584 
ME. H. E. BLANEOED ON THE WINDS OF NOETHEEN INDIA. 
the Taptee and Nerbudda, blows as a west or west-sonth-west current over Central. 
India up to the very confines of the Gangetic plains, and across the peninsula south of 
the Satpooras up to the coasts of Orissa. That from the Bay of Bengal pours into the 
funnel-shaped opening occupied by the delta, and then, turning westward, passes up the 
Ganges valley towards the Punjab ; while upper currents sweep over the Hazareebagh 
plateau in the same direction, and across the hills of Eastern Bengal towards the valley 
of Assam and the river-gorges that afford them an entrance to Tibet. It is not impro- 
bable that a portion of the current that traverses the Bundelkund plateau from the 
Arabian Sea may, on reaching the Gangetic plain, curve round towards the north-west 
as an upper current, coalescing with that from the Bay of Bengal. But no such passage 
can be detected in the registers of the surface-winds. Indeed along the southern margin 
of the plain the winds are on the whole rather from north-east, blowing towards the 
Malwa and Bundelkund plateau during the height of the monsoon. In any case the 
Punjab is the limit of these winds. On reaching the plain of the five rivers they perform 
a kind of cyclonic circulation around it ; and in Affglianistan, although easterly winds 
are occasionally felt at this season, the dominant current is from the westward. 
Up to the close of the south-west monsoon in October, the Coromandel coast and 
the plains of the Carnatic have received but little rain, and remain at a higher tempe- 
rature than any other part of the peninsula. Unsteady north-east winds, alternating 
with calms and variable winds from other quarters, then set in on the Orissa coast and 
over the north-west part of the Bay ; while the southerly current recurves from south- 
east and blows towards this heated region, bringing the late autumn rains, which some 
writers have erroneously attributed to the north-east monsoon*. At the same time the 
winds of Lower Bengal are conflicting and variable, and calms (alternating with storms) 
are at their maximum frequency. But in the North-western Provinces, where the 
rains cease somewhat earlier and the temperature falls more rapidly, there is, during 
the greater part of October, a decided movement of the air from the west and north- 
west. In like manner in the Central Provinces light land-winds have set in from east 
and north-east, which latter (or east to the south of the Satpooras) is there the charac- 
teristic direction of the winter monsoon. It is not until the end of this month, 
or in November, that north-west winds blow over the delta, connecting the north-west 
current of Upper India with the north-east winds of the northern part of the Bay in a 
continuous stream, and that it can therefore be said with strictness that the north-east 
monsoon has set in. 
The manner in which the change of monsoons takes place in the Bay of -Bengal has 
been already described by Captain Maury in the following terms: — “In October the 
north-east trades lead off the attack, and the two combatants have force enough about 
the parallel of 15° N. to blow during this month nine days each. The conflict, instead 
of being back to back, is now face to face ; instead of blowing away from the medial 
* This error was distinctly pointed out by Professor Dove in his Treatise, ‘ ITeber die Yertheilung des Eegens 
auf der Oberfliiche der Erde,’ page 98. 
