man that "In prosperous years when the gods favoured the
Zillah of Kadogi (a small village on the west bank of the Pennar river,
Hoskote Talook, 15 miles from Bangalore) with an ample harvest now and
then grains of gold were found on the ears of the paddy (rice plants)
grown under the tank lying close to the north of that village." And in
this connection I may mention that, when visiting the Kolar mines last
January, I found, in the course of a conversation with the head man of the
village of Ooregum, that he was aware of this tradition, and that grains
of gold were said to have been seen on the rice plants at a village about
fifteen miles distant from his own. The explanation of this is extremely
simple, as the rice plants are usually grown in nurseries and transplanted
in bunches of several plants, after which the fields are flooded, and in
heavy floods (and this accounts for the gold having been found in the
years which are prosperous from the abundant rain) the plants would often
be quite submerged. With the water no doubt came grains of gold, which
were deposited on the rice plants, and as these grew, the grains of gold
would naturally rise with them, and thus often be found adhering to the
roughly-coated grain.

After the attention of Lieutenant Warren was called to the subject, he
seems to have taken some trouble in investigating it, and having heard a
vague report that gold had been found in the earth somewhere near a small
hill about nine miles east of Budiakote, offered a reward for information
regarding this, and shortly afterwards a ryot of the village offered to
show him the place, which was close to his village. He visited the spot
in question on February 17th, 1802, "when the women of the village were
assembled, and, each being provided with a small broom and vaning basket,
and hollow board to receive the earth, they went to a jungle on the west
of the village. Here they entered some small nullahs, or rather breaks in
the ground, and removing the gravel with their hands, they swept the earth
underneath into their vaning baskets, by the help of which they further
cleared it of the smaller stones and threw it into the hollow board above
mentioned. Having thus got enough earth together, they adjourned to a tank
and placed the hollow boards containing the earth in the water, but just
deep enough for it to overflow when resting on the ground, and no more.
Then they stirred the earth with the hand, but keeping it