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 GOG

492

sweep away extensive buildings, which would come down before the inmates had any intimation of their danger. These stories, therefore, are not improbable. Amargarh, which is &n ancient fort in Dhaurahra, Chahldri in Kundri pargana, and Mallapur in the same, have all recently been wholly or partially destroyed. temple near Amargarh was swept away, great fragments of wall tumbling into the rushing water. The people allege that in 1871 they were watching the destruction of the shrine as one great mass of masonry was rent away, a large iron-bound chest appeared in a recess laid bare in the wall beneath the floor of the sanctuary, which was now jutting out into the flood. Rumour had previously announced that the Raja of Dhaurahra had buried his treasure in the neighbourhood, but before ropes could be procured, the whole of the remainder of the edifice toppled into the torrent, and its ruins are now buried in the sand.

A



Although such encroachments have been frequent, there has been no great change in the Gogra's course, at any rate for one hundred years. In 1765 Tieffenthaler followed it for many miles ; he described it with the towns on its banks in an itinerary, and drew a chart* besides it flowed then as now. He gives curious particulars about the change of name.

The Kauriala was then named the Kinar; Vol. III. page 378.

it joined the Sarda, now Called the Suheli, and both united streams flowing south-east, even then called the Sarda ; then the

it in the channel which now carries the water of the Sarda, and the joint stream was called the Gandak then the Chauka joined at Bahramghat, and the joint river was henceforth called the Gogra. The names of Kinar and Gandak have now disappeared; the only question is, when the name Kauriala ceases to apply and Gogra replaces it. Probably the junction of the Dahawar at Mallapur is the proper place. Using the name in this extension, we may say that the Gogra commences to be so called 600 miles from the source of its remotest tributary.

Dahawar joined



at Ramnagar, when it enters Oudh just below the rapids, 449 feet above the sea. At Mallapur the surface of the water is 375 feet above the sea it sinks to 302 at Ajodhya, and 235 when it The breadth varies from 850 feet at the narrowest part leaves Oudh. in the dry weather to two miles in the rains, when the discharge is supposed to be about a million cubic feet. It skirts the Sitapur district for 78 miles, Bahraich for 114, Bara Banki for 84, Gonda for 55, Fyzabad

The Kauriala

is



for 44.

The depth of mid-channel is nowhere now less than six feet but boats drawing more than four feet are not desirable, because they may be carried by the current on to shallows. The boats are clinker-built generally the largest do not carry more than 1,200 maunds, or about forty-five tons; they have generally no decks, and the cargo is protected by mat awnings the





cost of carriage is very small.

From Bahramghat


 * Vol. III. page 278, Berlin edition.

the freight for grain