1842.] of the Damoodah Valley. 735 



to this place, and to its agency probably the out-burst of the vein may 

 be attributed. 



From the description of this great coal field it will be seen, that 

 there is no want of the mineral to be apprehended, and that the pre- 

 sent collieries are fully capable of producing therefrom any quantity 

 of coal that can be required; but it is not the difficulty of raising, and 

 the production of coal that impedes supply. First, the necessary 

 charge for European superintendence, which is required to conduct 

 money operations, adds an extraordinary heavy charge upon the cost 

 of production. Then comes the capability of river transport, and the 

 difficulty of obtaining such a ghaut on the river as will admit boats 

 to lie ready laden to start off with the mountain torrents. The 

 rivers Barracar, Damoodah, and Adji, all rising in the hills, are navi- 

 gable only for boats to descend for about ten weeks, and then only at 

 such times as the rain in the hills affords sufficient water to produce 

 a flood in the river ; the rapid descent of the river beds seldom allow- 

 ing a flood sufficient to float a laden boat to remain three days, but 

 more usually two days, for unless a boat starts with the first or begin- 

 ning of the torrent, it will be difficult for it to reach its destination at 

 Omptah, where the coal depots are situated, before the water shall 

 have fallen to a depth insufficient to bear the laden boat; but empty 

 boats can proceed up the river at all times during the ten weeks. It 

 is therefore necessary for a colliery to have on the river's margin such 

 a ghaut, as where a pond of deep water is situated, and where laden 

 boats can remain till the torrents admit of their departure. Such 

 ghauts are extremely rare, and within the whole distance described 

 on the Damoodah, there are not more than four or five such, where 

 thirty laden boats can remain. It is with the greatest difficulty that the 

 present collieries can manage to keep their extensive number of boats 

 ready laden: This will be easily conceived, when it is recollected, that 

 from the Nooneah Khal, where the collieries of Messrs. Carr, Tagore 

 and Co. and those of myself are situated, if a flood succeeds after a period 

 of ten days' absence of it, that a line of coal boats then departing ex- 

 tends frequently six miles in length, and is perhaps one of the prettiest 

 sights that a stranger can witness. The channel of the river wherein 

 alone the boats pass down, is extremely tortuous, very narrow, and 

 constantly changing from the effects of the sudden rise and violence 



