The following passage indicates that the great Sir Walter, with his usual sagacity, saw the true sense of the word in its geographical use, though misled by books to attribute to the (so-called) 'Eastern Ghauts' the character that belongs to the Western only.
1827.—"... they approached the Ghauts, those tremendous mountain passes which descend from the table-land of Mysore, and through which the mighty streams that arise in the centre of the Indian Peninsula find their way to the ocean."—The Surgeon's Daughter, ch. xiii.
c.—
1553.—"The most notable division which Nature hath planted in this land is a chain of mountains, which the natives, by a generic appellation, because it has no proper name, call Gate, which is as much as to say Serra."—De Barros, Dec. I. liv. iv. cap. vii.
1561.—"This Serra is called Gate."—Correa, Lendas, ii. 2, 56.
1563.—"The Cuncam, which is the land skirting the sea, up to a lofty range which they call Guate."—Garcia, f. 34b.
1572.—
"Da terra os Naturaes lhe chamam Gate,
Do pe do qual pequena quantidade
Se estende hũa fralda estreita, que combate