PREFACE. VU 



liberal suppoi't of the Governor General in Council, this difficulty is 

 now being rapidly removed. 



In the present volume will be found descriptive accounts of *hat 

 portion of Bengal lying along the shore of the Bay, from the Chilka 

 Lake to the north of Calcutta, and in succeeding volumes. Maps and 

 description of the countries adjoining those now published will be issued, 

 so as finally to combine into one general Geological Map of Bengal. 

 A similar plan will be adopted with reference to Madras, and Central 

 India, and whenever practicable, these maps will be all on the same 

 scale, so as to combine into one. 



In a country, however, of such immense area, and regarding the 

 structure of which so little is known as India, it will occasionally be 

 necessary to visit, and examine, and therefore to publish description of, 

 districts not immediately connected with such systematic progress, as 

 we have just alluded to. Of this class, is the report given in the present 

 volume, on the Khasi Hills. Such reports would much more properly 

 have been delayed until the adjoining districts could have been visited, 

 but containing important information in itself, while many years would, 

 in all probability elapse, before the neighbourhood could be revisited, 

 it seemed desirable to publish it at once. 



So far as possible, my anxious desire is that all such reports or 

 memoirs as are published, should be drawn up by those gentlemen 

 attached to the survey, who have had the fullest opportunity of be- 

 coming acquainted with each district. 



A word on the orthography of Indian names. I have avoided any 

 discussion of the question, I have preferred adopting the spelling in 

 ordinary use, to any partial or imperfect rectification of it. And to a 

 great extent for the following reasons. On the Maps issued under the 

 authority of the great Trigonometrical Survey of India, the Jonesian 

 system of orthography for Indian names is adopted ; on the maps, pre- 

 pared by the Revenue Survey of India, issued from the same Office, 



