88 



THE NULLAMULLAYSe 



through this sort of jungle, without, however, coming to a 

 second stream (as it turned out afterwards, we were just at 

 the water), our guides objected to go any further, any paths 

 we met being reported to lead nowhere, or, as they put 

 it " that road went into the forest and came back again ;" 

 and as, in a subsequent excursion to be made about a week 

 hence, we were to return by Mantyconda, we turned back 

 on our path. 



On our descent by the same ghaut, there was plenty of ex- 

 perience of the burning grass on the side of the mountain, 

 for the villagers had apparently fired it then, instead of be- 

 fore our ascent, as they had been ordered to do. At one 

 point, as the fire came roaring and crackling up the face of 

 the hill-side, we had to run through it, as it flared along on 

 each side of the path with its fearfully scorching heat. 



The Brumeshwar valley. 



In the meantime, and while preparations were being made 

 for our more extended excursion into the interior of the 

 mountains from Nundial, I went off to Yellagode and thence 

 worked into the mountains by the Yellagode Cunnama, 

 and up into the Brumeshwar valley. To get at this 

 last, I had to pitch a temporary camp about 8 miles east 

 of Yellagode, near the site of the deserted village of Booga- 

 pully. There is low-country even beyond this for a 

 couple of miles or so, until a pool of running water is 

 reached at the foot of the ghaut ; and then the timber 

 track (or rather " slip" in this case) rises very steeply until 

 an intermediate terrace is reached. 



Looking east from Yellagode, the mountains, for about 4 

 miles, appear to consist of a long horizontal plateau, at the 

 southern end of which is the little irregular mass of Manty- 

 e onda, and to the north the saddle, over which the Yellagode- 



