MONSOON  . The two monsoon periods are divided by the

change of temperature, due to solar action upon the earth's surface, into two separate seasons; and thus the Indian year may be divided into four seasons: the cold season, including the months of January and February; the hot season, comprising the months of March, April and May; the south-west monsoon period, including the months of June, July, August, September and October; and the retreating monsoon period, including the months of November and December . The temperature is nearly constant in southern India the whole year round, but in northern India, where the extremes of both heat and cold are greatest, the variation is very large . In the cold season the mean temperature averages about 300 lower in the 'Punjab than in southern India . In the Punjab, the United Provinces, and northern India generally the climate The cold resembles that of the Riviera, with a brilliant' cloudless weather, sky and cool dry weather . This is the time for the tourist to visit India . In south India it is warmer on the west coast than on the east, and the maximum temperature is found round the head-waters of the Kistna . Calcutta, Bombay and Madras all possess the equable climate that is induced by proximity to the sea, but Calcutta enjoys a cold season which is not to be found in the other presidency towns, while the hot season is more unendurable there . The hot season begins officially in the Punjab on the 15th of March, and from that date there is a steady rise in the temperature, induced The hot by the fiery rays of the sun upon the baking earth, until the break of the rains in June . During this season the weather, interior of the peninsula and northern India is greatly heated ; and the contrast of temperature is not between northern and southern India, but between the interior of India and the coast districts and adjacent seas . The greater part of the Deccan and the Central Provinces are included within the hottest area, though in May the highest temperatures are found in Upper Sind, north-west Rajputana, and south-west Punjab . At Jacobabad the thermometer sometimes rises to 125' in the shade .

The south-west monsoon currents usually set in during the first fortnight of June on the Bombay and

Bengal coasts, and give more or less general rain in every part of India during the next The three months . But the distribution of the rainfall is monsoon very uneven . On the face of the Western Ghats, and on period. the Khasi hills, overlooking the Bay of Bengal, where the mountains catch the masses of vapour as it rises off the sea, the rainfall is enormous . At Cherrapunji in the Khasi hills it averages upwards of 500 in. a year . The Bombay monsoon, after surmounting the Ghats, blows across the peninsula as a west and sometimes in places a north-west wind; but it leaves with very little rain a strip loo to zoo m. in width in the western Deccan parallel with the Ghats, and it is this part of the Deccan, together with the Mysore table-land and the Carnatic, that is most subject to drought . Similarly the Bengal monsoon passes by the Coromandel coast and the Carnatic with an occasional shower, taking a larger volume to Masulipatam and Orissa, and abundant rain to Bengal, Assam and Cachar . The same current also supplies with rain the broad band across India, which includes the Satpura range, Chota Nagpur, the greater part of the Central Provinces and Central India, Orissa and Bengal . Rainfall rapidly diminishes to the north-west from that belt . A branch of the Bombay current blows pretty steadily through Rajputana to the Punjab, carrying some rain to the latter province . But the greater part of north-west India is served as a rule by cyclonic storms between the two currents . In September the force of the monsoon begins rapidly to decline, and after about the middle of the month it ceases to carry rain to the greater part of north-western India . In its rear springs up a gentle steady north-east wind, which Flora .

Unlike many other large

geographical areas, India is remarkable for having no distinctive botanical features peculiar to itself . It differs conspicuously in this respect from such countries as Australia or South Africa . Its vegetation is in point of fact of a composite character, and is constituted by the meeting and more or less blending of adjoining floras,—those of Persia and the south-eastern Mediterranean area to the north-west, of Siberia to the north, of China to the east, and of Malaya to the south-east . Regarded broadly, four tolerably distinct types present themselves . I . The upper levels of the Himalayas slope northwards gradually to the Tibetan uplands, over which the Siberian temperate vegetation ranges . This is part of the great temperate flora which, Himalayas. with locally individualized species, but often with identical genera, ranges over the whole of the temperate zone of the northern hemisphere . In the western Himalayas this upland flora is marked by a strong admixture of European species, such as the columbine (Aquilegia) and hawthorn (Crataegus Oxyacantha) . These disappear rapidly eastward, and are scarcely found beyond Kumaon . The base of the Himalayas is occupied by a narrow belt forming an extreme north-western extension of the Malayan type described below . Above that there is a rich temperate flora which in the eastern chain may be regarded as forming an extension of that of northern China, gradually assuming westwards more and more of a European type . Magnolia, Aucuba, Abelia and Skimmia may be mentioned as 'examples of Chinese genera found in the eastern Himalayas, and the tea-tree grows wild in Assam .

The same coniferous trees are

common to both parts of the range . Pinus longifelia extends to the Hindu-Kush ; P. excelsa is found universally except in Sikkim, and has its European analogue in P . Pence, found in the mountains of Greece . Abies smithiana extends into Afghanistan; Abies webbiana forms dense forests at altitudes of Sow to 12,000 ft., and ranges from Bhutan to Kashmir; several junipers and the common yew (Taxus baccata) also occur . The deodar (Cedrus Deodara), which is indigenous to the mountains of Afghanistan and the north-west Himalaya, is nearly allied to the Atlantic cedar and to the cedar of Lebanon, a form of which is found in Cyprus . A notable further instance of the connexion of the western Himalayan flora with that of Europe is the holm oak (Quercus flex), which is characteristic of the Mediterranean region . 2 . The north-western area is best marked in Sind and the Punjab, where the climate is very dry (the rainfall averaging less than 15 In.), and where the soil, though fertile, is wholly dependent on North . irrigation for its cultivation . The flora is a poor one in west. number of species, and is essentially identical with that of Persia, southern Arabia and Egypt . The low scattered junglg contains such characteristic species as Capparis aphylla, Acacia arabica (babel), Populus euphratica (the " willows " of Ps. cxxxvii . 2), Salvadora persica (erroneously identified by Royle with the mustard of Matt. xiii .

31),

tamarisk, Zizyphus, Lotus, &c . The dry flora extends somewhat in a south-east direction, and then blends in-sensibly with that of the western peninsula; some species representing it are found in the upper Gangetic plain, and a few are widely distributed in dry parts of the country . 3 .