1865.] Notes of a tour in the Tributary Mehals. 25 



In the thickness of the gateway wall, a niche four feet in depth and 

 about eight feet in height and breadth, is divided by a column still in 

 position, shewing how the fragments of the columns of the ruined 

 colonnade should be restored. The shaft and base are octagonal and the 

 bracket-like projections of the capital are crouching human figures, so 

 placed, that head, arms, hands and back all appear to support the 

 abacus. There is one well executed figure in this enclosure, of a man 

 kneeling on a coiled cobra, and with snake heads peering over each 

 shoulder. 



A flight of 48 cut stone steps leads from this resting place to 

 another mass of ruins which appear to have been a temple and gateway 

 combined. There is here an image of Durga with 20 arms, another 

 with eight, and a large figure of Hunooman, all more or less mutilated. 

 We are now on the ridge forming the top of the hill. Bare as are 

 the sides of the rock, there must be here a great depth of soil, as it 

 supports a variety of large forest trees and shrubs, which are growing 

 luxuriantly. On the highest part of the ridge and about the centre 

 of the hill, is the temple, which contained no doubt the principal object 

 of worship. It consisted of a small fane, the inner crust of which, 

 constructed of parallel courses of roughly cut stone, is still standing, 

 with a detached portico on columns. It is small and insignificant, but 

 no doubt immensely old ; it is impossible to say to what idol or object 

 of worship the temple was originally dedicated ; at present, on the old 

 " argha" or stand, there is a group of Vishnu with his wives, but the 

 group does not fit the pedestal, is of more elaborate workmanship than 

 the figures that are lying about, and whilst all the old figures are mu- 

 tilated, this one is perfect. I conclude that it was placed in the temple 

 after its partial destruction, and the mutilation of the original images. 



I found the air on the hill keen and invigorating. There is space for 

 several houses on the saddle back ; and as it is an independent isolated 

 mountain, it commands an extensive view, shewing that all this part 

 of Sirgoojah, which the maps make out to be a mass of hills, from 

 tha foot of the Mynepat, as far as the eye from this elevation can 

 penetrate westward, is, thus seen, a plain slightly undulating, but on 

 the whole well adapted for the Railroad, which, I am confident, will some 

 day be made through it, connecting, by the most direct route, Calcutta, 

 Central India and Bombay. 

 4 



