36 MANUAL OP THE NILAGIRI DISTRICT. 



CHAP. IV, experience ; a week's residence here produced the greatest possible 



PART I. change in my health and feelings^ and I have no doubt that the 



Climate, &c. day will come when this will be esteemed the Montpellier of 



India, and that people will resort to it from all quarters." 



In another portion of his letter this correspondent remarks : " I 

 don't remember to have seen the glass lower than 56 degrees at 

 the coldest season, and in the coldest portion of the Isle of France. 

 If my memory is correct, it usually rose to 75 or 76 degrees during 

 the day. This was during the months of May, June, July, August, 

 and part of September ; during the remainder of the year the 

 weather is very much better. If this statement is correct, the 

 temperature of the air on the Nilagerry Mountains in the hot 

 season is about equal to the temperature of the Isle of France 

 in the cold. I have no means of knowing what the temperature 

 at the Cape is, but it is not much cooler, I imagine, than the 

 climate of the Isle of France, as the mountainous parts of the island 

 are much higher than any habitable lands at the Cape. The 

 mean temperature for the month of March (when the hot season 

 is over) is stated in a periodical publication to be 72 degrees. I 

 remember to have seen the glass at the Government House at the 

 Cape rise to above 100 degrees on Christmas-day, the hottest 

 season of the year." * * * '' Partictilars of the climate 

 of New South Wales are given in Wentworth's recent account of 

 that colony, but I think he states the thermometer to rise as high 

 as 85 degrees or 90 in the shade. In the summer months of 

 March, April, and May on the Nilagerries it got as high as 79. 

 * * * These facts are abundantly sufficient to prove the 

 very extraordinary coolness of the Nilagerry Mountains through- 

 out the year." 

 Reports on When this letter was written only fifteen or twenty travellers had 



to^o™^a ^r^ visited the Hills, but the number of visitors rose rapidly, and still 

 more rapidly did the climate rise in popular estimation for cool- 

 ness and salubrity. But some of the doctors were diffident. The 

 main point at issue was whether or not the Hills would supply 

 suitable sanitaria firstly for the invalids of the Honorable Company's 

 European troops, and, secondly, as a residence for Civil and Military 

 officers not invalids. Report after report was called for. Finally 

 a complete digest of all information collected on the medical 

 topography and climate of the Hills was submitted to Government 

 by the Medical Board on the 13th March 1828, together with an 

 excellent paper on the meteorology, contributed by Surgeon 

 Dalmahoy, then stationed at Kotagiri. 



Later, in 1832, a full report was submitted to the Court of 

 Directors respecting " the extent and permanence of the benefit 

 derived by European soldiers and public officers " from a resort to 

 these Hills. The officer from whom the Medical Board derived 



