224 



Notes, chiefly Geological, on the Western Coast of South India. 



By Capt. Newbold. 

 I have not yet had an opportunity of examining the Western Coast 

 from Cape Comorin to Beypoor, but by specimens received thence, 

 and by information from General Cullen, laterite is doubtless the pre- 

 valent surface rock. General Cullen writes me that he has found a bed 

 of lignite, in the laterite at Karkully, about fifteen miles south of Quilon, 

 in a stratum of dark shales and clays. At Cape Comorin itself are 

 beds of sandstone, and shell limestone, of which a good account is a desi- 

 deratum. 



Calicut. — At Calicut, the ancient capital of the Zamorin, (a corrup- 

 tion by the Portuguese for Raja Samudri) and the landing place of 

 Albuquerque on the shores of India, laterite is also the prevalent rock. 



The modern town exhibits few traces of this once famous city. Of 

 the old fort scarcely a vestige remains beyond a ruined doorway, the 

 traces of a fosse and counterscarp, some mounds marking the southern 

 gateway, and the site of a few bastions. 



Another fort, it is said, was built by Tippoo; but this too has been 

 destroyed ; and the present shoal of Calicut was pointed out to me 

 by an old native as the site of a still older fort overwhelmed by the 

 sea. Tradition states that the place where the Syrians landed near 

 Quilon is also engulfed.* 



The modern town is a large assemblage of garden houses, on a low 

 sandy sea coast, under a grove of cocoanut and jack trees, and extend- 

 ing a considerable distance inland. A broad street runs down to the 

 sea through the midst of this scattered town. The houses flanking 

 it are usually contiguous, built of laterite, or brick and chunam, 

 whitewashed. 



The streets, that branch off from it to the right and left, are narrow, 

 winding, and dirty, like those in the oldest parts of Lisbon. Here 

 dwell the Moplay and other native merchants. 



On the beach facing the sea runs a row of warehouses for timber, 

 coir rope, split bamboos and other marine stores. The rope is manu- 

 factured on the spot. 



* Madias Journal, No. 30, p. 146. 



