124 FLOEA INDICA. 



himiid climate, and is therefore most appropriately noticed 

 here. It attains its greatest elevation to the southward, and 

 is broken up, by considerable depressions, into two or more 

 separate masses, of which the southernmost may be called 

 the Travancor range, whilst to the northward it is continued 

 as the Nilghiri, Kurg, and Nagar mountains. 



Travancor. — The mountains of Travancor form an iso- 

 lated mass at the extreme south of Malabar, which they se- 

 parate from the districts of Tinnevelly and Madura, in the 

 Southern Camatic. They are completely cut off from the 

 mountains on the north (Nilghiri) by a remarkable depres- 

 sion, in 11° N. lat., which is fifteen miles wide, and is oc- 

 cupied by the western portion of the district of Coimbator. 

 The Travancor group of mountains thus presents a striking 

 analogy to the island of Ceylon in position and outline. The 

 main chaia runs southward for 150 miles to Cape Comorin, 

 with occasional deep depressions, and terminates in a bold 

 precipitous mass, 3-4000 feet high, within three miles of the 

 Cape itself. The Travancor mountains are loftiest at the ex- 

 treme north of the district, where they stretch east and west 

 for sixty to seventy miles, separating the districts of Dindigal 

 and Madura, and rising into peaks of 8-9000 feet, which 

 overhang the plain of Coimbator ; and they retain an elevation 

 of 5-6000 feet throughout then- extent to the southward. 

 They are generally very precipitous, and undulating or rounded 

 grassy ridges seem to be of common occurrence at 6-7000 

 feet. Of the deep depressions that intersect the Travancor 

 range, and by which communications are kept up between the 

 districts which it divides, that of Courtalam, in 9° N. lat., is a 

 well-known botanical station, which, though on the eastern or 

 Camatic side, from its peculiar form and situation, is under 

 the influence of the south-west monsoon, and enjoys, together 

 with the rest of the province, a deliciously cool and equable 

 climate. Notwithstanding the perennial humidity, the rain- 

 fall at Courtalam is only 40 inches; on the hills around, 

 however, it is doubtless much greater. The Pulney or Palnai 



