90 S I N S I N for the improvement of breeds of sheep; and in 1793 he circulated a plan for a board of agriculture and internal improvement. When the board was shortly afterwards established by a charter from the orown he was nominated its first president. From the agricultural reports published by this society he compiled his Code of Agriculture, published in 1819. About 1790 he conceived a plan for a Statistical Account of Scotland, and the work was published in twenty-one volumes, 1791-1799. Sir John Sinclair was also the author of a number of tracts on naval and military subjects; and in 1794 he raised for the defence of the kingdom a regiment of a thousand men, at first called the "Caithness Fencibles," afterwards the "Rothesay and Caithness Fencibles"; a second battalion of a thousand men was raised by him in 1795, which took part in suppressing the rebellion in Ireland in 1798. Though originally a supporter in parliament of the war policy of Pitt, he afterwards joined the "armed neutrality " party, which advocated retrenchment and reform. In 1805 he was appointed by Pitt a commis- sioner for superintending the construction of roads and bridges in the north of Scotland. He was a member of most of the agricultural societies of the Continent, and held as many as twenty-five foreign diplomas. He was a fellow of the Royal Societies of London and Edinbuigh, a fellow of the Antiquarian Society of London, and president of the Highland Society of London. No man of his time took a more comprehensive and enlightened interest in the general welfare of the country or conferred on it more substantial benefits. He enjoyed the esteem and intimate friendship of many eminent contemporaries both at home and abroad, with several of whom he kept up an extensive correspondence. He died 21st December 1835. By his first wife, a daughter of Alexander Maitland of Stoke Newington near London, he had two daughters, of whom the elder, Hannah, was the authoress of a work on the Principles of the Christian Faith. By his second wife, the Hon. Diana Macdonald, only daughter of Alexander, first Lord Macdonald, lie had thirteen children, of whom the eldest son, George (1790-1860), who suc- ceeded to the baronetcy, was a schoolfellow of Byron and Peel at Harrow, and is styled by Byron the "prodigy of our school days"; the third son, John (1797-1875), became archdeacon of Middlesex, and, besides the Memoirs of his father, wrote several theological works ; and the fourth daughter, Catherine (1800-1864), who for many years acted as his secretary, after his death achieved some distinction as an authoress, her principal works being Modern Accomplishments, 1836 ; Scotland and the Scotch, 1840 ; Modern Flirtation, 1841 ; and Popular Legends and Bible Truths, 1852. See Correspondence of the Right Hon. Sir John Sinclair, Bart., with Reminis- cences of Distinguished Characters, 1 vols., London, 1831; and Afemoirs of the Life and Works of the Right Hon. Sir John Sinclair, 2 vols., Edinburgh, 1837. SIND, the westernmost territorial subdivision of India, and a frontier province of considerable importance in a geographical and political aspect, lies between the 23d and 28th parallels of N. latitude and between the 66th and 71st meridians of E. longitude. Its length from north to south is estimated at 360 miles, and the average of its breadth from east to west at 170. On the north it is bounded by the Khelat state (see BALUCHISTAN), the Punjab, and .Bahawalpur; on the E. by Jaisalmir and Mulani, or generally the more desert tracts of Western Rajputana; on the S. by the Runn of Cutch (Rann of Kachh) and the Indian Ocean ; and on the W. by Khelafc, which overlaps it on the north. Including the alienated district of Khairpur and the extensive tract to the south called the political superintendency of the Thar and Par- kar, its area is set down as between 56,000 and 57,000 square miles. The one 'great geographical feature in Sind is the lower Indus, passing, as it does, through the entire length of the province, first in a south-westerly direction, then turning somewhat to the east, then returning to a line more directly south, and finally inclining to the west, to seek an outlet at the sea. Though there is much similarity in the appearance of the landscape on the two sides of the broad river, the distant line of mountains between Sakhar and Sehwan, the steep pass overhanging the water at Lakki, and the hill country below Sehwan give a distinctive character to the right bank, and lend it special attraction when contrasted with the flat lowlands, merging into desert, on the left. Sind has been aptly likened to Egypt. If the one depends for life and fertility on the Nile, so does the other on the Indus. The cities and towns are not so readily to be compared. Hyderabad, notwith- standing its remarkable fortress and handsome tombs, can Map of Sind. scarcely vie in interest as a native capital with Cairo ; nor can Kurrachee, as a Europeanized capital, be said to have attained the celebrity of Alexandria. Yet there are some respects in which this particular province would not be wholly eclipsed, even in its outside pictures. It contains many monuments of archaeological and architectural interest, and to the traveller descending the river from the Punjab, or ascending it from Kotri, the coup d'oeil on the approach to Rohri is at times singularly striking. The beautiful little island of Khwaja Kidhr is a gem in itself ; and there is at certain seasons undoubted poetry in the very dreariness of Sakhar and Bakhar. Owing to the deficiency of rain, the continuance of hot weather in Sind is exceptional. Lying between two monsoons, it just escapes the influence of both. The south-west monsoon stops short at Lakhpat Bandar, the north-west monsoon at Kurrachee, and even here the annual rainfall is not reckoned at more than six or eight inches. At times there is no rainfall for two or three years, while at others there is a whole season's rainfall in one or two days. The average temperature of the summer months rises to 95 F., and the winter average is 60, the summer maximum being 120 and the winter minimum 32. The temperature on the sea-coast is much more equable than elsewhere. In Northern Sind we find frost in winter, while both there and in Lower Sind the summer heat is extreme and prolonged. This great heat, combined with the pois- onous exhalations from the pools left after the annual inundation and the decaying vegetable deposits, produces the fever and ague with which the name of the country is associated, and to which even the natives themselves fall a prey.
