1845.] Notes on the South Mahratta Country, fyc. 277 



dipping but slightly in the same direction. A dyke of basaltic green- 

 stone, of about five feet broad, penetrates the hornblende schist in an 

 easterly direction, bifurcates at about the middle of the ascent from 

 the N. E. and is lost in the substance of the rock. 



Falls of Gokauk. The subordinate ranges of Gokauk and Cota- 

 banghy now before us, form the eastern flank of the Western Ghauts, 

 and run in a parallel direction, here about S. by E.. At Gokauk the 

 upper portions of this range present mural precipices with either well 

 flat tabular summits, or running in narrow crested ridges. 



They are entered from the east by a picturesque gorge (cross 

 valley), through which the Gutpurba hurries from its mountain sources 

 into the elevated plains of the Deccan, near the town of Gokauk, 

 which is about three and a half miles easterly from the falls. 



The road lay along the bottom and side of this defile on the right 

 bank of the river, which was now (July) swollen by the monsoon 

 freshes from the Western Ghauts. It varied in breadth from 90 to 300 

 yards, presenting a rapid muddy stream, brawling and rushing from 

 the alternate confinement and opening out of its rocky channel. It 

 is unfordable generally during four months in the year at Gokauk, 

 viz. from the middle of May to the middle of September, at the 

 cessation of the monsoon. The water at the dry season ford, a little 

 below the town, is now 15 feet deep. The sources are said to be near 

 Bunder or Gunder Ghur, a little N. of the Ramghaut Pass from the S. 

 Concan to Belgaum. After a course of about 100 miles, watering the 

 plains of Kulladghi and Bagulcotta, it finds its way through the gaps in 

 the Sitadonga hills just described, to the Kistnah, which it joins at the 

 liudli Sungum. 



After an hour's time spent in winding up this rugged defile, the falls, 

 the roar of which we distinctly heard during the silence of night at 

 the town of Gokauk, at a sudden angle of the road became partly visi- 

 ble, presenting the magnificent spectacle of a mass of water containing 

 upwards of 16,000 cubic feet precipitated from the tabular surface of 

 the sandstone into a gorge forming the head of the defile, the bottom 

 of which is about 178 feet below the lip of the cataract. The Gut- 

 purba a little above the fall is apparently about 250 yards across, but 

 contracts to 80 as the brink of the chasm is approached ; consequently 

 the density and velocity of the watery mass is much increased, and 



