Himalayan Journals — Volume 1: Or, Notes of a Naturalist in Bengal, the Sikkim and Nepal Himalayas, the Khasia Mountains, etc.Hooker, Joseph Dalton
History
Himalayan Journals — Volume 1: Or, Notes of a Naturalist in Bengal, the Sikkim and Nepal Himalayas, the Khasia Mountains, etc.
Hooker, Joseph Dalton
Himalaya Mountains -- Description and travel; Natural history -- Himalaya Mountains
In the route I had taken, I had crossed the eastern extremity alone
of the range, commencing with a very gradual ascent, over the
alluvial plains of the west bank of the Hoogly, then over laterite,
succeeded by sandstone of the Indian coal era, which is succeeded by
the granite table-land, properly so called. A little beyond the coal
fields, the table-land reaches an average height of 1130 feet, which
is continued for upwards of 100 miles, to the Dunwah pass. Here the
descent is sudden to plains, which, continuous with those of the
Ganges, run up the Soane till beyond Rotasghur. Except for the
occasional ridges of metamorphic rocks mentioned above, and some
hills of intruded greenstone, the lower plain is stoneless, its
subjacent rocks being covered with a thicker stratum of the same
alluvium which is thinly spread over the higher table-land above.
This range is of great interest from its being the source of many
important rivers,* [The chief rivers from this, the great watershed
of western Bengal, flow north-west and south-east; a few
comparatively insignificant streams running north to the Ganges.
Amongst the former are the Rheru, the Kunner, and the Coyle, which
contribute to the Soane; amongst the latter, the Dammooda, Adji, and
Barakah, flow into the Hoogly, and the Subunrika, Braminee, and
Mahanuddee into the Bay of Bengal.] and of all those which water the
country between the Soane, Hoogly, and Ganges, as well as from its
deflecting the course of the latter river, which washes its base at
Rajmahal, and forcing it to take a sinuous course to the sea. In its
climate and botany it differs equally from the Gangetic plains to the
north, and from the hot, damp, and exuberant forests of Orissa to the
south. Nor are its geological features less different, or its
concomitant and in part resultant characters of agriculture and
native population. Still further west, the great rivers of the
peninsula have their origin, the Nerbudda and Taptee flowing west to
the gulf of Cambay, the Cane to the Jumna, the Soane to the Ganges,
and the northern feeders of the Godavery to the Bay of Bengal.
On the 12th of February, we left Sheergotty (alt. 463 feet), crossing
some small streams, which, like all else seen since leaving the
Dunwah Pass, flow N. to the Ganges. Between Sheergotty and the Soane,
occur many of the isolated hills of greenstone, mentioned above,
better known to the traveller from having been telegraphic stations.
Some are much impregnated with iron, and whether for their colour,
the curious outlines of many, or their position, form quaint, and in
some cases picturesque features in the otherwise tame landscape.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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