IN INDIA AND CALIFORNIA. 107 



Edinburgh, 129 George Street, February 10, 1854. 



My Dear Sir: In course of conversation with you at Amherst, when I enjoyed the pleasure of a 

 visit to your house, I communicated to you my impression of the height of certain precipitous cliffs on 

 the banks of the Sutlej river, in the Himalaya, mentioning, that to the best of my recollection, I had 

 estimated them at the time to reach the height of 1500 feet. I find on referring to my notes that I 

 was correct in this recollection. I had set them clown as of that height and possibly higher. The 

 place is on the Sutlej, about seven miles above the confluence of the Buspa, in the district called 

 Koomiwur, the great grape-growing country of the Himalaya. In addition to the note of the estimated 

 height of the cliffs, I had observed in my note-book that they were very precipitous, almost and some- 

 times quite vertical. The path was all along the face of the cliff, now mounting high up to avoid 

 some impracticable projection, and again similarly descending ; the ascents managed by rude steps, at 

 times very high and perpendicular. The path throughout a mere ledge, often extremely narrow, and 

 occasionally supplemented by a trunk of a tree thrown across a chasm and in contact with the vertical 

 face of rock, its ends resting on the projecting ledges forming the path. 



The above is the description of the place as obtained from my note-book. At the base of this cliff 

 flowed the Sutlej, here a very full and impetuous river. The rocks are gneiss and clay slate. 



I am ashamed to have so long omitted to write to you and give the above information, which may be 

 interesting, as confirming what I stated to you, with only half confidence, at Amherst. 



22. The famous Cow's Mouth, in the Himalaya mountains, appears to be an 

 enormous gorge cut by the Ganges, through a part of that chain. Some other 

 similar cuts are described on that river; but I have not the authorities at hand for 

 a minute description. 



23. Ravines on the west side of tlie Sierra Nevada Mountains, in California. — The 

 general character of the western slope of these mountains is thus stated by Philip 

 T. Tyson, Esq., in his Eeport to the Government, on the Geology of California 

 (p. 7) : "The western flanks of the Sierra, as far as observed, consist of a vast 

 mass of metamorphic and hypogene rocks, stretching from the Sacramento valley 

 to the axis of the mountain. This mass of matter has an average slope from the 

 valley upwards of 180 feet to the mile, thus giving a great rate of fall to the 

 streams which rise in the vicinity of the snow peaks : these, aided by the decom- 

 posing energies of atmospheric agents, have excavated ravines of enormous depths, 

 reaching along some branches of the American river at least 3500 feet. Into 

 these, other ravines open with their innumerable tributaries, which, by intersecting 

 the country in every direction, give it the appearance of a group of rounded and 

 conical mountains." The following are examples of these ravines : — 



1. South Fork of Yuba river: about 3000 feet deep. 



2. North Fork of the American river : 3000 feet deep. 



3. Middle Fork, not quite so deep. 



4. South Fork, of a similar character. 



5. Mokelumne river : 2000 feet. 



The following extract from a private letter, from Mr. J. S. Daggett, principal of 

 the Academy, in Americus, Georgia, gives so clear an idea of some of the features 

 of the western slope of the Sierras of California, that I take the liberty, without 

 consulting him, to insert it : — 



"In the passage from San Francisco to the mining or mountainous region of the interior of the 

 State of California, one cannot but be sensibly impressed with the geological features of the country, 

 which give indication, amounting almost to positive proof, that the whole of that part of the State has 



