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netism, concluding with the experimentum crucis of Dr. FARADAY, by which the identity of the galvanic and magnetic fluids, is considered to be finally established. The magnetic spark was produced continuously by SAXTON's rotating apparatus, of which a description will be found in the Arcana of Science for 1834.

Wednesday Evening, the 1st April, 1835.

The Honorable Sir EDWARD RYAN, President, in the chair.

The Honorable GEORGE TURNOUR, of the Ceylon Civil Service, proposed as an Honorary Member at the last Meeting, was unanimously elected. Captain M. G. WHITE, Sen. Asst. Commissary, Arrakan, proposed by Mr. W. H. MACNAGHTEN, seconded by the Honorable Colonel MORRISON. Professor LEA and Dr. HARLAN, of Philadelphia, were proposed as Honorary Members by Mr. J. PRINSEP, seconded by Mr. MACNAGHTEN. Read a note from JOHN LACKERSTEEN, Esq. enclosing a letter from the Right Reverend JEAN LOUIS, Bishop of Isauropolis, and Vicar-Apostolic of Cochinchina, Camboge, and Ciampa.

The Reverend gentleman's letter, in French, stated, that he had in his possession a manuscript Dictionary, Cochinchinese and Latin, originally prepared more than 40 years ago by his predecessor, Monseigneur PIGNEAUX, Bishop of Adran, and revised and much augmented by himself during 14 years' residence in the country. He had also nearly completed a second volume of the same materials reversed, or Latin-Cochinchinese, and he had prepared a grammar of the same language in Latin, adopting for all three works the Roman alphabet, in lieu of the complex hieroglyphic characters of the country, which somewhat resemble those of China, but have different powers.

These three volumes he tendered to the Asiatic Society, requesting to be informed of its intentions in regard to their publication. If it were possible to -print them at Penang, where the Bishop and a few of his Cochinchinese converts have sought refuge from the severe persecutions to which the Mission has been subjected by the present king (who owes his seat on the throne to this very mission), he would there undertake the revision of the proofs: or if it should be necessary, he would proceed to Calcutta for the purpose of superintending the publication under the auspices of the Society. In the latter case, he must look to the Society for pecuniary aid, as all had been lost to the mission, through the - cruel treatment it had lately endured.

Resolved, that this important communication be submitted to the Committee of Papers, who will make the requisite inquiries regarding the work, and report on the expediency, and on the means, of effecting its - publication.

Library.

Mr. C. E. TREVELYAN, presented, on the part of the author, a copy of the Jáme Bahadur-khání, an epitome (4to, 600 pp.) of European sciences in the Persian language, compiled by KHAN BAHADUR, son of Rája Mitra Jíra of Patna, including treatises on astronomy, optics, and mathematics, and copious tables of logarithms for natural numbers, sines, tangents, &c. Also, a small octavo volume on Perspective (Ilm-ul Manázarat), in the Persian language, by the same author.

Mr. H. PIDDINGTON presented a copy of the Transactions of the Geological Society of Pennsylvania, for August, 1834.

Meteorological Registers, for Jan, and Feb. 1835-by the Surveyor

General.

From the Book-sellers.

LARDNER'S Cabinet Cyclopedia, SWAINSON's Natural History.

Museum and Antiquities.

Read a letter from Mr. W. DAWES, of the Delhí Canal Establishment, forwarding at the request of Lieut. KITTOE, a drawing of an image found about 10 years ago near the Herrod Ghat, on the western branch of the Jumna, and offering, if desired, to send the image itself to the museum. Resolved, that the offer be accepted with thanks.

A notice by B. H. HODGSON, Esq. of an inscription in Tibetan and Lantsa (correctly Ranza) characters, on a temple on the confines of Tibet, was submitted.

[This will be printed in the next number of the Journal.]

Physical.

The President brought to the notice of the Society Dr. PEARSON'S suggestion regarding the Curatorship. He had conversed with the Baron HUGEL (who was present at the Meeting) on the subject of procuring a competent person from Europe, and was assured that a salary of 150 or 200 rupees per mensem would be ample. The funds were in a state to warrant the measure. He therefore proposed, and it was resolved, that a Special Committee, consisting of the Honorable Col. MORRISON, Mr. W. H. Macnaghten, Dr. PEARSON, with the President and Secretary, be formed for the purpose of carrying the measure into effect, limiting the vote of salary to 200 rupees, and empowering the Committee to arrange other incidental expences with reference to the present means of the Society.

Read a letter from Serjeant DEAN, dated Delhí, the 20th March, acknowledging the receipt of the remittance of Rupees 100, on account of the expences incurred by him in transmitting fossil bones and other specimens, and announcing further contributions from himself and friends.

A letter from Lieut. N. VICARY, forwarding a small box of fossil bones from Julalpur, on the banks of the Betwa river; also some fossils of the Alligator, from between Chunar and Mirzápur on the Ganges; and a specimen of limestone from Landour, with impressions or erosions by water similar to those alluded to by Dr. MCCLELLAND.

Some of the bones from the Betwa, the metacarpus and femur of an ox, were lined with beautiful crystals of dog-tooth spar, which was also remarked lining the cavities of the kankar conglomerate forming the matrix in which they were imbedded.

Mr. BENSON, who was acquainted with this fossil site, stated his opinion that they were of modern fossilization, being found abundantly in the bed of the Betwa river.

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Mr. H. B. BENSON exhibited to the members present, the collection of shells made by him on his recent return to India, comprising many new genera and species.

[Notices of this collection will be given in the Journal.]

Meteorological Register, kept at the Assay Office, Calcutta, for the Month of March, 1835.

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JOURNAL

OF

THE ASIATIC SOCIETY.

No. 40.-April, 1835.

L.-Description of Ancient Temples and Ruins at Chárdwár in Assam. By Captain G. E. WESTMACOTT, Assistant, Governor General's Agent, N. E. Frontier.

TOWARDS the close of November last, I had occasion to proceed on public duty into Chárdwár, a small district in the northern division of Central Assam, being on the north bank of the river Brahmaputra between Lat. 26° 32′ and 26° 51', and Long. 92° 19′ and 92° 55'. It has its name from conducting to four passes of Bhután, and is bounded on the north by hills of various altitude, situate at the base of the Himálaya, and inhabited by three wild tribes of mountaineers, called Duphlas, Akhás, and Kupah Chowahs*; the Brahmaputra, confines it on the south; to the East it has the Bhairaví river, which divides it from Nondwár, and to the west the river Rhotás, which separates it from the small district of Chúteáh.

I think it necessary to state thus much in the way of introduction, to point out the precise locality of the ruins I am about to describe, as it is doubtful if many of my readers are aware of the geographical position of a district placed in so remote a corner of our possessions.

In the south-east angle of Chárdwár, a chain of granite hills, rising from two hundred to five hundred feet above sea level, and clothed with grass and forest trees, sweeps outwards in a crescent form from

* Kupah Chowah is a corruption from kupás-chor or cotton stealer, a name to which the people are well entitled from their predatory habits; but the Chárdwárians stand in much awe of these robbers, and shrink from bestowing on them so uncourteous an appellative. They come of the same stock with the Akhás, from whom they differ in few respects, and are said to have divided into a separate clan about sixty years since in the reign of LACHMI' SINGH king of Assam.

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the Bhairaví to the Brahmaputra. The inhabitants assert, these hills were originally called Agníghar or Agnigarh, the place or fort of fire, from their constantly sending forth flames, or, as others affirm, from a rájá named BANH having made a fort on the spot of fire: they add, that KRISHNA mounted on his garúra (a creature half-bird half-man, corresponding with the eagle of the Grecian Jupiter,) brought hither a supply of water and quenched the fires, and that in commemoration of the event the name of the hills was changed to Pord, which in the dialect of Assam signifies the burnt,' a name they still retain. I thought it possible this obscure tradition might be connected in some way with the existence at a former period of volcanos, but after an active scrutiny of the spot no traces of subterranean fire were discovered to bear out the supposition. I had taken up my abode temporarily in the neighbourhood, when I accidentally learnt there were some gigantic ruins to be seen in the wilds, respecting which the natives could furnish no satisfactory information on proceeding in the direction indicated, I found it impracticable to conduct the search from the density of the jungle, which consisted of lofty trees entwined with parasitical plants, and reed-grass upwards of twenty feet high swarming with wild animals; these obstacles were partly removed with the assistance of some peasants, and opened to view many interesting remains of antiquity which amply recompensed me for the trouble I had taken.

The first temple I examined appeared to have faced the north, and to have been provided with a portico supported on three columns of sixteen sides; each shaft, not including the plinth and pedestal which stand four feet above the ground, measured eight feet high and five and a half in girth, and was wrought from a single block of fine granite. The shafts have sculptured capitals, while the surbases take the form of an octagon, and the plinths are circular at top, and spread into four feet, making a sort of cross that measured four and three quarters feet each way. Three gigantic stones, with the fragments of a fourth, each hewn from a single block fourteen feet long, and cut into five irregular sides of which the total showed a circumference of eight feet, seem to have formed the entablature of the entrance porch, which I judged to have been fifty-six feet long. The frieze has three tiers of carving in basso relievo representing scrolls of flowers; the apertures in which iron rivets were introduced can be distinctly traced, and it is evident that no cement was employed to unite the materials. The other members were too much shattered and dispersed to enable me to conjecture the form of the temple; from a great portion of the surrounding works being in an unfinished state, it affords the presumption that the architect must have met some unlooked-for interruption; and

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