1921.] The Eighth Indian Science Congress. Ixxxv 
meteorological, combined with a fortuitously favourable timing 
of the irrigation. Now if we only know exactly what these 
favourable conditions were, might we not so control our opera- 
tions of watering, draining, cultivating and manuring as to make 
the normal approximate the present bumper? And the same 
applies to many other crops. Take cotton for example. The 
advent of the ridging plough tends to a much better control of 
irrigation water and ought to help us to regulate to some extent 
at least the position of the soluble plant food in the soil. Fur- 
ther, one of the chief problems with regard to cotton growing 
is to prevent the plants from shedding their bolls prematurely. 
Under a properly regulated irrigation system this should be 
quite possible but a way out has not yet been found, owing | 
probably to the non-utilisation of our present means of control. 
up and prematurely ripened, were to be seen a few fields which 
had been manured with bonemeal, fresh, unwithered. and pro- 
perly ripened, giving every appearance of having been irrigated, 
although no irrigation had been applied, nor, indeed was such 
possible. There was a genuine result, nothing accidental about 
it, demonstrating some great principle of immense potential 
value to the country. The whole thing was very striking and 
advance on present practices and to increase crop outturn 
appreciably. That the best results, however, will not be ob- 
tained empirically will be at once conceded when it is considered 
that improvement will be mainly in the correct timing of 
