1845.] from Pondicherry to Bet/poor. 765 



which held it after the fall of Seringapatam ; granaries, powder 

 magazines, and in the NW. angle, a tomb inscribed to the memory 

 of Lieut. Colonel John Murray, 1st Cavalry, who died 1799, erected 

 by his widow, (6th May) also an obelisk, from which the inscription 

 evidently has been shamefully removed. 



Ahtoor is now the Kusbah, or capital town, of a Taluk, Lat. N. 11° 

 40' and Long. E. 7#° 48'. It comprises, the natives say, upwards of 

 1,200 houses, occupied chiefly by Kuddiyans, or cultivators, (exclusive 

 of the Nellalo, Pulli, Agmuddi, Nattaman, Mullayman, Latraman 

 &c.,) and Dhairs, chiefly engaged in procuring and smelting iron. 

 There are also nearly fifty families of Brahmins, of whom the Smaltal 

 sect is much the most numerous ;next the Maduals, and finally the 

 Sri Vaishnovams. There are about fifty houses of Mussulmans, chiefly 

 employed as peons, in mat-making, day-labour, and a few in agricul- 

 ture. To hold the plough is almost a dernier resort with a Mussul- 

 man of South India. 



The houses are neater, and more cleanly than any I have seen in 

 this part of India, and are often tiled. Mr. Fischer, who may be truly 

 styled the Salem Zemindar, has a depot for indigo and cotton here. 

 I saw thirty- six women and children employed in cleaning cotton, 

 which is done by means of wooden cylinders, resembling those of an 

 Indian Sugar-cane mill on a small scale, revolving horizontally, and 

 turned by the hand. 



The table land on the hills to the North is said to be held free by Poli- 

 gar Pedda Collaray. It produces hill rice, castor-oil plant, Kimbgoni, 

 and a little common rice. The produce of the land about Ahtoor is 

 much the same as at Chinna Salem. The water of the wells is often 

 brackish. 



Salem-. — From Ahtoor to within three miles East of Salem, the Pass 

 continues along the southern base of the elevated table lands of the 

 Balaghat. Near Salem the mountains which support them assume 

 a bolder and more indented outline, rising in separate conical peaks, 

 domes, and abrupt ridges. The highest peak of the Moolnad by 

 rough trigonometrical calculation, is upwards of 3000 feet above 

 Salem, and Salem itself, by the boiling point of water, is about 1,131 

 feet above the sea. 



The same formation prevails around Salem as at Ahtoor. The 

 gneiss is often penetrated by veins of eurite, of a faint reddish and 



