256 MOISTURE OF THE AIR; ITS FALL, 



wind, the sky has never been clouded for a moment. 

 In the same manner all high mountains are with- 

 drawing the waters from the air even when it does 

 not rain on the plains. Thus they are, in all 

 parts of the world, the spots which form the chief 

 points for the settlement of the moisture of the 

 air, and are the main feeders of the rivers. 



The wide plains of Northern India are, as you 

 know, burning hot and dry during the summer. 

 The currents of air rising up from the heated soil 

 hinder the fall of wet from the air. The waters 

 of the air, which are brought in unceasingly from 

 the Indian Ocean by the south wind (the summer 

 monsoon) cannot, therefore, be set down before they 

 reach the Himalaya mountains, which, stretch- 

 ing for a length of nearly fourteen hundred miles 

 almost due east and west, form the boundary of 

 India. Here, however, the moisture is so 

 thoroughly arrested, that the south wind having 

 passed the mountain-range is almost completely 

 dry before it reaches Inland Asia. Thus the 

 Steppes of arid Asia form, for the most part, dry, 

 barren wastes, with very hot summers and severe 

 winters. 



Much of the effect wrought by high mountains 

 on the moisture of the air may be secured to the 

 plains by careful attention to the forests. Forests 

 are the natural gatherers of the moisture from the 

 air. By the loosening which they give to the soil, 



