Monsoon seas

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By evening I could distinguish low jungle-covered hills rising into the cloud behind; ahead lay a long headland surmounted by a fort. This landmark was little use, as on that coast almost every strategic headland is surmounted by a fort. These are massive stone buildings, built either by the Portuguese about the 16th century, or by the Mahrattas when their kingdom controlled that coast and also threatened the Great Moghul as far away as Delhi.

I lay-to about eight miles off, and at ten o’clock that night spotted the flash of a lighthouse between lulls in the rain. It was Dabhol, about 80 miles