150 Contributions to Physical Geography. 



Victory, so named by Hyder; and the remaining three at 

 Koodolee ; and after being precipitated down the cataract, and 

 then gently winding the current through a rugged way, which 

 it has forced through the base of the mountains at the verge of 

 their declivity, widens at Gersuppah, and forms a beautiful 

 river, called Sarawati, navigable for sixteen miles for boats to 

 the town of Honore, where it falls into the sea. 



" Like most other places to which the natives have given 

 names from something remarkable in their soil or site, this was 

 called Gersuppah, because the ground, before the buildings had 

 been erected, was covered with cashew-nut trees ; Ger, signify- 

 ing in Canarese, the tree of this description, and Sooppoo, a 

 leaf 



" It was asserted by the bramin who accompanied ine, in 

 their usual exaggerated style, that the old city here contained, 

 in its flourishing state, a lakh of houses, and I have no doubt, 

 from the extent of the ruins, that its population may have been 

 above half that number. Out of seventy-four temples called 

 Busty, there remains but one, well constructed of granite, 

 covered with a stone roof, where the Chatour Mookee, or four- 

 fronted idol of the Jain caste (the then inhabitants) sits, sur- 

 viving the homage of its long silent worshippers, a prey to the 

 moles and to the bats. 



" On leaving Gersuppah, we commenced the arduous un- 

 dertaking of ascending the Ghauts. The pass here is neither 

 so steep, rugged, narrow, or so much intersected with conical 

 loose rock as those in other directions through the same range ; 

 but is much longer, being fully twelve miles in continued un- 

 dulations, so that the line of road (and it is surprising how it 

 could have been first traced out) is disheartening, as well as 

 unsatisfactory ; for imagining that considerable progress has 

 been made, descent and rise alternately succeed ere the long 

 wished-for summit be gained, which occupies at the least six. 

 hours to accomplish. 



" The morning having proved fair, seemed, independently 

 of the solemnity of the day (Sunday,) to fill our hearts with 

 cheerfulness at the thoughts of making towards the scene from 

 which we expected our curiosity to be so scon amply repaid for 

 the distance we had come. The solemn silence that pervaded 



