'Transactions of the Bombay Geographical Society, from September 1850 to June 1852. Edited by the Secretary. Volume X.' [‎175] (308/458)

bribed utij erfe
strata full ofo^
y a veryeiti
of Sewree is j,
U first be n
one, a Had f :
if the volcanic i
■e still tracei
bjected. A sen
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ilgh-water mat
A beautiful f'
)ld artillery P * 1 '
ie end oftlifii*
i U s rock, or«
general of^l
lS of greens^*
CENTRE OP THE ISLAND. ^
tuffaoeotis series of eminences from the Lighthouse to Sion Fort,—the is
land is almost perfectly flat, about a fourth of it being in reality under
tlie level of the sea, the waters of which are excluded, by embankments
walls, and sluices. This space is covered over with various sorts of allu
vium) afterwards to be described, mostly of marine, and much of it of
very recent, origin. Though recent railway operations, with the ex
cavations for the supply of water during the dry season, have helped to
enable me to trace formations here completely concealed by the super
ficial beds, a very imperfect idea is all that can be afforded of the cha
racter or position of the rocks constituting the lower parts of the island
though there is much reason to believe them mostly soft argillaceous
stratified beds, such as prevail at Love-Grove sluices, and near Sewree.
17.—It is quite clear that at a comparatively recent date, probably
within the human period, Western India has suffered from a succession
of upheavals and depressions, and that just before the latest of these,
instead of a single island, Bombay consisted of a group of at least seven
islands. Still more recently than this, and quite within the reach of
tradition, if not of history, Colaba formed two islands, and Bombay itself
either three or four, these being united at low water, the sea at spring
tides effectually dividing them from each other. Malum is mentioned
in an old MS. as forming a distinct island, and it is mentioned as still so
continuing when Dr. Freyer visited Bombay in 1680. “ In the middle
of the Island,” says he, “ between Parell and Mayem [Mahim,] Seeam
[Sion,] and Bombaim, is an hollow wherein is received a branch [of the
sea] running out at three several places, which drowns 40,000 acres of
good land; athwart which from Parell to Mayem are the ruins of a
stone causeway, made by Pennanees.”* The three places where the
sea found admission are clearly at the Worlee and the Sion sluices, and
the openings at the Mahaluximee and Love-Grove velard, which would
at once constitute Mahim town and woods, Worlee Hill, and Love-
Grove, into three separate islands,—their insular condition continuing
till the construction of the walls now uniting them excluding the sea.
18—The neighbourhood of the Mazagon Gaol is termed Omarkadee,
kadee being the word always applied to salt water creeks dry at ebb tides;
the neighbourhood of the temple of Mombadaviis called Pae Dhonee, or
* New account of Persia and the East Indies, betwixt 1680 and 1688. By Dr. Freyer, F. R. S.
London; 1697,
i V
*