1839.] Lieut Kittoe's Journey through the Forests of Orissa. 677 



The Bissai valley is evidently a most fertile tract of country, it is 

 about twenty miles or more in length, and averages on the whole about 

 four in breadth ; there are several small streams intersecting it, and one 

 large torrent called " Korkaie" which rises in the Seemulpal moun- 

 tains to the southward, and crossing the valley between Nowagaon and 

 Arjunbilla, winds down its northern face, turns round the base of the 

 Soolapat hill (one of the points in the trigonometrical survey) then pass- 

 ing through the Baumunghatti valley continuing in a north easterly di- 

 rection, ultimately joins the Subunreeka somewhere near Ghatislla ; 

 the water of this rivulet could be made available for sugar mills. 



Leaving Nowagaon I proceeded by a narrow defile towards Jush- 

 purgurh, which place I reached in two marches. I passed the Tinderi 

 ghat (which I have already described) to my right, and found myself 

 in another extensive valley, bounded on one side by the Buddaum 

 range, and on the other by the lofty Seemulpal and Selma mountains. 

 The villages here (like those of Bissai) have all been destroyed, the coun- 

 try has become a perfect wilderness but in the immediate vicinity of 

 Jushpur it is open and well inhabited, the cultivation is chiefly rice and 

 oil seeds. 



Jushpurgurh is the capital of a large purgunnah of that name, be- 

 longing to Mohurbhunj, it is situated at the confluence of the rivulets 

 Krere and Bundun, on a high mound between the two ; the place was 

 in former years strongly stockaded, but at present there is scarcely a 

 vestige of the works left. The town is built round the foot of the mound. 



The two rivers assume the name of Krerebundun below their junc- 

 tion, where, for the distance of a mile they flow in a deep and narrow 

 channel as far as a spot called Ram Teerut; at this place the (gneiss ?) 

 rocks stretch across a little below the level of the banks, the Krere- 

 bundun falls over them into a tolerably deep chasm, in which there is 

 a large circular basin ; beyond it is a smaller fall into a second pool 

 from whence the river flows over a gravelly bed by a most tortuous 

 course, till it finally empties itself into the Byeturni a little above 

 Jotepur. The water is considered very good, there are fish in abun- 

 dance, a very fine Mahasir*was caught and brought to me. The 

 mode of fishing here is curious, a net is let down and placed in a circu- 

 lar manner, several persons ply about in canoes and keep tapping the 

 rocks at the bottom with long poles to frighten the fish from under 

 them, the two ends of the net are gradually closed, it is then drawn up 

 and the fish taken out. 



There are the remains of a small temple beside the falls, also seve- 

 ral strange marks in the rock caused originally by the water : some are 



