3

INDIA

Himalayas and the western mountains, bringing the soil of
Tibet, of Afghanistan and Baluchistan to nourish the
swarming populations of Bengal, the North-West Provinces,
 the Punjab, and Sind. In this area of depression
‘never rising more than a few hundred feet above sealevel,
 and often only a few inches above) we must include
Assam, the valley of the Brahmaputra, only noting here
in anticipation of further detail, that all the three great
river systems of India—the Indus, the Ganges, and the
Brahmaputra—derive a part of their water-supply from
sources which lie in the highlands beyond the Himalayas
and the western mountains, and part from the countless
salleys which lie hidden within the mountain folds.
To the south of the area of depression succeeds the
region of southern table-land, or peninsular area, which
includes the Central Provinces, Bombay, Madras, Mysore,
and several other minor states and provinces. This
three-sided tract of territory, known to the ancients as
the Dakshin (Deccan) or “south land,” supports a population
 of about two-thirds the strength of the population
>f the depression, and is buttressed by the Vindhya
mountains on the north, and by the Eastern and Western
Ghats of the Bengal and Arabian sea coasts respectively ;
‘he two latter running to an angle near Cape Comorin.
Sweeping round the island of Ceylon and the Coromandel
 coast to the head of the Bay of Bengal, and
‘hen extending an arm southwards embracing the Andaman
 and Nicobar Islands, and stretching very nearly
to Sumatra, is the roo fathom line of sea bottom, bounding
 a shoreward width of about fifty miles, with a fairly
aniform contour at another fifty mile interval, which
represents the goo fathom limit. Opposite the mouth
of the Ganges these intervals are very much extended by
deltaic influence. Inland from the coastline of Madras
for a width of go to 100 miles, and reaching to the Gangetic
delta, is a belt of shore formation of low elevation fringing
the foot of the Eastern Ghats. The width of low foreshore
on the western coast of India is very much less than this
of the east, whilst the 100 fathom line reaches farther out