1853-62.] CENTEAL TABLE-LAND : TITE DI8TEICTS. 225 



ing Cotton. It is made use of when Jonna is sown, 

 which is much more remunerative ; and as Jonna ought 

 not to be grown two successive years on the same land, 

 Cotton is substituted. The Cotton stalks are cut and 

 used as fuel ; sometimes they are placed with earth over 

 them, as a protection to walls [of houses] from the mon- 

 soon raias. 



Diseases. — " Cotton plants when weakened by un- 352 

 seasonable rains, suffer from the effects of a mildew, 

 which covers the green leaf with white spots, and then 

 the plant being thus weakened is speedily attacked by 

 insects, grasshoppers, etc., and destroyed. Another 

 species of blight causes honey dew to exude from the 

 plant, which greatly weakens it. In January, should 

 there he cloudy weather and rain whilst the pods are 

 forming, they are very liable to drop off and the produce 

 to be injured." 



(4) Salem : Messrs. Fischer and Co., the only ex- 353 

 porters, — The Cotton lands under cultiva- letter of Mr. 

 tion in this district are rather more than Brett, uth 

 15,000 acres. Messrs. Kscher and Co. are ^^•'i**'i- 



the only persons in the district who buy Cotton for 

 exportation, and the views of Mr. Pischer p , 

 upon the subject have already been exhi- 

 bited. The Collector adds that good roads intersect 

 the district in all directions, and that the lands on 

 which the Cotton is chiefly grown are for the most part 

 within twenty-five or thirty miles of the South-Western 

 Eailway. 



(5) doimbatore: detailed report of Mr. Thomas, 354 

 the Collector, — In this important district, the scene of 

 Dr. Wight's labours, upwards of 120,000 acres are 

 under Cotton cultivation. The report of Mr. Thomas 



in reply to Professor Mallett's application jj^.Thomas's 

 is rather lengthy, but exhibits so many plain letter, isth 

 and practical details, that it has been ex- ^^''' ^^^' 

 pedient to print it in extenso, merely omitting certain 

 data wMch have already been exhibited so prominently 

 in the summary of Dr. Wight's reports, as to require 

 no repetition here. 

 Soil: Black, Red, and Alluvium, — "The soils on 355 



Q 



