SERA, a town of the south of India, in the province of Mysore, and capital of a district of the same name. The climate is subject to drought, and there seldom falls as much rain as is required to raise a full crop. Rice is the most beneficial product, and in favourable years the greater part of the watered land is sown with it; but in dry seasons coarser grains are sown. The trade carried on is to the nizam's country, the Mahirattas, and Bednore, Seringapatam, and Bangalore, and the article of exportation is the dried kernel of the cocoa-nut. This place, which was first conquered by the Bejapoor Mohammedan government in 1643, was afterwards the seat of an independent principality, which was at its greatest prosperity under Delawar Khan,
immediately before it was conquered by Hyder, at which time the natives assert it to have contained 50,000 houses. It afterwards suffered many calamities from Tippoo and the Mahrattas, and now contains scarcely 300 houses; but it is fast reviving. In the district of Sera, all the villages were strongly fortified; and frequent famines took place, when the inhabitants were in the practice of plundering each other to support life. The defence of the villages against plunderers was conducted, not by fire-arms, but by throwing stones, in which the inhabitants are very dexterous. The town is eighty four miles north from Seringapatam. Long. 76. 55. E. Lat. 13. 37. N.