2/0 MANUAL OF THE NILAGIRI DISTRICT. 



CHAP. XII. But lie was more concerned with these wild people than with the 

 „ ^, grand hills on which they dwelt. Still the glorious panorama of 

 History, hill and plain which was spread out before him could not pass 

 unnoticed. 



" Although the atmosphere was rather hazy, I had from the hills," 

 he writes, " a noble view of the whole course of the Bhavani and of 

 the country called Chera, as far as Sandi-durga, and other remote hills. 

 Near the village I was refreshed by the cool water of a fine perennial 

 spring, which in India is a great rarity." 



Thus, whilst the first European who ascended these hills was a 

 religious propagandist, upon whose eye their glorious scenery fell 

 unheeded, the first Englishman was a scientist, whose first words 

 were a tribute of praise to the hills, the river, and the refreshing 

 spring, and the note he struck has been re-echoed by every fellow- 

 countryman who has since climbed to this land of " springs of 

 water ^^ and of " sacred hills." 



From Devanaikenkota Buchanan passed to Srimugai, near 

 Mettapollium, the residence in Tippu's time of an amildar, and 

 thence to Coimbatore, where we part company with him. 

 Colonel Colin We tum now to Colonel Mackenzie. His scheme of survey 

 8urvev°^^^^ embraced ''the statistics and history of the country as well 

 as its geography." He had three assistants and a Naturalist, 

 Dr. Heyne. Among the services to science which he performed 

 may be mentioned the discovery of the Jaina religion, the 

 accumulation of a mass of information regarding Lingayat 

 and other sects, the Sassanams and other inscriptions, the 

 monumental stones and trophies — virakal and mastil-al,^ — 

 " the sepulchral tumuli, mounds, and barrows of the early 

 tribes." This information was embodied in district survey 

 memoirs. Although we know that Colonel Mackenzie did not 

 ascend the Nilagiris, yet there can be little question that either 

 one or more of his assistants did, for we find from his letter (11th 

 January 1816) to the Madras Government, that in 1808 he had 

 forwarded a notice of the Hills contained in his " 6th Volume of 

 Memoirs of the 18th and 26th October 1808 " transmitted to the 

 Court of Directors in 1809. I have endeavoured to obtain this 

 notice from the Surveyor- General's Office, Calcutta, to whom these 

 volumes were returned, but without success ; the extract, 

 however, is of interest. 



" I have put up in the case for transmission to Europe a copy of a 

 map of the Nilagiri mountains in the district of Danaikencotta. in the 

 Coimbatoor province, on the original scale of survey of one mile to an 

 inch. I have selected this as an original specimen of the work of the 

 native assistant surveyors, and of the survey of a singular tract of 



' See his letter quoted in Preface to Tol. 1 of the Cot. Rais. 



