4 1 S On the Tenasserim Coal Field. 



of the town. Its course in ascending has a south-eastern direction 

 for thirty-eight miles, when it turns suddenly to the northward ; it is 

 here joined by the little Tenasserim river from the south, and the an- 

 cient capital of the province. The town of Tenasserim is situated at 

 the point of junction. The coal is seventeen miles dva north of Te- 

 nasserim, but the sinuosities of the river increase the distance to 

 twenty-nine miles. 



2. The banks of the river are in a few places one hundred, and one 

 hundred and twenty yards apart, but two hundred yards may be 

 called the average breadth above Tenasserim, below this it is in no 

 part less than three hundred. 



It discharges a large body of water during the south-west mon- 

 soon. The greatest difference of level at different seasons observed 

 at the coal site is thirty-five feet, and though there is a rise of tide at 

 Mergui of eighteen feet, ships at anchor there during the freshes are 

 said not to swing to the flood. At Tenasserim, the daily rise and 

 fall is six feet, which, sixteen miles higher up, is reduced to one and 

 a half feet, and though the highest springs are felt within eight miles 

 of the coal, the tide cannot be said to assist navigation for more than 

 fifty-four miles. 



3 . I passed up the river for the purpose of inspecting the coal mine, 

 between the 12th and 16th of April, when the channel is confined to 

 nearly its narrowest limits. For the first forty-nine miles it is little 

 affected in point of utility by the changes of season ; it affords for 

 that distance a broad and deep channel, entirely free from rocks 

 or other impediments, and is at all times fit for inland navigation of 

 any description. Above this, the course becomes more tortuous, and 

 the rise of its bed increases by a succession of platforms, the edges of 

 which present, at this season, sloping ridges of gravel across the 

 stream, which cannot be avoided. 



They are fourteen in number, but the difference of level at each 

 step not great, and the current not accelerated thereby at any one point 

 to more than four and a half miles per hour. The depth of water above 

 and below was usually three feet, but on these gravel banks it varied 

 from one foot ten inches to one foot six inches to thirteen inches. They 

 are from forty to eight yards in extent, and form with the sand banks 

 some sudden turns in the stream. Its width for the last eighteen miles 



