THE NERBUDDA 281 



on their long journey of many hundred miles to the 

 ocean. 



What a stupendous force, which is gradually levelling 

 down the land and sinking it in the sea ! How many 

 million tons of solid earth and sand and stones are whirled 

 along by this great river daily or weekly would be hard to 

 calculate. The mass of water, a mile wide and 50 feet 

 deep, moving along for days and months together, is a 

 spectacle that fills the mind with wonder and awe. The 

 sky is lurid with heavy rain-charged clouds, at times 

 discharging torrents of drenching warm rain. At times 

 the thunder rolls, and flash after flash of vivid lightning 

 rends the sky, and again the surface of the torrent is 

 whitened and lashed by the howling hot tempest. There 

 is a cataract through a narrow gorge 200 miles lower 

 down, near Chandgarh, where the Satpura and Vindhya 

 hills close in upon the Nerbudda. The river has worn 

 a passage for itself between solid masses of rock which 

 are quite close together. How does the great river, 

 when in flood, pass through this narrow gorge ? That I 

 have not myself seen ; but when crossing the river at 

 low water in the month of May, then about 60 yards 

 wide, in a small dug-out canoe, it struck me that it must 

 be at full flood equal in volume to several Niagaras. 



The forest bungalow in which we spent the hot season* 

 when I was employed as Deputy Conservator of forests 

 in charge of the Western Division, Central Provinces, 

 stands on the banks of the Nerbudda at Hoshangabad. 

 The bungalow is a large straggling, thatched, typical 

 Indian habitation, with very wide verandahs all round, 

 and a wide chappar shed, on strong posts, forming a 

 shelter outside in the garden, which is a large one, with 



* This was in 1870, when the writer had returned from furlough in 

 Europe, a married man. 



