Cuar. XIV.] TIME AND METHOD OF SOWING. 269 
had been scattered over the surface of the land. 
In some cases the seed, instead of being sown broad- 
cast, is sown in drills or patches, but this mode is 
less common than the other. The rains, which al- 
ways fall copiously at the change of the monsoon 
which takes place at this season of the year, warm 
and moisten the earth, and the seeds swell, and 
vegetation progresses with wonderful rapidity. 
Many of the operations in Chinese agriculture are 
regulated by the change of the monsoon. The 
farmer knows from experience, that, when the 
winds, which have been blowing from the north 
and east for the last seven months, change to the 
south and west, the atmosphere will be highly 
charged with electric fluid, and the clouds will 
daily rain and refresh his crops. 
The cotton fields are carefully tended during the 
summer months. The plants are thinned where 
they have been sown too thickly, the earth is 
loosened amongst the roots, and the ground hoed 
and kept free from weeds. If the season is favour- 
able, immense crops are obtained owing to the 
fertility of the soil, but if the weather happens to 
be unusually dry from June to August, the crop 
receives a check which it never entirely recovers, 
even although the ground, after that period, should 
be moistened by frequent showers. 1845 was a 
season of this kind, and the crop was a very defi- 
cient one compared with that of the previous year. 
The spring was highly favourable, and the plants 
looked well up to the month of June, when the dry 
