BY W. KINO. ESQ. 



89 



pass leads to Bolapilly. The path to Brumesh war leads over 

 this apparent plateau. 



As I rose from the intermediate terrace, mentioned above, 

 towards this plateau, I really felt that morning something of 

 the " sweet, half-English, Neilgherry air," as the fresh breeze 

 swept past me ; but this was doubtless owing to there having 

 been a heavy shower of rain three or four days previously, and 

 to the fact that the interior of the mountains since then had 

 been covered with a light cap of clouds during the night. 

 From the terrace,the path ascends rapidly to the seeming pla- 

 teau, which turned out to be the tolerably level crest of a long 

 slope rising up from the Brumeshwar valley ; and when I 

 stood there in the fresh breeze, looking over the plains, I 

 thought how much more preferable a site this would be for a 

 bungalow than Mantyconda, if we could only get water. 



At present this crest of the Brumeshwar basin is covered 

 with jungle of bamboo and tolerably large trees of the kinds 

 usually found on the Nullamallays ; and it is about 2,700 feet 

 above the sea, or nearly 300 feetlower than Mantyconda. De- 

 scending gently to the eastward towards the Brumeshwar 

 Valley through a tolerably open jungle with large trees, and 

 then getting into the head of a narrow valley, I found 

 myself (in 20 minutes, from the top) beside a stream of water. 



This little valley deepens and narrows, and the stream be- 

 comes a brook of clear running water, quite charming to look 

 at in these generally dry mountains, whose stones are covered 

 with ferns and moss, and which is buried in a tolerably close 

 growth of great trees and bamboos. 



There are very large mangoe trees, as is usually the case in 

 these water valleys, only that here they are more numerous. 

 The bamboos are very fine, many of them 4 and 5 inches in 

 diameter at least • while the sago palm shows its beautiful 

 plume of leaves and ropy droops of fruit here and there 



