188 PETRIFIED SHELLS, FOUND IN THE 



On the southward side they rise abruptly from the extensive plain 

 of Berar, the average height of which is one thousand feet above the level 

 of the sea, and tower above it to the height of two and three thousand 

 feet. The descent to the bed of the TajjL'i is equally rapid, although the 

 northern is less elevated than the southern side of the range. The outline 

 of the land is generally flat, but much broken by ravines and by groupes 

 of flattened summits, and isolated conoidal frustra. The summits and 

 the flat land are generally remarkably destitute of trees, but thickly 

 covered by long grass. In the ravines and passes of the mountains, the 

 forest is very thick, and, in many places, almost impervious. The inhabi- 

 tants are principally Goands, whose language, manners, and customs diifer 

 remarkably from those of the Hindus. At present, their chief occupation 

 is hunting and cultivating small patches of land, which produce a coarse 

 rice and millet. In former years, the cultivation must have been 

 very extensive, since there are the ruins of numerous hill-forts and. 

 villages, which derived their chief subsistence from the surrounding 

 lands. 



Many opportunities are afforded of studying the nature of this 

 mountainous range in the numerous ravines, torrents, and precipitous 

 descents, which abound in every part. A Wernerian would not hesitate 

 in pronouncing them to be of the " newest floetz-trap formation," a 

 Huttonian would call them overlying rocks, and a modern Geologist would 

 pronounce, that they owed their origin to sub-marine volcanoes. 



1 shall not give them any other name, than the general one of trap- 

 rocks ; but proceed to describe them, and state with diffidence the 

 inferences which, I think, obviously present themselves on an attentive 

 study of their phenomena. 



1st. 



