WESTERN COAST of India includes Travan core, Cochin, aud Malabar, and comprises a strip of land of various width, lying between the sea on the western side of India, and the range of Western Ghats, which it includes. It is naostly undulating or hilly, almost everywhere covered with jungle of every description, from low bushes to the most lofty forest trees. Most of the roads here, too, are lined with splendid avenues of banyan, cashew, and various other fine trees. The climate is moist and comparatively cool. The Wynad district, and generally the wooded parts bordering the summit of the ghats, may also be included in this, which they resemble in climate and productions. The cardamom hills in Travancore are the southern continuation of the Western Ghats. Ghat is a term employed in India to designate a ferry or landing-place on a river, a range of hills, or the scarped wall of a table-land, or the defile or pass leading through or down such. The Western Ghat is the range
of mountains which extend from the valley of the Tapti to the gap of PaIghat, about 800 miles, and then, after an interruption, to Cape Comorin. The coast line from the sea to their base is gener ally flat and low, with occasional spurs or solitary hills, but the ghats rise abruptly almost scarped to an averarre height of 3000 feet ; but Purunder is 4472, and Mahabaleshwara 4700, Matheran, projecting spur, about 3500. The Eastern Ghats extend from Orissa to Connbatore, along the eastern side of the Peninsula of India, at distances of 50 to 150 miles from the Bay of Bengal. They are steep, and well clothed with forests. The country lying between them and the sea is low, scarcely rising 100 feet above the sea. See Ghat. I