The climate of the Khasia mountains, which lie north-east from
Calcutta, and are separated by the valley of the Burrampooter River
from the Himalaya range, is remarkable for the inordinate fall of
rain--the greatest, it is said, which has ever been recorded. Mr. Yule,
an English gentleman, established that in the single month of August
1841 there fell 264 inches of rain, or 22 feet, of which 12½ feet
fell in the space of five consecutive days. This astonishing fact is
confirmed by two other English travellers, who measured 30 inches of
rain in twenty-four hours, and during seven months above 500 inches.
This great rain-fall is attributed to the abruptness of the mountains
which face the Bay of Bengal, and the intervening flat swamps 200 miles
in extent. The district of the excessive rain is extremely limited; and
but a few degrees farther west, rain is said to be almost unknown, and
the winter falls of snow to seldom exceed two inches.