9 



weather prevented our seeing any thing of the surrounding shores 

 on the first day: the next morning we passed the low sandy plains 

 near the entrance of the river Nerbudda, in the Baroche Pur- 

 gunna; there were no enclosures, and only a few trees round the 

 villages. As we proceeded up the gulf, the atmosphere cleared, 

 and we distinguished the western hills at Bownagur: the eastern 

 view continued to present a flat country, richly cultivated. We 

 anchored that evening with the ebb tide near Gongwa, a village 

 embosomed in mango and tamarind trees, surrounded by corn- 

 fields, pasturage, flocks of sheep, herds of cattle, and large ricks 

 of wheat; monkeys, squirrels, peacocks, doves, and smaller birds 

 cheered the groves; the plains were animated by an immense num- 

 ber of antelopes. 



This village belongs exclusively to the Gosaings, or Senassees, 

 a caste of religious Hindoo mendicants, described in another place, 

 who march in large bodies through the provinces of Hindostan, 

 and levy heavy contributions : they are sometimes hired as auxilia- 

 ries, being an athletic race, brave and hardy, seldom encumbered 

 with drapery, and often entirely naked: these gymnosophists at 

 Gongwa acknowledge a superior of their own tribe, and seem con- 

 tented with their fertile district, which they enjoy unmolested by 

 paying an annual tribute to the Mahratlas. Some of us landed 

 and were hospitably entertained with milk, butter, and a variety 

 of fruit. Unlike the generality of Hindoos, these Gosaings do not 

 burn their dead, but bury them, and, what is more extraordinary, 

 often inhume them before they expire. On this occasion, when a 

 patient is deemed past recovery, his friends dig a grave, and 

 placing him in a perpendicular posture, put an earthen pot over 



VOL. II. c 



