1834.] Chirra Punji, 8(C. 25 



IV. — Chirra Punji, and a Detail of some of the favourable circumstances 

 which render it an Advantageous Site for the Erection of an Iron and 

 Steel Manufactory on an extensive scale. By Lieut. -Col. Thomas C. 

 Watson. 



Now that the commercial privileges of the East India Company arc 

 abolished, and that free scope is given to the improvement of India, 

 through the enterprising speculations of British subjects, it may fairly 

 be expected ere long that the efforts of enlightened industry, and all the 

 aid of modern machinery and scientific research, supported by a liberal 

 outlay of capital, will be employed in perfecting the existing produce and 

 manufacture of the country, as well as bringing into vigorous and flou- 

 rishing development many sources of national prosperity which have 

 hitherto languished under the unwholesome shadow of a wide -spreading 

 and disqualifying monopoly. 



My present object however is not to speculate on possibilities, but to 

 bring forward a few plain matters of fact, which may appear to others 

 who have the means of turning them to account to be pregnant with 

 matter of some importance. 



A residence of considerable duration in the Kasya or Silhet hills, 

 and my observations and inquiries while sojourning there, have impress- 

 ed my mind with a full and satisfactory conviction, that works might be 

 established in those hills for the manufacture of iron and steel on a 

 very extensive scale, and under as favorable a combination of circumstan- 

 ces as can well be imagined or desired. It would be foreign to my 

 purpose, and I fear beyond my ability, to attempt anything like a scien- 

 tific treatment of this subject, and I shall therefore content myself with 

 merely detailing in the order in which they strike me, certain matters of 

 fact, leaving the inference to be drawn from them to those better qua- 

 lified than myself to consider the question in all its bearings and rela- 

 tions. 



The sanatary station of Chirra Punji is situated on the range of 

 mountains that bound the plains of Silhet on the north, and which run 

 nearly east and west. There is little or no rise in the country, to the 

 very foot of the hills ; the ascent to which is for the most part very 

 abrupt. The Sanatarium is about 4,200 feet above the level of the sea, 

 and distant about eight or ten miles from Tyrea Ghat, where the 

 ascent commences, to which place the Pandua river is navigable nearly 

 half the year. The journey from Tyrea to Chirra is seldom performed 

 in less than four hours. 



The average temperature of Chirra throughout the year is more than 



