Himalayan Journals, vol 2 by J. D. Hooker (great reads TXT) 📖

Tendong, a very fine mountain,

which rises 8,613 feet, and is a conspicuous feature from Dorjiling, where it is known as Mount Ararat. The Lepchas have a curious legend of a man and woman having saved themselves on its summit, during a

flood that once deluged Sikkim. The coincidence of this story with

the English name of Ararat suggests the probability of the legend

being fabulous; but I am positively assured that it is not so, but

that it was current amongst the Lepchas before its English name was heard of, and that the latter was suggested from the peculiar form of its summit resembling that given in children's books as the

resting-place of the ark.

The ascent from the Great Rungeet (alt. 818 feet) is through dry

woods of Sal and Pines (P. longifolia). I camped the first night at the village of Mikk (alt. 3,900 feet), and on the following day

ascended to Namtc (alt. 5,600 feet).

On the route I was met by the Lama of Silokfoke Goompa. Though a

resident on the Lassoo Kajee's estates, he politely brought me a

present, at the same time apologising for not waiting till I had

encamped, owing to his excessive fat, which prevented his climbing.

I accepted his excuses, though well aware that his real reason was

that he wished to pay his respects, and show his good feeling, in

private. Besides his ordinary canonicals, he carried a tall

crozier-headed staff, and had a curious horn slung round his neck,

full of amulets; it was short, of a transparent red colour, and

beautifully carved, and was that of the small cow of Lhassa, which

resembles the English species, and is not a yak (it is

called "Tundro").

Namtchi was once a place of considerable importance; and still

possesses a mendong, with six rows of inscribed slabs; a temple, and a Lama attached thereto: the latter waited on me soon after I had

encamped, but he brought no present, and I was not long kept in

suspense as to his motives. These people are poor dissemblers; if

they intend to obstruct, they do it clumsily and hesitatingly: in

this instance the Lama first made up to my people, and, being coolly received, kept gradually edging up to my tent-door, where, after an awkward salute, he delivered himself with a very bad grace of his

mission, which was from the Lassoo Kajee to stop my progress. I told him I knew nothing of the Lassoo Kajee or his orders, and should

proceed on the following morning: he then urged the bad state of the roads, and advised me to wait two days till he should receive orders from the Rajah; upon which I dismissed him.

Soon afterwards, as I sat at my tent-door, looking along the narrow bushy ridge that winds up the mountain, I saw twenty or thirty men

rapidly descending the rocky path: they were Lepchas, with blue and white striped garments, bows and quivers, and with their long knives gleaming in the sun: they seemed to be following a figure in red Lama costume, with a scarlet silk handkerchief wound round his head, its ends streaming behind him. Though expecting this apparition to prove the renowned Kajee and his myrmidons, coming to put a sudden

termination to my progress, I could not help admiring the exceeding picturesqueness of the scenery and party. My fears were soon

dissipated by my men joyfully shouting, "The Tchebu Lama! the Tchebu Lama!" and I soon recognised the rosy face and twinkling eyes of my friend of Bhomsong, the only man of intelligence about the Rajah's

court, and the one whose services as Vakeel were particularly wanted at Dorjiling.

He told me that the Lassoo Kajee had orders (from whom, he would not say) to stop my progress, but that I should proceed nevertheless, and that there was no objection to my doing so; and he despatched a

messenger to the Rajah, announcing my progress, and requesting him to send me a guide, and to grant me every facility, asserting that he

had all along fully intended doing so.

On the following morning the Lama proceeded to Dorjiling, and I

continued the ascent of Tendong, sending my men round the shoulder to Temi in the Teesta valley, where I proposed to pass the night.

The road rapidly ascends by a narrow winding path, covered with a

loose forest of oaks, rhododendrons, and various shrubs, not found at equal elevations on the wetter Dorjiling ranges: amongst, them the

beautiful laburnum-like Piptanthus Nepalensis, with golden

blossoms, was conspicuous. Enormous blocks of white and red

stratified quartz, and slate, some 20 and even 40 yards long, rest on the narrow ridge at 7000 feet elevation. The last ascent is up a

steep rounded cone with a broad flat top, covered with dwarf bamboo, a few oaks, laurels, magnolias, and white-flowered rhododendron trees (R. argenteum), which obstructed the view. I hung the barometers

near one of the many chaits on the summit, where there is also a rude temple, in which worship is performed once a year. The elevation is 8,671 feet by my observations.* [8,663 by Col. Waugh's

trigonometrical observations.] The geological formation of Tendong in some measure accounts for its peculiar form. On the conical summit

are hard quartzoze porphyries, which have apparently forced up the

gneiss and slates, which dip in all directions from the top, and are full of injected veins of quartz. Below 7000 feet, mica-schist

prevails, always inclined at a very high angle; and I found jasper

near Namtchi, with other indications of Plutonic action.

The descent on the north side was steep, through a rank vegetation, very different from that of the south face. The oaks are very grand, and I measured one (whose trunk was decayed, and split into three,

however), which I found to be 49 feet in girth at 5 feet from the

ground. Near Temi (alt. 4,770 feet) I gathered the fruit of

Kadsura, a climbing plant allied to Magnolia, bearing round heads of large fleshy red drupes, which are pleasantly acid and much eaten; the seeds are very aromatic.

From Temi the road descends to the Teesta, the course of which it

afterwards follows. The valley was fearfully hot, and infested with mosquitos and peepsas. Many fine plants grew in it:* [Especially upon the broad terraces of gravel, some of which are upwards of a mile

long, and 200 feet above the stream: they are covered with boulders of rock, and are generally opposite feeders of the river.]

I especially noticed Aristolochia saccata, which climbs the

loftiest trees, bearing its curious pitcher-shaped flowers near the ground only; its leaves are said to be good food for cattle.

Houttuynia, a curious herb allied to pepper, grew on the banks,

which, from the profusion of its white flowers, resembled

strawberry-beds; the leaves are eaten by the Lepchas. But the most

magnificent plant of these jungles is Hodgsonia, (a genus I have

dedicated to my friend, Mr. Hodgson), a gigantic climber allied to

the gourd, bearing immense yellowish-white pendulous blossoms, whose petals have a fringe of buff-coloured curling threads, several inches long. The fruit is of a rich brown, like a small melon in form, and contains six large nuts, whose kernels (called "Katior-pot" by the

Lepchas) are eaten. The stem, when cut, discharges water profusely

from whichever end is held downwards. The "Took" (Hydnocarpus) is a beautiful evergreen tree, with tufts of yellow blossoms on the trunk: its fruit is as large as an orange, and is used to poison fish, while from the seeds an oil is expressed. Tropical oaks and Terminalias are the giants of these low forests, the latter especially, having

buttressed trunks, appear truly gigantic; one, of a kind called

"Sung-lok," measured 47 feet in girth, at 5 feet, and 21 at 15 feet from the ground, and was fully 200 feet high. I could only procure

the leaves by firing a ball into the crown. Some of their trunks lay smouldering on the ground, emitting a curious smell from the mineral matter in their ashes, of whose constituents an account will be found in the Appendix.

Birds are very rare, as is all animal life but insects, and a small fresh-water crab, Thelphusa, ("Ti-hi" of the Lepchas). Shells, from the absence of lime, are extremely scarce, and I scarcely picked up a single specimen: the most common are species of Cyclostoma.

The rains commenced on the 10th of May, greatly increasing the

discomforts of travelling, but moderating the heat by drenching

thunder-storms, which so soaked the men's loads, that I was obliged to halt a day in the Teesta valley to have waterproof covers made of platted bamboo-work, enclosing Phrynium leaves. I was delighted to

find that my little tent was impervious to water, though its

thickness was but of one layer of blanket: it was a single ridge with two poles, 7 feet high, 8 feet long, and 8 feet broad at the base,

forming nearly an equilateral triangle in front.

Bhomsong was looking more beautiful than ever in its rich summer

clothing of tropical foliage. I halted during an hour of heavy rain on the spot where I had spent the previous Christmas, and could not help feeling doubly lonely in a place where every rock and tree

reminded me of that pleasant time. The isolation of my position, the hostility of the Dewan, and consequent uncertainty of the success of a journey that absorbed all my thoughts, the prevalence of fevers in the valleys I was traversing, and the many difficulties that beset my path, all crowded on the imagination when fevered by exertion and

depressed by gloomy weather, and my spirits involuntarily sank as I counted the many miles and months intervening between me and my home.

The little flat on which I had formerly encamped was now covered with a bright green crop of young rice. The house then occupied by the

Dewan was now empty and unroofed; but the suspension bridge had been repaired, and its light framework of canes, spanning the boiling

flood of the Teesta, formed a graceful object in this most beautiful landscape. The temperature of the river was 58 degrees, only 7

degrees above that of mid-winter, owing to the now melting snows.

I had rather expected to meet either with a guide, or with some

further obstruction here, but as none appeared, I proceeded onwards as soon as the weather moderated.

Illustration--PANDANUS. SIKKIM SCREW-PINE.

Higher up, the scenery resembles that of Tchintam on the Tambur: the banks are so steep as to allow of no road, and the path ascends from the river, at 1000 feet, to Lathiang village, at 4,800 feet, up a

wild, rocky torrent that descends from Mainom to the Teesta.

The cliffs here are covered with wild plantains and screw-pines

(Pandanus), 50 feet high, that clasp the rocks with cable-like

roots, and bear one or two crowns of drooping leaves, 5 feet long:

two palms, Rattan (Calamus) and Areca gracilis, penetrate thus

far up the Teesta valley, but are scarcely found further.

From the village the view was superb, embracing the tropical gulley below, with the flat of Bhomsong deep down in the gorge, its bright rice-fields gleaming like emeralds amid the dark vegetation that

surrounded it; the Teesta winding to the southward, the pine-clad

rocky top of Mainom, 10,613 feet high, to the south-west, the cone of Mount Ararat far to the south, to the north black mountains tipped

with snow, and to the east the magnificent snowy range of Chola,

girdling the valley of the Ryott with a diadem of frosted silver.

The coolies, each carrying upwards of 80 lb. load, had walked twelve hours that day, and besides descending 2000 feet, they had ascended nearly 4000 feet, and gone over innumerable ups and downs besides.

Beyond Lathiang,