[Sidenote: 54.
Map of India, distinguishing Madras, Mysore, Cochin, and Travancore.]
[Sidenote: 55.
Coffee Planters, Coorg.] Lastly, let us consider the map, and learn what
part of India is ruled from Madras and Ootacamund. We have in the first
place, coloured red, the territory of the Presidency of Madras, which is
ruled directly by the Governor and his Council. In purple are shown the
important native state of Mysore, separated from both coasts by British
territory, and the two little native states of Travancore and Cochin
along the Malabar Coast southward to Cape Comorin. Mysore is directly
under the general supervision of the Government of India, but Travancore
and Cochin are under that of the Government of Madras. Beside Mysore is
the diminutive territory of Coorg, no larger than the County of Essex,
in England. But Coorg has a certain importance for the growth of coffee.
Here we have a group of native coffee planters.
[Sidenote: Repeat Map No. 3.] Then we look again at the map in which the
lowlands were shown green and the uplands brown. We see the plain from
Tuticorin to Madras city. We see the southern end of the Deccan plateau,
with the state of Mysore upon it, and the Nilgiri hills at its
extremity. We have the lowland passage of Coimbatore, to which we
referred in describing Ootacamund, and south of this afresh the hills
extending to Cape Comorin. The native states of Cochin and Travancore
are on the westward descent from these southernmost hills. Note again
how the railways take advantage of the lowland passages, especially the
line from Madras leading westward to the Malabar Coast.
The Cauvery flowing eastward over the plateau is the most considerable
river of Southern India. As it descends the Eastern Ghats it makes great
falls, and these have been harnessed, as the phrase is, and made to
supply power which is carried electrically for nearly a hundred miles to
the Kolar goldfield, within the Mysore boundary. The engineer who
superintended the construction of this work was a French Canadian
officer of the Royal Engineers—interesting evidence of the increasing
solidarity of the British Empire.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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