The original and proper Indian name of Malabar is _Malayalam_. _Mala_ signifies a mountain, _Alam_ a habitation, district or country. _Malayalam_, therefore, signifies the mountainous land, which indeed Malabar really is; for, except towards the west, where it is bounded by the sea, it is every where surrounded by high mountains: _Malanàda_ and _Malangàra_ have the same signification; and from the latter has been formed, by various contortions, the word Malabar. The opinion of Father Raulin, who contends that Malabar is of Arabic extraction, being compounded of _Mala_ and _Barr_, has no foundation whatever. The old Samscred name of this country is _Kerulara_, the kingdom of _Kerula_. I shall have occasion hereafter to offer some conjectures respecting this appellation. The inhabitants of Malabar call themselves _Malayalese_, and not _Maleatese_; as Sonnerat says, the inhabitants of the Gauts, a kind of people who have little intercourse with those who reside in the towns, are called Malays, that is, inhabitants of the mountains. This kingdom commences in the south at _Tovàla_, a castle situated on Cape Comari, towards the east, in latitude 8° 6′, and borders on the kingdom of Madura, as well as the coast of Pescaria. On the west it is bounded by the sea, and on the east by the Gauts, the latter of which separate it from Madura and Maïssur. Towards the north it borders on Canara and the mountain _Illi_, which, according to J. Hamilton Moore, lies in 12° 5′ north latitude, and 75° east longitude. According to the same author, Cochin lies in the latitude of 10° and the longitude of 75° 52′; Calicut in the latitude of 11° 21′; and Cape Comari in the latitude of 7° 55′, and the longitude of 77° 20′. From the Gauts to the sea, that is from east to west, this country is sometimes thirty, forty, thirty-five, or twenty leagues in breadth, according as these mountains extend themselves more or less into the interior parts. Its whole length amounts to more than 120 leagues. It is intersected by a great many rivers, which, falling down from these mountains, pursue their winding courses in different directions, and at last proceed westwards towards the sea. The most remarkable of these rivers are: the _Cariapatnam_, the _Coleci_, the _Valavaley_, and the _Modelaposha_, which run past _Attinga_, _Ceringa_, and _Angenga_; also the _Paru_, which flows past _Chidàcolam_, _Paru_ and _Mainàda_, and, uniting itself with several other rivers, forms, from _Cochin_ to _Codungalur_, towards the north, a kind of stagnant lake; so that people can travel through the greater part of Malabar by water. The rivers of less note are: the _Vaypur_ and _Porotta_; the _Feira d’Alva_, which in its course washes _Maleatur_, _Cognur_, _Ciovare_, _Varapole_, _Angicaimal_ and _Cochin_; the _Alangata_, which after running past _Alangata_, _Cenotta_ and _Codungalur_, discharges itself into the sea at _Aycotta_; also the _Cettuva_, the _Paniani_, the _Calicut_,