46 
THE ISLAND OF CEYLON. 
These land winds are to Europeans the most intolerable cir- 
cumstance in the climate of India. In Bengal, and several 
other parts in our possession, they prevail almost to suffoca- 
tion; and it is with pain I recollect the expedients we were 
obliged to have recourse to in order to diminish their effects. 
The common remedy is to place, in frames before the win- 
dows or doors, Tatts , or blinds of straw loosely woven; and 
these being kept constantly wet by black fellows retained for 
the purpose, the air which penetrates through the interstices 
is cooled by the water, and deprived in a great measure of 
its noxious heat. The violence of these winds indeed, depend 
on the quantity of moisture they meet with in their passage. 
In those parts where they blow over tracts of low and marshy 
grounds, or rice fields, they are much cooled and less sensibly 
felt at the places which they afterwards meet in their course. 
I recollect to have observed a very striking instance of this 
while I was stationed at Trichinopoly. On one side of the 
fort is an extensive sandy plain, and on the other a large tract 
of low marshy ground : during the season of the land-winds, 
that part of the fort which is exposed to those from the 
sandy plain, is heated almost to suffocation ; while that part 
which receives the winds from the marshy grounds, rather 
feels refreshed from the breeze. The violence of the land- 
winds in their hottest state is almost inconceivable. The intense 
heat cracks every thing which comes in their way : the glass 
in the windows is often splintered in pieces, on which account 
Venetian blinds are generally used instead. Unless precautions 
