I/O Sketch of the Geology of the [Jan. 



the disintegration of the latter. At the southern landing place 

 there is a ledge of large masses of amygdaloid (of which the cavities 

 have been washed empty, if we except a few nodules of quartz), over 

 which the surf beats high and renders landing dangerous, although it 

 forms one of the few situations in these islands, where boats can reach 

 the shore without grounding. 



Near this landing place is a Portuguese ruin, situated on a knoll, and 

 adjoining it, we discover the extraordinary artificial figure from which 

 the island derives its European name, for its Hindoostani name is 

 Gallipooti. The animal represented by this sculpture is evidently an 

 elephant, fully equal to the natural size, and, upon the whole, well exe- 

 cuted. The trunk and head have been separated from the body, and 

 lie fractured and prostrate on the ground. Considerable damage has 

 been done to other parts of the figure, for the instrument of which we 

 must have recourse to the tradition current in that neighbourhood, which 

 states that the Portuguese went so deliberately to work as to employ 

 cannon in effecting their barbarous work of destruction, from the idea, as 

 we have shewn, of extirpating superstition ! The rock of which the 

 figure consists is a very hard basalt, containing a few minute cavi- 

 ties, scantily supplied with mineral crystals, and is of the same na- 

 ture as the rock of the adjoining hillock. From this spot the ascent of 

 the western hill is pretty easy, the pathway leading along the bed of 

 what constitutes a torrent during the wet season, formed in the porphy- 

 ry and amygdaloid, and runs to a considerable depth ; a kind of natural 

 walls rising up on each side, which are overshadowed by earissa bushes 

 (Carissa carandas), agnus castus* (Vitex trifolia), the garruga tree 

 (Garruga pinnata), with its abundant fruit hanging in clusters, like the 

 produce of the vine, and castor oil tree (Ricinus communis), while the 

 soil is ornamented with the solanum (Solanum jacquini), and the 

 Mexican Argemonet (Argemone Mexicana). About half way up 

 the hill, the smaller temple or caves are reached. They are three in 

 number, having the face of the rock polished perpendicularly, and some 

 pillars formed on its surface, with several figures represented flying 

 in the clouds. The inferior part of the rock consists of a variegated 

 porphyry, sometimes reddish, and frequently of a yellow tint, the 



* The leaves of this shrub are employed by the Hindoo women in some religious cere- 

 mony, as I found a quantity deposited on the convex stone in the lateral square compart- 

 ment of the great temple. 



+ The occurrence ©f this plant, (a native of the New World), wherever the Portu- 

 guese have formed settlements, is a striking instance of the agency of man in the distri- 

 bution of vegetable species. In addition to the habitat here given, I have observed it at 

 Malabar Point in Bombay Island ; on the Island of Coulaba ; and at the south end of the 

 town of Macao, in China, in all of which localities it is an abundant plant, affording a 

 parallel case with that of the Chenopodium ambrosioides, (cited by Lyell, vol. ii. p. S3.) 

 which we observe so abundantly in the Island of St. Helena. 



