SIMLA, a sanatorium in the Simla district of British India, situated on a transverse spur of the Central Himalayan system, in lat. 31° 6' N., and long. 77° 11' E. Mean elevation above sea level, 7084 feet. The Shnla district is under the Lieutenant-Governor of the Panjab, and con sists of several detached plots of territory among the hills of the Lower Himalayan system. Area, 18 square miles; population in 1868, 3'3,995. The inountains of Simla district and the surround ing Native States compose the southern outliers of the great central chain of the Eastern Hima layas. The climate of Shnla Hills is admirably adapted to the European constitution, and the district has therefore been selected as the site of ninnerous sanatoria and cantonments. The plains at the foot of the Simla Hills attain 1000 feet elevation, and the outer ranges are lower than those of Garhwal and Kainaon. Rupar, close to the Sntlej amongst the outer hills, is under 1000 feet, but Subathu, a little farther in, is 4200; and Kussowlee, 6500 feet. The name is the Hindi Shyea Isialay. Simla was taken from the Jun raja in 1815, and given to the Patiala raja, but again obtained from him as a sanatorium ; the houses are scattered over an extent of about 7 miles, on a series of heights varying from 6500 to 8000 feet, which is the highest elevation. The portion of the Himalaya visible from Simla is a depressed continuation of the chain, extending from the emergence of the Sutlej through the_snow, to an abrupt limit bordering close upon the plain of the Panjab near the debouche of the Ravi ; few, if any, of the detached peaks rise beyond 20,000 feet.
The range bears wild thyme, avild strawberries, various oaks, pines, the deodar, and all the forms of Europe. Pinus excelsa is a very comtnon tree at Simla, particularly on the southern face of Mount Jako, which is the highest part of the ridge. Abies Smithiana is rare, while the deodar is common on the southern and western slopes of Jako, above 7000 feet ; and again in shadY groves at the bottom of the valleys on both sides of the ridge, as low as 5000 feet. Firms longifolia is common
at the western or lower extremity of the Simla station, and prevails, to the exclusion of any other tree, on the dry, sunny spurs which run towards the south, at elevations from 5000 to 7000 feet. The trees furnishing the supply of firewood at Simla are chiefly Quercus incana, Rhododendron arboreum, Andromeda ovalifolia. Pinus excela, and Cedrus deodara. The fruit of the trimal, or Ficus macrophylla, is sold in the bazar at Simla.
Koli is the name given to the lower class of cultivators in the Simla Hills. The Kant& are an agricultural race in the Simla Dina and east of the Sutlej, holding most of the land in the Simla Hills. They are inferior in position to Rajputs, but they are often educated, and are generally ministers to the Itajput chiefs. Their women are nice-looking, and all the tribe who are not (in the tipper hills) in contact with Tartars are quite Aryan, though not very large. In certain places there is a partial and local practice of polyandry among. them, but it is not the general castom of the tribe. The billmen of Sitnla are offspring of the dark Kayasth races and Ilajputs who have for eight centuries been flying to the mountains to escape Muhammadan invasions. They are filthy in their persons ; they have clear, almost Anglo Saxon, complexion ; many have goitres, and they hate Mulaatumadans. Their chiefs, as the ranas Dati and Kat, are of Ilajput origin, and they have a municipal system, with shamilik or commons, and a lombardar or mukhia, i.e. chief. Polyandry prevails among the hillmen beyond Kotgliur, but it is on the decline, polygamy often taking. its place. In the winter the then ahnost hybernate, spending months in eating and sleeping.
Simla district produces iron-ore, plumbago, pipe-elay, red ochre, limestone, sandstone, and fossils. — hap. Gaz. viii.; Cal. Review, 1867 ; Thomson's Trs. p. 22 ; Mrs. Hervey, Adventures Tartary; Hooker and Thomson, Flora Indica, p. 202; Ann. Ind. Adm.