset. 



JUNE, 



In the early part of this month the rains generally commence, 

 and much depends on the mildness of the season for the thrift 

 of the garden. If your young plants, sown last month in boxes 

 or baskets, are looking well, remove them into beds that have 

 been a little raised and edged with tiles or bricks, so that the 

 rain does not lodge : put in the plants about four inches apart ; 

 protect them still with thorns, and examine them as often daily 

 as you possibly can. A small fly settles on them during the 

 evening and deposits its eggs, which are hatched in a few hours, 

 when a small caterpillar is produced, hardly perceptible at first 

 to the naked eye : in the course of a few days it has arrived at 

 maturity, during which time it had been feeding, if left unmo- 

 lested, upon the tenderest leaves of the cabbage plants. The 

 centre of the sugar-loaf cabbage they seem most fond of ; knol- 

 khol next. This small caterpillar has the power of protecting 

 itself from dust or water by spinning a thread from one edge 

 of the minute leaf in which it is hatched to the other, thereby 

 drawing them together; when it feeds in security. I think 



