On the Conditions of Wheat-Groioing in India. 27 
country (in most cases these are but the old beds of former 
streams, or the silted-up lakes which were thrown off as con- 
tortions of the river, isolated by the main stream taking the 
more direct course through a narrow isthmus), rich clayey loam 
occurs which merges in its character into the heavy mud soil of 
Bengal. Secondly, within the regions of climatic extremes, 
natural growth and cultivation alike have been checked, and 
loam is there found to be more and more intermixed with sand, 
until absolute sandy deserts are attained. 
Thus there exist four types of soil in the alluvial plains of 
India : a heavy loam, in which clay predominates (the muddy 
swamps of Bengal) ; a heavy loam, with a certain amount of sand, 
in which the clods remain firm (the low-lying and inundated 
tracts of Upper India) ; a light loam, in which the clods are 
pulverised on being let fall from the hand (the principal soil of 
Behar, the North- West Provinces, the Panjab, and a certain 
portion of Bombay and Sind) ; and lastly, a poor loam with a 
large admixture of sand, passing into pure sand in which clods 
do not form at all (the soil of some parts of the North-West 
Provinces, of a large proportion of Central India and of Sind, 
with also certain parts of the Panjab). The intimate relation of 
the two features of soil alluded to in the opening sentence 
of this paragraph has been thus exemplified. The absence of 
water, together with the extremes of heat and cold, have had 
much to say to the production of desert tracts, and annual 
inundations have greatly tended to preserve the heavy loams. 
There are certain agricultural terms used in the Panjab, 
but fairly well understood throughout India : — 
Thus, land that is dependent on rain is known as bdrani ; if watered hy 
canals it is nahri ; chahi is watered by wells, and ahi from tanks. We have 
already defined the word doab (i.e. the region between two rivers), and have 
shown the natural classification of doab lands, according to water-supply. 
The five great streams of the Indus break the Panjab into vast interfluvial 
expanses or doabs, so that, to understand Panjab agriculture, this feature 
must be fidly appreciated. The tracts annually inundated by the rise of 
the rivers, or kept moist from being adjacent to flooded land, are known in 
the Panjab as hhet, banjar, or saildba, and in other parts of India as 'khaddr, 
but by the Hindustani-speaking population this name is even used in the 
Panjab. The chief danger such re^ons are subjected to is the growth of 
the saline efflorescence known as reh (a crude sulphate or carbonate of soda). 
Land beyond the hhet influence is generally known as desya in the 
Panjab, and to Hindustani-speaking people as bungar. This may be chahi, 
ahi, nahri, or harurd, according to the source from which it derives its water. 
The interior or higher portions of the doab are often spoken of as des-utar, 
(in contradistinction to hetur) or mdhjah. 
The lA-mes given to denominate the physical character of 
the soil are : — 
1. Nydi, rich land around the homestead, on which vegetables, tobacco, 
poppies, &c.,are grown. 
