Westward the plateau becomes very hilly, bare, and grassy, with the streams broad and full, but superficial and rocky, precipitating themselves in low cascades over tabular masses of sand-stone. At Mamloo their beds are deeper, and full of brushwood, and a splendid valley and amphitheatre of red cliffs and cascades, rivalling those of Moosmai (chapter xxvii), bursts suddenly into view. Mamloo is a large village, on the top of a spur, to the westward: it is buried in a small forest, particularly rich in plants, and is defended by a stone wall behind: the only road is tunnelled through the sandstone rock, under the wall; and the spur on either side dips precipitously, so that the place is almost impregnable if properly defended. A sanguinary conflict took place here between the British and the Khasias, which terminated in the latter being driven over the precipices, beneath which many of them were shot. The fan-palm, _Chamaerops Khasiana_ ("Pakha," Khas.), grows on the cliff's near Mamloo: it may be seen on looking over the edge of the plateau, its long curved trunk rising out of the naked rocks, but its site is generally inaccessible;* [This species is very closely allied to, if not identical with _P. Martiana_ of Nepal; which ascends to 8000 feet in the western Himalaya, where it is annually covered with snow: it is not found in Sikkim, but an allied species occurs in Affghanistan, called _P. Ritcheana_: the dwarf palm of southern Europe is a fourth species.] while near it grows the _Saxifragis ciliaris_ of our English gardens, a common plant in the north-west Himalaya, but extremely scarce in Sikkim and the Khasia mountains. Illustration--MAMLOO CASCADES. The descent of the Mamloo spur is by steps, alternating with pebbly flats, for 1500 feet, to a saddle which connects the Churra hills with those of Lisouplang to the westward. The rise is along a very steep narrow ridge to a broad long grassy hill, 3,500 feet high, whence an extremely steep descent leads to the valley of the Boga-panee, and the great mart of Chela, which is at the embouchure of that river. The transverse valley thus formed by the Mamloo spur, is full of orange groves, whose brilliant green is particularly conspicuous from above. At the saddle below Mamloo are some jasper rocks, which are the sandstone altered by basalt. Fossil shells are recorded to have been found by Dr. M'Lelland* [See a paper on the geology of the Khasia mountains by Dr. M'Lelland in the "Bengal Asiatic Society's Journal."] on some of the flats, which he considers to be raised beaches: but we sought in vain for any evidence of this theory beyond the pebbles, whose rounding we attributed to the action of superficial streams.