Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 3.djvu/638

620 park, but it has a very sparse population and little culti vated land. In the extreme north a line of hill rises abruptly out of the great plain of the Narbada valley. The central tract alone possesses a rich soil, well watered by the Machna and Sampna rivers, almost entirely cultivated and studded with villages. To the south lies a rolling plateau of basaltic formation (with the sacred town of Multai, and the springs of the River Tapti at its highest point), extending over the whole of the southern face of the district, and finally merging into the wild and broken line of the Ghats, which lead down to the plains. This tract consists of a succession of stony ridges of trap rock, enclosing valleys or basins of fertile soil, to which cultivation is for the most part confined, except where the shallow soil on the tops of the hills has been turned to account.

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Little is known of the early history of the district except that it must have been the centre of the first of the four ancient Gond kingdoms of Kherla, Deogarh, Mandla, and Chdrida. According to Farishta, these kingdoms engrossed in 1398 all the hills of Gondwaua and adjacent countries, and were of great wealth and power. About the year 1418 Sultan Husain Shah of Malwa invaded Kherla, and reduced it to a dependency. Nine years later the Raja rebelled, but although with the help of the Bahmini kings of the Deccan he managed for a time to assert his independence, he was finally subdued and deprived of his territories. In 1467 Kherla was seized by the Bahmini king, but was after wards restored to Malwa. A century later the kingdom of M4lwa became incorporated into the dominions of the emperor of Delhi. In 1703 a Musalman convert of the Gond tribe held the country, and in 1743 Eaghuji Bhonsla, the Marhatta ruler of Berar, annexed it to his dominions. The Marhattas in the year 1818 ceded this district to the East India Company as payment for a contingent, and by the treaty of 1826 it was formally incorporated with the British possessions. Detachments of British troops were stationed at Multai, Betul, and Shahpur to cut off the retreat of Apa Sahib, the Marhatta general, and a military force was quartered at Betul until June 18G2. The ruined city of Kherla formed the seat of government under the Gonds and preceding rulers, and hence the dis trict was, until the time of its annexation to the British dominions, known as the &quot; Kherla Sarkar.&quot; The town of Multai contains an artificial tank, from the centre of which the Tapti is said to take its rise; hence the reputed sanctity of the spot, and the accumulation of temples in its honour. The climate of Betul is fairly salubrious. Its height above the plains and the neighbourhood of extensive forests moderate the heat, and render the temperature pleasant throughout the greater part of the year. During the cold season the thermometer at night falls below the free/ing point ; little or no hot wind is felt before the end of April, and even then it ceases after sunset. The nights iii the hot season are comparatively cool and pleasant. During the monsoon the climate is very damp, and at times even cold and raw, thick clouds and mist enveloping the sky for many days together. The average annual rainfall is 40 inches. In the denser jungles malaria prevails for months after the cessation of the rains, but the Gonds do not appear to suffer much from its effects. Travellers and strangers who venture into these jungles run the risk of fever of a severe type at almost all seasons of the year.  BETWÁ, a river of India, which rises in the native state of Bhopal in Malwa, and after a course of 360 miles, for the most part in, a north-easterly direction, falls into the Janina at Hamirpur in 25 57 N. lat. and 80 17 E. long.  BEUDANT,, a French mineralogist and geologist, was born at Paris in 1787, and died in 1862. He was educated at the Polytechnic and Normal schools, and in 1811 was appointed professor of mathematics at the Lycde of Avignon. Thence he was called, in 1813, to the Lycee of Marseilles to fill the post of professor of physics. In the following year the royal mineralogical cabinet was committed to his charge to be conveyed into England, and from that time his attention seems to have been directed principally towards geology and cognate sciences. In the year 1818 he undertook, at the expense of Government, a geological journey through Hungary, and the results of his researches, Voyage Min&ralogique ct Gcologique en Ilongrie, 3 vols. 4to, with atlas, published in 1822, established for him a European reputation. He was about the same time appointed to the professorship of mineralogy in the Paris Faculty of Sciences. His treatises on physics (Traite de Physique, Gth eel., 1838) and on mineralogy and geology (Cours Elementaire do Mineralogie et Geologie, 1841) were very popular. Beudant also, when holding the post of inspector of the university, published a valuable French grammar.  BEULÉ,, a French archaeologist and man of letters, was born at Saumur 29th June ,1 82 6, and died 4th April 1874. He was educated at the Ecole Normale, and in 1852 was sent to Athens as one of the professors in the Ecole Francaise established there. At first distinguished as a man of fashion, he afterwards devoted himself with intense vigour to archaeological researches. He had the good fortune to discover the propykea of the Acropolis, and his work, L Acropoled Athencs (2 vols. 1854), was published by order of the minister of public instruction. Promotion and distinctions followed rapidly upon his first successes. He was made doctor of letters, chevalier of the Legion of Honour, professor of archaeology at the Bibliotheque Imperiale, member of the Academy of Inscriptions, and perpetual secretary of the Academy of Fine Arts. Like too many French men of letters, he joined eagerly in political affairs, with which the last few years of his life were entirely occupied. The most important of his writings are Etudes sur le Peloponnese, 1855 ; Les Monnaies d Atkcnes, 1858; Ilistoire de la Sculpture avant Phidias, 18G4 ; Ilistoire de I Art Grcc, 1870.