North-Western Provinces, the one melting gradually into the other--the
hot season beginning in March and ending in June, the rainy season
beginning with July and ending in October, and the cold weather
beginning with November and ending in February. The seasons may thus be
described in a general way, but in fact every year differs somewhat from
others, as they do in our own country. The hot weather is sensibly felt
before March begins, and the heat of March is far less than that of the
succeeding months. The first burst of the rains is often before the
middle of June, but after that burst, called the "little rainy season,"
it is not uncommon to have a spell of very hot sunny weather. In some
years, indeed, there is so much weather of this kind during what is
called the rainy season, that the heat is most intense, and the crops
are burnt up. Towards the end of September there is commonly the last
great outpour of rain, and as October advances there is the cooling
freshness of the approaching cold weather, with enough of heat in the
day-time to tell us it has not quite let go its grasp. December and
January are our coldest months. In England, after an unpropitious
summer, the remark is often made, "We have had no summer!" and in the
same manner in India, when the temperature has been high in the cold
season, and we have not had the expected bracing, we say, "We have had
no winter!" Yet as in our own country, so in India; we have our marked
seasons, though we cannot be sure of the weather at any particular
period.

As India is an immense region, a great continent, with every variety of
scenery, with plains extending hundreds of miles, and vast stretches of
forests, with table-lands and lofty mountains, with land of every
description from barren sand to the richest alluvial soil, the climate
and products of its different countries are so different, that the
statements made about one region, however correct, when applied to the
whole are utterly misleading. I have been describing the seasons of the
North-Western Provinces; and yet, as Benares is in the lower part of
these provinces, its climate is considerably different from that of the
country farther north and west. The farther north we travel the longer
and colder is the cold season, and as a rule the hotter and briefer is
the hot season. On one occasion the heat was so great in Benares in
March that we found the night punkah pleasant; but on reaching Delhi,
nearly six hu