January 24, 1850.—­Sandee, fourteen miles, over a plain of light domuteea soil, which becomes very sandy for the last four or five miles.  The crops are scanty upon the more sandy parts, except in the vicinity of villages; but there is a little jungle, and no undue portion of fallow for so light a soil.  About five miles from our last ground, we came through the large and populous village of Bawun; about three miles further, through another of nearly the same size, Sungeechamow; and about three miles further on, through one still larger, Admapoor, which is three miles from Sandee.  Sandee and Nawabgunge join each other, and are on the bank of the Gurra river, a small stream whose waters are said to be very wholesome.  We passed the boundary of the Bangur district, just before we entered the village of Sungeechamow, which lies in that of Sandee.

There is a Hindoo shrine on the right of the road between Sandee and Admapoor, which is said to be considered very sacred, and called Barmawust.  It is a mere grove, with a few priests, on the bank of a large lake, which extends close up to Sandee on the south.  The river Gurra flows under the town to the north.  The place is said to be healthy, but could hardly be so, were this lake to the west or east, instead of the south, whence the wind seldom blows.  This lake must give out more or less of malaria, that would be taken over the village, for the greater portion of the year, by the prevailing easterly and westerly winds.  I do not think the place so eligible for a cantonment at Tundeeawun, in point either of salubrity, position, or soil.

January 25, 1850.—­Halted at Sandee.  The lake on the south side, mentioned yesterday, abounds in fish, and is covered with wild fowl; but the fish we got from it yesterday was not good of its kind.  I observed very fine groves of mango-trees close to Sandee, planted by merchants and shopkeepers of the place.  The oldest are still held by the descendants of those by whom they were first planted, more than a century ago; and no tax whatever is imposed upon the trees of any kind, or upon the lands on which they stand.  Many young groves are growing up around, to replace the old ones as they decay; and the greatest possible security is felt in the tenure by which they are held by the planter, or his descendants, though they hold no written lease, or deed of gift; and have neither written law nor court of justice to secure it to them.  Groves and solitary mango, semul, tamarind, mhowa and other trees, whose leaves and branches are not required for the food of elephants and camels, are more secure in Oude than in our own territories; and the country is, in consequence, much better provided with them.  While they give beauty to the landscape, they alleviate the effects of droughts to the poorer classes from the fruit they supply; and droughts are less frequently and less severely felt in a country so intersected by fine streams, flowing from the Tarae forest, or down from the perpetual