Volume 12

The Gazetteer of Bombay Presidency.

Date:
1877-1904
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: The Gazetteer of Bombay Presidency. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    23/652 page 5
    KHANDESH, 5 I In tliG hot season (March-June)^ the lake^ the neighbouring forests, j and a strong steady south-west wind combine to make the climate [ delightful, with, during May, a mean temperature of about seventy- ; seven degrees.^ The best way up the hill from Sultan pur was :l formerly passable only to very lightly laden beasts of burden. In I 1877, it was much improved by clearing the first twelve of the twenty-four miles from Bhogar on the Shahadaside. The remaining [I twelve offer no great difficulty. The Hatti hills, bounding the Puma valley on the east, run I north-west and south-east, and for about twenty miles pass :i, through the south-east-«©r»er of Khandesh. Rising gradually from , the Tapti valley, in their first twenty miles they are rather low and i tame. Further east, forming the northern frontier of Berar, they rise to nearly 4000 feet, and finally merge in the Nagpur hills. At first bare and rocky, as they near the southern limit of Khandesh, their sides are in places somewhat thickly covered with brushwood and timber, and give shelter to wild beasts. The Satmala, also known as the Ohandor or Ajantarange, breaking off sharply from the Sahyadris in the north-west of Nasik, runs ' for about fifty miles east in a series of quaint basalt pinnacles and ridges. Near Manmad, after a gentle depression, it again rises about 600 feet above the plain, and forms a somewhat monotonous wall-like boundary between Khandesh and the Deccan. Though, except for about fifteen miles in the west, not actually within its limits, ! the range skirts the south of Khandesh for about eighty miles. A few miles beyond Ajanta it turns south, merging into the highlands that form the southern frontier of Berar. As they are a narrow range, little more than the steep northern face of the Deccan i table-land, the Satmalas contain few forest tracts. Their sides, mostly bare or with a few scattered trees, have here and there, on the banks and in the beds of streams, timber and brushwood thickets I large enough to shelter tigers and other wild animals. Of late years, i tillage has spread to the sides of many of the northern spurs, and in some places comes close to the foot of the main range. Besides the picturesqueness of its western peaks, the chief interest in the Satmala range are the rock-cut Buddhist temples and monasteries at Ajanta, Patna, and Chandor. Within Khandesh limits, besides several foot-paths, two cart roads cross the hills, one through the Ranjangaon or Outram pass near Chalisgaon, and the other by the Ajanta pass above Fardepur. The Sahyadri hills bound the south-west corner of Khandesh. Then, at the northern extremity of the range, they turn sharply to the east, leaving the broad Tapti plain between them and the Satpudas. Without any well marked peaks, many of the Sahyadri ridges have curious and picturesque outlines. They are scattered one behind the other, chiefly running north-east and south-west but with many spurs starting eastwards nearly at right angles to Chapter I. Description, Hills. Hattis. Sdtmdlds, Sahyddris. 1 This was in 1852. In 1850 the highest temperature was 89^, the mean 77°, and the daily range 16°
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