1868.] Proceedings of the Asiatic Society. 235 



stretch along from Buxar to near the Sone, forming the higher ground 

 north of Beeheea ; they occur again under the narrow ridge on which 

 the cantonment of Dinapore is placed ; under the city of Patna ; again 

 under Bhagulpore ; still further east near Colgong ; forming the high 

 ground extending northwards from Rampore Beauleah towards Darjee- 

 ling, again they constitute the often-talked of Madhopur jungle, 

 north of Dacca ; have been traced by Mr. Medlicott on the flanks of 

 the Graro hills, and by Captain Grodwin-Austen at the foot of the 

 Bhootan hills. Thus the permanence of the banks noticed by Mr. W. 

 Oldham in this brief paper is due to the fact, that there the river has 

 cut its channel through one of these isolated areas of the older beds, 

 which, as compared with the recent alluvium, have just as much 

 greater a power of resistance as an ordinary sandstone would have as 

 compared with loose sand. 



The determination of this character of the river's bank, is of impor- 

 tance, as the writer has shewn, both as affects the navigation of the 

 river, and the agriculture of the district. And while he has not added 

 materially to the knowledge of the action of the river, it is always 

 desirable to have on record such local observations, detailed with care, 

 which only those locally resident can attempt. 



The President then asked the Philological Secretary to read an ex- 

 tract from a letter received from Prof. A. Kuhn, Berlin. 



Babu Rajendralala Mitra said, he thought, the extract would not be 

 unwelcome to many members of the Society in this country. It referred 

 to a subject of considerable interest, which, in ancient times, inspired the 

 imagination of man with some of the richest ideas of poetry, and in later 

 days afforded the means of unravelling many a classic myth — the gorge- 

 ous sunrise of the East. To it Homer, it was said, owed his plot of the 

 Trojan war, and the Ramayana, it was presumed by some, had nothing 

 more substantial for its substratum. To the poets of the Vedic age 

 it was a most fruitful theme, and the Veclas were interspersed with a 

 number of myths founded on it. One of them is indelicate and highly 

 offensive ; but with the Rishis of the primitive age, untrammelled by 

 the amenities of modern civilization, it was a great favorite. It was no 

 other than the rape of Usha by her father Brahma,-— the dawn likened 

 to a charming nymph chased by her progenitor, the sun. In one 

 version of this myth, given in the third chapter of the Aitareya 



