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cul, or Ser-cul close, or on the borders of the lake: and Serpanil by Ser-pamer. These mountains are called in the Puranas Cumuda, the Comadi of PTOLEMY, and Anjana or Crishna the black mountains. CAMBER-ALI gave me a dreadful account of them from report, for he never saw them, but at a distance.

The fourth lake in the North is called MahaBhadrá, which is probably the lake Saisans, from which flows the river Irtiz. As the epithet Maha implies a great lake, I am sometimes inclined to suppose it to be the same with the lake Baikal; but it is too much out of the way: though I must confess, that its distance can be no objection with the Paurán'ics. Besides, the Baikal lake is called to this day Sweto-more, or the holy and sacred sea, and the country about it, and all along the Ergone, or Argon, is considered as holy by the Hindus, who occasionally visit this sacred spot. BELL, in his travels, mentions, his seeing a Hindu there from Madras. STRAHLENBERG saw another at Tabolsk, who, it seems, had settled there. I have seen two who had visited that country, one was called Arees'wara, whom I mentioned in my essay on mount Caucasus. The four sacred rivers springing from the Man-sarovara, according to the divines of Tibet, are the Bramá-putra, the Ganges, the Indus, and the Sitá. The Ganges is the only one that really issues from that lake, or if the three others do, it must be through subterranean channels; and such communications, whether real or imaginary, are very common in the Puránías. The Sitá may be the Sitodá, Sitlodá, supposed to communicate with the 'Satlaj or 'Satodara, thus called from its hundred branches or bellies, through which it is supposed to fall into the sea.

The Indus was supposed formerly to have its source not far from Mán-sarovara, which P. MONSERRAT places in thirty-two degrees of latitude North; and the source of the Indus in latitude 32° 15', the difference of longitude between the source and the lake 1° 45′.

The difference of longitude between Delhi, and Mansarovara is according to MONSERRAT 5° 2. This places Mánsarovara in 82° 2' of longitude, and both its longitude and latitude are remarkably correct: but what is more surprising, the good father was ignorant that the Ganges issued from it. ABUL FAZIL places the source of the Indus nearly in the same latitude with Cashmir, but eighteen degrees to the Eastward. The Indus has its source four or five days journey to the North-West of Yarchand, according to CZERNICHEF: it runs thence in a direction South South-East toward Ládac, and within two days journey of it: nay, merchants, who trade from India to Cáshghar, say it can be done in one day. The Indus then turns immediately toward the West, taking an immense sweep round Cashmir; and the place near Ládac, where it turns suddenly to the Westward, has been mistaken for its source.

X. The followers of JINA in the Trai-locya-derpan'a represent the old continent, as consisting of two concentric dwipas, of the same superficial extent. They call the whole world Arai, or A'daidwipas, literally the two and half Islands. The two first dwipas are Zambu in the centre, and Dhútuci: and they are divided by an intermediate sea. The whole is surrounded by the ocean, in which are many islands, called, in general, Antaca or Anta-mai-dwipas, or the islands at the anta (end,

54'. 6,4". In these distances, I did not compute on the chords of the arcs, because the instrument I had in use was not sufficient for that purpose.

Experiments for determining the Expansion of the

Chain.

In making allowance for the expansion of the chain, in the annexed table, it will appear that I have differed both from GENERAL ROY and COLONEL WILLIAMS. It may therefore be necessary to give the following account of the experiments which were made for ascertaining that allowance, -which experiments were made by the chain itself, observing its length at sun-rise and at one o'clock, between which hours the base was generally measured.

This

AFTER the chain was extended in the coffers, in the manner formerly mentioned, it was carefully adjusted, at each end, to some particular marks on the register heads, about the hours of sun-rise. The finger screw of one of these brass sliders had been previously graduated into eight equal parts, on its circumference, which were counted, on its being turned, by another mark on the end of the slider, touching that part of the circumference. finger screw was observed to make 26 revolutions in one inch, so that one of the divisions, on the circumference, was equal part of an inch. Things being thus adjusted, the experiments were made in the following order, and the mean temperature taken from three of the best thermometers I had, which remained the whole time in the coffers, with the chain; and these coffers were covered, in the same manner as they had been during the operations the measurement.

I

DECEMBER 11th, at one P. M. the temperature was 95°.

DECEMBER 12th, at seven A.M. the mean temMéru, beginning in the West in fifty-two degrees of latitude, or nearly so: being, as it is declared in the Puránas, in the shape of a Cow.

perature

To King BHARATA, MAHADEVA gave eight sons and one daughter, called ILA', or Cumárí, emphatically the Maiden. A new division of the Earth took place according to some; but the general opinion is, that it was only a partial one. Be this as it may, it appears that, out of the ten divisions of the old continent, Bharata, included nine; Curu, in the North, being excepted and left

out.

According to the Prabhása-chan'da, the names of these nine c'handas or sections, are, reckoning from the East toward the West, Indra-dwipa or Gandharva-chanda, Caseru, Tamrapurnah, Gabhastimán, Cumáricá, (India), Nagá-chanda, Saumya, Varuna-chanda, and Gandharva-chanda again. In the Revá-chan'da, their names are thus exhibited; Gandharva, Caseru, Tamraparni, Gabhastimán, Cumáricá or India, Nága, Saumya, Varuna, Chandra-dwipὰ.

In the same section we find another variation; Gandharva, Cáseru, Tamrapatra (erroneously for Tamra-purriah), Shilastica, Cumáricá (India), Bhá ga-dwipa (probably for Naga), Saumya, Varun'a and Chandra-dwipa. The first and the last divisions are, in general, called Ghand harva-chanda, being supposed to be the abode of the Gods, with their usual retinue of heavenly musicians. Through the seven remaining divisions, seven rivers are said to flow. They have a common source in the lake from which issues the Ganges. To the East are, the Nalini, flowing through Cas'eru; the Páναπί, through Tamrapurnáh; Hládiní, through Gabhas

ΧΙ.

On the Origin and PECULIAR TENETS of CERTAIN MUHAMMEDAN SECTS.

T

HE

By H. T. COLEBROOKE, Esq.

Bóhrahs, numerous in the provinces of the Indian peninsula, but found also in most of the great cities of Hindustan, are conspicuous by their peculiar customs; such, for example, as that of wearing at their orisons an appropriate dress, which they daily wash with their own hands. Their disposition for trade to the exclusion of every other mode of livelihood, and the government of their tribe by a hierarchy, are further peculiarities, which have rendered them an object of inquiry, as a singular sect.

RESEARCHES made by myself, among others, were long unsuccessful. My informers confounded this tribe with the Ismailiyahs, with the Alíilahiyahs, and even with the unchaste sect of Cheragh-cush. Concerning their origin, the information received was equally erroneous with that regarding their tenets. But at length a learned Sayyad referred me to the Mejálisu'lmúminin composed by NURULLAH of Shúster, a zealous Shiah, who suffered for his religious opinions in the reign of JEHA'NGI'R. In the passage, which will be forthwith cited from that work, the Bóhrahs are described by the author, as natives of Gujrat converted to the Muhammedan religion about three hundred years before his time, or five centuries ago.

To that passage I shall subjoin extracts from the same work, containing an account of similar tribes, with some of which the Bóhrahs may perhaps have been sometimes confounded. Concerning the Ismáiliyahs, for whom they have been actually mistaken, it must be remembered, that these form a sect of Shiahs, who take their distinctive appellation from

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