Ras Mala, Or, Hindu Annals of the Province of Goozerat in Western India (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: RAS MALA. CHAPTER I. NATURAL BOUNDARIES OF GOOZERAT SHUTROONJYE ? WULLUBHEEPOOR. The province of Goozerat, in Western India, is composed of two portions?the one of these is continental, the other is peninsular and projects into the Arabian Sea nearly opposite the coast of Oman, and below that of Mekran and Sindh. Hindoos usually assume the river Nerbudda to be the southern boundary of the continental portion, or Goozerat proper. The language of the province is, however, spoken much further to the south?as far even as Damaun, or St. John's, about half-way between the mouth of the river and Bombay. Stretching northwards from the banks of the Nerbudda, a range of hills connecting the Vindhya with the Arawullee mountains forms the eastern and northern barrier of Goozerat, and separates it from Malwa, Mewar, and Marwar. The Gulf of Kutch and a salt, and sometimes partially inundated, desert called the Runn are the boundaries of the province on the north-west and west; the Arabian Sea and the Gulf of Cambay wash its southern and south-western shores. The least protected part of this frontier line, and that by which Goozerat has usually been invaded, is on the north-west, where a sandy plain intervenes between the desert and the foot of Mount Aboo. The mountains which bound Goozerat on the north and cast, and which project numerous branches into the nearest parts of the province, are steep, craggy, and difficult of access. The shoulders of the hills and the valleys which intervene between the spurs are covered with forest. From the dark shadow of these woods numerous streams emerge, whose lofty banks are indented by long, deep, and intricate ravines, and overgrown with almost impenetrable underwood. As the plains are approached, and the forest disappears the rivers widen ...