A History of the Mahrattas v1.c7.28

v1.c7.28

Sewdasheogurh to the Taptee. Although so far below the great chain of mountains stretching along parallel with the western coast of India, it must not be considered a flat country; on the contrary, the Concan is in most parts remarkably rugged and broken, interspersed with huge mountains and thick jungles, intersected by rivers and numberless rivulets; rocky and clear, until they descend on the level, where they are affected by the tide, when they are very deep and muddy. The roads are generally stony footpaths, and become more inaccessible as they approach the Syhadree mountains, which, except in places rendered more practicable by the British government, can only be ascended by narrow paths and defiles, sometimes so precipitous that a led horse can with difficulty keep its footing. When ascending, and on gaining the summit of any of these passes, especially to the southward of Poona, the scenery which every where presents itself is of the grandest kind. Some idea of it may be formed by imagining mountains succeeding mountains, three or four thousand feet high, covered with trees, except in places where the huge, black, barren rocks are so solid as to prevent the hardiest shrub from finding root in their clefts. The verdure about the Ghauts to the southward of Poona is perpetual, but during the rainy season, especially towards the latter part of it, when the torrents are pouring from the side of the mountains, the effect is greatly heightened by the extreme luxuriance of vegetation; whilst gleams of sunshine, reflected from the breaking masses of clouds, give a thousand evanescent tints to every hill they light upon. Tempests and thunder storms, both at the commencement and close of the south-west monsoon, are very frequent, and in that region, these awful phenomena of nature are, in a tenfold degree, tremendous and sublime.