1890.] H. James Rainey — Barisdl Guns. 9 



The " burning springs" of, what Mi'. Mansou calls. " the Sita Kund 

 range," is probably not produced by marsh gas, but most likely, as 

 suggested by the learned Director of the Geological Survey of India 

 -with regard to the " Sita Kund " near Monghyr, to " deep seated 

 thermo-dynamic action." As regards the designation " Sita Kund," 

 I may explain that, it is a sort of generic term applied to all natural 

 hot springs in India, and it is derived from a well-known episode 

 chronicled in the great Sanskrit Epic, " the Ramayana:" on the rescue 

 of Sita from the clutches of Ravana, king of Lanka (Ceylon), her 

 consort Rama jealous of her honour, caused her to undergo the ordeal of 

 fire and to prove her chastity, after which she performed her ablution 

 in a spring, which thenceforth became a hot spring. 



I may add that I have no desire to impugn the correctness of 

 the conclusion arrived at by the Sub-Committee, — "that there is no 

 evidence in favour of volcanic action having caused the sounds ;" 

 and the scientific reputation of Colonel Waterhouse, the Rev. Father 

 Lafont and Mr. Pedler, who are among the melnbers of the Sub-Com- 

 mittee, is a sufficient guarantee that the enquiry will be carefully and 

 cautiously conducted on strictly scientific lines. Bnt, I would suggest 

 that, before finally discarding in foto all considerations of volcanic 

 agency, sub-marine or otherwise, it might be worth while to enquire if 

 similar sounds are heard any where in the proximity of mud volcanoes 

 intimately associated with petroleum beds, scattered in various parts 

 of the globe. I have read in some book, I think in a magazine, pub- 

 lished in the beginning of the present century, that somewhat similar 

 sounds are heard somewhere in China, and have been traced to subter- 

 ranean origin. The mud volcanoes of Java are said to explode in,ost 

 violently during the rainy season, and though Mr. Mallet found the con- 

 trary to be the case as regards Ramri and Cheduba, in one of his 

 Reports, yet it was admittedly on insufficient data. Captain Hannay, 

 quoted by Mr. Mallet, writing of a gas mud volcano connected with 

 petroleum beds in Upper Assam, in Jour. As Soc, B., 1845, says : — 



" This is indeed a strange looking place, and I am told by the 

 Singphos that at times there is an internal noise as of distant thunder, 

 when it bursts forth suddenly, with a loud report, and then for a time 

 subsides." 



If sub-marine volcanic action produces explosions on the coast, 

 would the sounds be readily carried inland along the course of the 

 rivers that discharge themselves into the Bay ? Of course this is put 

 forward as nothing more than a mere suggestion, and not advanced as 

 an attempt to build any particular theoxy as to the sounds being of vol- 

 canic origin. 



