190 



Effects of the Famine of 1833. [No 30. 



eighth is alluvial soil of the best kind, which with abundance 

 of water, population and cattle is capable of yielding crops of 

 rice far more plentiful than are to be met in the best parts of 

 Tanjore.* 



The Kistna River is the Northern boundary of the District. 

 Its bed is all but dry during the months of March, April and 

 May, but from June to January the freshes vary, the extreme 

 depth being about 35 feet at Bazwarrah and Seetanuggrum, 

 where it emerges from the hills. Its width is there 1 160 

 yards and its velocity not less than 5 miles an hour, so that 

 the quantity of water it discharges in one hour is \\ times 

 the whole annual discharge of the Clyde at Glasgow. Unfor- 

 tunately, but little can be rendered available for irrigation.f 



The river's surface at flood falls about 11| inches per mile 

 between Seetanuggrum and the sea, a distance in its course 

 of miles. In the dry season, bars of sand prevent the 

 entrance of vessels, but in the freshes large boats drawing 8 



* I cannot vouch for the correctness of these divisions but I believe they 

 are not very far from the truth. — If we wait for absolute exactitude, we shall 

 never write at all. I shall b^ happy to have my errors corrected. The Offi- 

 cers who surveyed our provinces drew up statistical reports explanatory of 

 their surveys, in which such particulars as I have given loosely are stated from 

 measurement. These reports unfortunately are not published. 



f When the Godavery has shrunk within its dry season limits, along the 

 banks may be seen numerous bullocks employed in raising water for irrigation 

 from the bed, a height of about 20 feet. Nothing of the kind is common in the 

 parts of Guntoor which border the Kistna. People who seldom leave their 

 own villages to go further than the Kutcherry, unless when driven by famine 

 are slow to learn the improved modes of cultivation followed even in neigh- 

 Louring Districts. There seems no other reason why the same plan should 

 not be common in Guntoor, provided always increased rates of taxation would 

 not interfere with the husbandman's profits. 



North of the Kistna, convenient rafts for the passage of small nullahs are 

 made out of two hollowed palmyras and are in common use along the coast 

 road and elsewhere. Every bearer in Madras knows what a mngady is, but 

 not one is to be seen from Ongole to Cape Comorin, though palmyras are 

 abundant, rafts are much required, and they might be made as easily in the 

 South as in the North, 



