32 Remarks upon the Auriferous Deposits of India. [J ult 



clivities of the Neilgheiry mountains, and other parts of the Malabar 

 Coast, where it is commonly found disseminated in small partic^es in 

 the sands and beds of rivers, and may be estimated to spread over an 

 extent of several hundred square miles, forming the principal gold tract 

 of Southern India. In the high table land of Mysore, gold is known to 

 exist in many places, as near Bangalore and Cbinnapatam, and in the 

 Wynaad district. In the Southern Mahratta Country, the existence 

 of gold is well known, and the deposits of the Kupputgode range have 

 been described in the " Madras Journal of Science," by an energetic 

 labourer in the field of Indian geology — Lieutenant Newbold. In the 

 Northern Circars, and the Rajah of Berar's territory, gold is described 

 as existing in many of the rivers, especially in the Nagpore district, al- 

 most the centre of India. I have also been informed by W. H. G. 

 Mason, Esq. that the natives obtain a little gold by washing, in the streams 

 near Vizagapatam. 



This very brief and imperfect review of auriferous localities within the 

 Madras territories, would be amply sufficient for our present purpose ; 

 yet it is deserving of notice, that these deposits of the precious metal, 

 are equally abundant in the northern portion of the Indian peninsula as 

 in the southern, as I shall now proceed to show. 



Gold is known to exist in the tributaries of the Indus, in Kumaon, 

 where it is obtained by washing in the streams in the vicinity of Kalsee. 

 That these auriferous particles are derived either from the rocky escarp- 

 ment of the Himalayahs, or the mountains subordinate to them, is 

 highly probable, as gold mines are described as being worked by the 

 Chinese Tartars north of these mountains near Hurtoh, beyond the 

 lake Mansuraor. These gold workings are said to have been stopped 

 by order of the Chinese government, lest the precious metal should be 

 the means of tempting us across the snow clad pinnacles which bound 

 the British territory. Gold is stated to occur in great abundance in 

 Assam, where it is profitably worked by the natives at Gowhetti, on the 

 Bramahputra. From this point deposits of gold are well known to ex- 

 tend southward through the Burmese empire, the Malayan peninsula, 

 and the adjoining islands, but these localities it would be foreign to my 

 present purpose to notice. 



Of the actual economical value of this prodigious range of auriferous 

 deposits, which has been shown to extend so widely over the Indian 

 peninsula, little or nothing is, I believe, known. There is, however, the 

 simple fact before us that in many places they have been worked by the 

 natives, who must therefore have been able at least to obtain a subsist- 

 ence from then- labours, although carried on, we know, in the rudest 



