1829.] 
Into the Himmataya Mountains. 
351 
change of commodities, or other intercourse must cease. To give some. idea of the 
number of impassable torrents by which the face of the country is covered, I may 
mention that on the road from Bhamaiiri to Alradrah, a distance of 44 miles, there 
are required in the rainy season three bridges. In the road from A Imuran to 
Petdrahgerh (40 miles), there are required two bridges all the year round. In the 
road from Petdrahgerh to Ldhu-ghfit (18 miles), one bridge all the year round. 
These arc all military roads, and as the communication must be kept open, the fact 
is, that these bridges have been erected at the expense of Government, 
The people of these bills, every where aware of the value of intercommunication, 
have exerted themselves to facilitate it, hut their cti'orts, like their means, have been 
circumscribed ; and, in general, their bridges have been rude and inefficient in a de- 
gree commensurate with their poverty-. Their most simple erection is a single rope, 
or rather several ropes gathered together, stretched across a river, on which slides a 
wooden block, to which the traveller, being attached, is pulled across. This is a 
disagreeable, though not a dangerous method of crossing a river ; but it is exceed- 
ingly tedious, and laborious to the attendants at the bridge ; and has this capital ob- 
jection, that cattle cannot pass such a bridge; they arc necessarily dragged through 
the foaming torrent, where if they escape the two-fold danger of drowning or being 
dashed to pieces against the rocks, they are fortunate. Yet as even the worst 
communication is better than none, and as the poverty of the people cannot afford 
better, these bridges are numerous in the hills. 
The next step, is the bridge of ropes, which is a little, and only a little better ; 
being merely a huge rope ladder as it were, stretched across the river, on the 
spokes or steps of which the traveller has to pick a precarious footing, assisted by 
the two lateral ropes which he holds to steady himself. This kind of passage of a 
river is scarcely less disagreeable than the other ; it is a little less tedious, and in- 
volves little labour on the part of the attendants ; but it has the same disadvantage 
of being impassable to cattle. These bridges are generally made of rope, manu- 
factured from the fibres (bark) of the M&lzan , ( Bauhinia scandals) a gigantic 
climber common in the mountains. It is a rope of great toughness ; but exposed as 
it is, without any defence, to the action of the sun and atmosphere, it does not last 
many years. Instances have occurred of these bridges giving way, and the unfor- 
tunate passengers being lost. 
The third step is the wooden bridge, and this alone is, perhaps, entitled to the 
name or capable of answering the purposes of a bridge. It is, however, of various 
degrees of efficiency, and some of its ruder and less expensive forms, are in- 
deed scarcely preferable to the preceding arrangement. Bnt whatever the care 
bestowed in its construction, one principle guides the workmen ; a principle 
which shows little mechanical ingenuity on the part of these people, and which is 
the very opposite to that which directed the construction of the celebrated bridge 
in Europe, at Schaffhausen, over the Rhine. Instead of disposing their timber in a 
lio-ht frame work, judiciously opposingtension to stress, they use massy aud heavy 
beams, the support of which, when the bridge exceeds a certain span, forms a great 
difficulty in the erection of such bridges. They are in fact only kept in their 
places by a heavy mass of stones and earth placed on them, and even this weight is 
not always a match for the great length of lever combined with the weight of the 
bridge itself, particularly when extra loaded by passengers ; any twist or warping 
of the beams too, immediately weaken such a bridge. These objections will be. 
better understood by considering the following short description of the inode of 
construction. A row of massy beams about 18 ft. in length, are laid in a direction, 
slanting upwards, on each hank, with not more than G feet projecting orer. On these 
a second tier of beams, 6 ft. longer, is laid, the extra fift. projecting beyond the 
ends of the lower tier : a third and fourth tier, and even more, are added, each project- 
ing 6ft beyond the inferior tier, till the vacant space in the middle is so tar reduced 
as'to allow of spars beiog laid across it. The ends of the projecting beams are 
then secured by masses of stones aud earth, as above noticed, and the whole is 
planked over and railed. Such a construction docs not require its faults to be pointed 
out. Were it necessary, nothing could show them iu a clearer light, than the very 
narrow limits to which such a bridge applies. AspanoflOO teet is not without 
its difficulties. To erect one of 190 feet was considered a great triumph, and I be- 
lieve no one thinks it possible to apply this construction to a bridge with a span 
of 250 feet. . 
It will be supposed that the bridges erected by order of our Government, menti- 
oned in one of the preceding paragraphs, were on a superior principle ; and that an 
opportunity was taken of showing the people the inferiority of their method of eon- 
