179 A BIRD CALENDAR 



for the Englishman by the knowledge that, 

 while he lives beneath a cloudless sky and 

 enjoys genial sunshine, his fellow-men in 

 England dwell under leaden clouds and endure 

 days of fog, and mist, and rain, and sleet, and 

 snow. In England the fields are bare and the 

 trees devoid of leaves ; in India the country- 

 side wears a summer aspect. 



The sowings of the spring cereals are com- 

 plete by the fifteenth of November ; those of 

 the tobacco, poppy and potato continue 

 throughout the month. By the beginning 

 of December most of the fields are covered by 

 an emerald carpet. 



The picking of the cotton begins in the 

 latter part of October, with the result that 

 November is a month of hard toil for the 

 ponies that have to carry the heavy loads of 

 cotton from the fields into the larger towns. 

 By the middle of the month all the san has 

 been cut and the water-nuts have been 

 gathered in. Then the pressing of the sugar- 

 cane begins in earnest. The little presses that 

 for eight months have been idle are once 

 again brought into use, and, from mid- 

 November until the end of January, the 

 patient village oxen work them, tramping 



