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Thomson for the Khasia mountains Mahanuddy river Vegetation of banks Maldah Alligators Rampore-Bauleah Climate of Ganges Pubna Jummul river Altered course of Burrampooter and Megna Dacca Conch shells Saws Cotton muslins Fruit Vegetation Elevation Rose of Bengal Burrampooter Delta of Soormah river Jheels Soil Vegetation Navigation Mosquitos Atmospheric pressure Effects of geological changes Imbedding of plants Teelas or islets Chattuc Salubrious climate Rains Canoes Pundua Mr.
Fifty-four barometric observations, taken at the level of the water on the voyage between Dacca and the Soormah, and compared with Calcutta, showed a gradual rise of the mercury in proceeding eastwards; for though the pressure at Calcutta was .055 of an inch higher than at Dacca, it was .034 lower than on the Soormah: the mean difference between all these observations and the cotemporaneous ones at Calcutta was + .003 in favour of Calcutta, and the temperature half a degree lower; the dew-point and humidity were nearly the same at both places.
To the geologist the Jheels and Sunderbunds are a most instructive region, as whatever may be the mean elevation of their waters, a permanent depression of ten to fifteen feet would submerge an immense tract, which the Ganges, Burrampooter, and Soormah would soon cover with beds of silt and sand.
This being the driest season of the year, it is very probable that the mean level of the water at this part of the delta is not higher than that of the Bay of Bengal; but as we advanced northwards towards the Khasia, and entered the Soormah itself, the atmospheric pressure increased further, thus appearing to give the bed of that stream a depression of thirty-five feet below the Bay of Bengal, into which it flows!
We pursued our voyage on the 30th of May, to the old bed of the Burrampooter, an immense shallow sheet of water, of which the eastern bank is for eighty miles occupied by the delta of the Soormah. The immense area thus drained by the Soormah is hardly raised above the level of the sea, and covers about 10,000 square miles.
From Sikkim to the Khasia mountains our course was by boat down the Mahanuddy to the upper Gangetic delta, whose many branches we followed eastwards to the Megna; whence we ascended the Soormah to the Silhet district.
This was no doubt the result of unequal atmospheric pressure at the two localities, caused by the disturbance of the column of atmosphere by the Khasia mountains; for in December of the same year, thirty-eight observations on the surface of the Soormah made its bed forty-six feet above the Bay of Bengal, whilst, from twenty-three observations on the Megna, the pressure only differed + 0.020 of an inch from that of the barometer at Calcutta, which is eighteen feet above the sea-level.
We proceeded up the Burrampooter, crossing it obliquely; its banks were on the average five miles apart, and formed of sand, without clay, and very little silt or mud: the water was clear and brown, like that of the Jheels, and very different from that of the Jummul. We thence turned eastwards into the delta of the Soormah, which we traversed in a north-easterly direction to the stream itself.
The rains generally commence in May: they were unusually late this year, though the almost daily gales and thunder-storms we experienced, foretold their speedy arrival. From May till October they are unremitting, and the country is under water, the Soormah rising about fifty feet.
On the 1st of June we entered the Soormah, a full and muddy stream flowing west, a quarter of a mile broad, with banks of mud and clay twelve or fifteen feet high, separating it from marshes, and covered with betel-nut and cocoa-nut palms, figs, and banyans.
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