Travels in the Mogul Empire (Bernier) 24.11

24.11

These rains obviate the necessity of cutting canals in Bengale, as is done in Egypt, for the purpose of irrigating and enriching the land. They could indeed be made with as much facility in the one country as in the other, the Ganges and other rivers of Hindoustan increasing, the same as the Nile, in summer in consequence of the rains which regularly fall at that season. There is this difference between the two countries: that in Egypt no rain is known, neither in summer nor scarcely at any other time, excepting occasionally in a small quantity toward the sea. It is only near the source of the Nile, in Ethiopia, that rain falls; whereas throughout the Indies it rains periodically in the countries through which the rivers flow. It should be observed, however, that this is not the case universally; for in the kingdom of Scindy, toward the Persian Gulf, where the mouth of the Indus is situated, there are years during which no rain whatever falls, although the Indus be greatly swollen. The fields are then irrigated, as in Egypt, by means of kalis, or artificial channels.