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sal (Shorea robusta) forests and many villages are named after the 

 tree Sakhi Sakrauli, Sakhua, Sakhopur and it is recorded that 

 the Emperor Babar hunted in these forests. The sal tree requires 

 a moist climate, but the conditions have so changed that there is 

 scarcely a single tree between the Himalayan Tarai and the 

 Satpuras. The -drop in the Jumna level is established by the 

 prevalence of old sugar mills in the Etawah trans-Jumna area 

 where the water level is now far too low to admit of irrigation, and 

 also in the fort at Shergadh near Auraiya where the curb of the 

 large well in use in 1550 is now 60 feet above mean flood level. 



The whole aspect of the ravine country is most depressing ; 

 during the hot weather the temperature rises to well over 125 F. 

 in the shade, of which there is practically none, and there is a 

 remarkable absence of life in these tracts during these months. 



The Etawah district has been specially described for reasons 

 which will be understood later on in this record, but identical con- 

 ditions prevail in such districts as Jhansi, Jalaun, Hamirpur, Agra, 

 and Banda as can be seen from the short accounts abstracted 

 from the settlement reports and gazetteers, which have been added 

 as appendix I of this book. 



v 



