764 Notes, chiefly Geological. [No. 166. 



most prized by the natives, but whether this excellence is attributable 

 to a better mode of smelting or better ore, does not appear. According 

 to the natives, about 100 families of the Dhairs at Ahtoor are employ- 

 ed in getting iron ore ; there are about thirty or forty iron furnaces in 

 this vicinity. 



Ahtoor lies near the base of the great break of Salem, where the 

 high table lands of Mysore, the Balaghat, &c. descend by an abrupt 

 step to the plains of Salem and Coimbatoor. To the south of this 

 break, a broken disjointed mass of bare rocks forms a sort of talus to 

 the lofty steeps on the North ; but separated from them by a narrow 

 and in general flat-bottomed valley, along which the road runs to Salem. 

 The extreme height of the ranges to the right (or N.) by a rough tri- 

 gonometrical observation from a paced base, I made to be (?) feet above 

 the level of the valley, or foot of the break at Ahtoor. And Ahtoor by 

 the boiling point of water I find to be about (?) feet above the sea : 

 but these observations must only be regarded as some approximation 

 to the truth. 



The subjoined diagram* will give an idea of this profile presented in 

 the bolder parts of this great feature, in the physical configuration of 

 South India. The rocks to the South of this break, after running 

 southerly some miles, attain near Shendanumgalum, not far from their 

 termination to the SW., an elevation little inferior to that of the ranges 

 on the North of the break. The break itself varies from one and a half 

 to three or four miles in width. It contracts East of Ahtoor, and opens 

 out West of it as Salem is neared, and is about fifty-six miles long. 



Ahtoor was formerly held by a Poligar, the remains of whose 

 palace, are still to be seen in the fort, a low building supported on 

 Saracenic arches, and covered with a terrace roof. The fort which 

 was, it is said, built about four centuries ago by the then Poligar, 

 Ghut Moodely, stands on the North bank of the river, rectangular in 

 shape, and provided with wet ditch, glacis and covered way, except on 

 the South face, which is washed by the river. The walls are of stone, 

 with a ruinous brick parapet, garnished with mud bastions, and square 

 cavaliers in the usual Hindoo style. It is entered by a gate on its 

 eastern face : and, besides the palace, contains two temples to Siva and 

 Vishnu ; the remains of buildings occupied by the European garrison 



* See plate. 





