The day becomes oppressive, the nights unrefreshing, the grass is withered and brown, the earth hard and cleft, the lakes shrunk to shallows, and the rivers evaporated to dryness.

Europeans now escape from the low country, and betake themselves to the shade of the forests adjoining the coffee-plantations in the hills; or to the still higher sanatarium of Neuera-ellia, nearly the loftiest plateau in the mountains of the Kandyan range.

The winds, when any are perceptible, are faint and unsteady with a still increasing westerly tendency, partial showers sometimes fall, and thunder begins to mutter towards sunset.

At the close of the month, the mean temperature will be found to have advanced about a degree, but the sensible temperature and the force of the sun's rays are felt in a still more perceptible proportion.
[Sidenote: Wind N.W.to S.W.
Temperature, 24 hours: Mean greatest 88.7 deg.
Mean least 73.6 deg.
Rain (inches) 7.4] _April_ is by far the most oppressive portion of the year for those who remain at the sea-level of the island.

The temperature continues to rise as the sun in his northern progress passes vertically over the island.