492 Notes of a trip from Simla to the Spiti Valley. [No. 5, 



tion of rocky lake barriers along the course of the Sutlej, but they are 

 rather to be regarded as a guage whereby we may estimate the extent 

 to which the Sutlej has deepened its channel by the ordinary process 

 of erosion during the most recent geologic periods. Cataclysms 

 produced by landslips or the descent of glaciers into a river bed, 

 however devastating in their effects, are quite incapable of giving 

 rise to such regular deposits of sand and shingle as constitute the 

 elevated terraces along the Sutlej ; neither have I anywhere seen de- 

 posits of such a nature as to induce the belief of their lacustrine 

 origin, as they every where present the appearance of ordinary river 

 sands and shingle, such as in the present day are forming in existing 

 river channels. In the village is a Hindoo temple in a ruinous con- 

 dition, with images of Bulls and Lingums, and the whole place pre- 

 sents an aspect of dilapidation and decay. 



lQth, Rampur. — Passed the village of Datnaga, near which the 

 Sutlej is spanned by a jhula bridge. A good deal of cultivation ex- 

 ists hereabouts, and transplanting rice was being carried on vigorous- 

 ly. The town of Rampur is snugly situated within a bend of the river, 

 which here rushes impetuously through a narrow rocky bed, hurrying 

 down numberless pine logs at a rate of some six miles an hour. 



Above the town are some commodious native houses, a temple and 

 a large, well built room facing the river, for the convenience of travel- 

 lers. In the temple are two figures of Devi and some other god- 

 dess, with silver faces and a profusion of long hair. When I was 

 there, these images were brought out and paraded, with music and 

 attendants waving chouries over them. They were carried on a litter 

 placed on two very long and elastic poles, supported by a man at 

 either end, after the fashion of a sedan chair ; and at intervals the 

 bearers would, by means of the elastic poles, jerk the images violent- 

 ly up and down, causing their long ringlets to fly about their ears in 

 a mad fashion, to the intense delight of the spectators, comprising 

 many of the elders and most of the juveniles of Rampur. This 

 strange manoeuvre was, I think, a clumsy attempt to represent the 

 inspiration and actual presence of the divinity in her idol, thereby 

 imparting to it life and motion, as in Bengal the idol of Kali is, 

 during the festival of the Durga Pujah, supposed to be animated by the 

 spirit of the goddess, and is thrown away uncared for, when the " real 

 presence" (to borrow the appropriate catholic phrase) is supposed to 



