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

its European houses doubled in two years; its

salubrious climate, its scenery, and accessibility, ensure it so

rapid a further increase that it will become the most populous

hill-station in India. Strong prejudices against a damp climate, and the complaints of loungers and idlers who only seek pleasure,

together with a groundless fear of the natives, have hitherto

retarded its progress; but its natural advantages will outweigh these and all other obstacles.

I am aware that my opinion of the ultimate success of Dorjiling is

not shared by the general public of India, and must be pardoned for considering their views in this matter short-sighted. With regard to the disagreeables of its climate, I can sufficiently appreciate them, and shall be considered by the residents to have over-estimated the amount and constancy of mist, rain, and humidity, from the two

seasons I spent there being exceptional in these respects. Whilst on the one hand I am willing to admit the probability of this,* [I am

informed that hardly a shower of rain has fallen this season, between November 1852, and April 1853; and a very little snow in February

only.] I may be allowed on the other to say that I have never visited any spot under the sun, where I was not told that the season was

exceptional, and generally for the worse; added to which there is no better and equally salubrious climate east of Nepal, accessible

from Calcutta.

All climates are comparative, and fixed residents naturally praise

their own. I have visited many latitudes, and can truly say that I

have found no two climates resembling each other, and that all alike are complained of. That of Dorjiling is above the average in point of comfort, and for perfect salubrity rivals any; while in variety,

interest, and grandeur, the scenery is unequalled.

From Sikkim to the Khasia mountains our course was by boat down the Mahanuddy to the upper Gangetic delta, whose many branches we

followed eastwards to the Megna; whence we ascended the Soormah to

the Silhet district. We arrived at Kishengunj, on the Mahanuddy, on the 3rd of May, and were delayed two days for our boat, which should have been waiting here to take us to Berhampore on the Ganges: we

were, however, hospitably received by Mr. Perry's family.

The approach of the rains was indicated by violent easterly storms of thunder, lightning, and rain; the thermometer ranging from 70 degrees to 85 degrees. The country around Kishengunj is flat and very

barren; it is composed of a deep sandy soil, covered with a short

turf, now swarming with cockchafers. Water is found ten or twelve

feet below the surface, and may be supplied by underground streams

from the Himalaya, distant forty-five miles. The river, which at this season is low, may be navigated up to Titalya during the rains; its bed averages 60 yards in width, and is extremely tortuous; the

current is slight, and, though shallow, the water is opaque.

We slowly descended to Maldah, where we arrived on the 11th: the

temperature both of the water and of the air increased rapidly to

upwards of 90 degrees; the former was always a few degrees cooler

than the air by day, and warmer by night. The atmosphere became drier as we receded from the mountains.

The boatmen always brought up by the shore at night; and our progress was so slow, that we could keep up with the boat when walking along the bank. So long as the soil and river-bed continued sandy, few

bushes or herbs were to be found, and it was difficult to collect a hundred kinds of plants in a day: gradually, however, clumps of trees appeared, with jujube bushes, Trophis, Acacia, and Buddleia, a

few fan-palms, bamboos, and Jack-trees. A shell (Anodon) was the

only one seen in the river, which harboured few water-plants or

birds, and neither alligators nor porpoises ascend so high.

On the 7th of May, about eighty miles in a straight line from the

foot of the Himalaya, we found the stratified sandy banks, which had gradually risen to a height of thirteen feet, replaced by the hard

alluvial clay of the Gangetic valley, which underlies the sand: the stream contracted, and the features of its banks were materially

improved by a jungle of tamarisk, wormwood (Artemisia), and white rose-bushes (Rosa involucrata), whilst mango trees became common, with tamarinds, banyan, and figs. Date and Caryota palms, and

rattan canes, grew in the woods, and parasitic Orchids on the trees, which were covered with a climbing fern (Acrosticum scandens), so that we easily doubled our flora of the river banks before arriving at Maldah.

This once populous town is, like Berhampore, now quite decayed, since the decline of its silk and indigo trades: the staple product, called "Maldy," a mixture of silk and cotton, very durable, and which washes well, now forms its only trade, and is exported through Sikkim to the north-west provinces and Tibet. It is still famous for the size and excellence of its mangos, which ripen late in May; but this year the crop had been destroyed by the damp heats of spring, the usual

north-west dry winds not having prevailed.

The ruins of the once famous city of Gour, a few miles distant, are now covered with jungle, and the buildings are fast disappearing,

owing to the bricks being carried away to be used elsewhere.

Below Maldah the river gets broader, and willow becomes common.

We found specimens of a Planorbis in the mud of the stream, and saw apparently a boring shell in the alluvium, but could not land to

examine it. Chalky masses of alligators' droppings, like coprolites, are very common, buried in the banks, which become twenty feet high at the junction with the Ganges, where we arrived on the 14th.

The waters of this great river were nearly two degrees cooler than

those of the Mahanuddy.

Rampore-Bauleah is a large station on the north bank of the Ganges, whose stream is at this season fully a mile wide, with a very slow

current; its banks are thirty feet above the water. We were most

kindly received by Mr. Bell, the collector of the district, to whom we were greatly indebted for furthering us on our voyage: boats being very difficult to procure, we were, however, detained here from the 16th to the 19th. I was fortunate in being able to compare my

barometers with a first-rate standard instrument, and in finding no appreciable alteration since leaving Calcutta in the previous April.

The elevation of the station is 130 feet above the sea, that of

Kishengunj I made 131; so that the Gangetic valley is nearly a dead level for fully a hundred miles north, beyond which it rises;

Titalya, 150 miles to the north, being 360 feet, and Siligoree, at

the margin of the Terai, rather higher. The river again falls more

considerably than the land; the Mahanuddy, at Kishengunj, being about twenty feet below the level of the plains, or 110 above the sea;

whereas the Ganges, at Rampore, is probably not more than eighty

feet, even when the water is highest.

The climate of Rampore is marked by greater extremes than that of

Calcutta: during our stay the temperature rose above 106 degrees, and fell to 78 degrees at night: the mean was 2.5 degrees higher than at Calcutta, which is 126 miles further south. Being at the head of the Gangetic delta, which points from the Sunderbunds obliquely to the

north-west, it is much damper than any locality further west, as is evidenced by two kinds of Calamus palm abounding, which do not

ascend the Ganges beyond Monghyr. Advancing eastwards, the dry

north-west wind of the Gangetic valley, which blows here in

occasional gusts, is hardly felt; and easterly winds, rising after

the sun (or, in other words, following the heating of the open dry

country), blow down the great valley of the Burrampooter, or

south-easterly ones come up from the Bay of Bengal. The western head of the Gangetic delta is thus placed in what are called "the

variables" in naval phraseology; but only so far as its superficial winds are concerned, for its great atmospheric current always blows from the Bay of Bengal, and flows over all northern India, to the

lofty regions of Central Asia.

At Rampore I found the temperature of the ground, at three feet

depth, varied from 87.8 degrees to 89.8 degrees, being considerably lower than that of the air (94.2 degrees), whilst that of a fine

ripening shaddock, into which I plunged a thermometer bulb, varied

little from 81 degrees, whether the sun shone on it or not. From this place we made very slow progress south-eastwards, with a gentle

current, but against constant easterly winds, and often violent gales and thunder-storms, which obliged us to bring up under shelter of

banks and islands of sand. Sometimes we sailed along the broad river, whose opposite shores were rarely both visible at once, and at others tracked the boat through narrow creeks that unite the many Himalayan streams, and form a network soon after leaving their mountain valleys.

A few miles beyond Pubna we passed from a narrow canal at once into the main stream of the Burrampooter at Jaffergunj: our maps had led us to expect that it flowed fully seventy miles to the eastward in

this latitude; and we were surprised to hear that within the last

twenty years the main body of that river had shifted its course thus far to the westward. This alteration was not effected by the gradual working westwards of the main stream, but by the old eastern channel so rapidly silting up as to be now unnavigable; while the Jummul,

which receives the Teesta, and which is laterally connected by

branches with the Burrampooter, became consequently wider and deeper, and eventually the principal stream.

Nothing can be more dreary and uninteresting than the scenery of this part of the delta. The water is clay-coloured and turbid, always

cooler than the air, which again was 4 degrees or 5 degrees below

that of Calcutta, with a damper atmosphere. The banks are of

stratified sand and mud, hardly raised above the mean level of the

country, and consequently unlike those bordering most annually

flooded rivers; for here the material is so unstable, that the

current yearly changes its course. A wiry grass sometimes feebly

binds the loose soil, on which there are neither houses nor

cultivation.

Ascending the Jummul (now the main channel of the Burrampooter) for a few miles, we turned off into a narrower channel, sixty miles long, which passes by Dacca, where we arrived on the 28th, and where we

were again detained for boats, the demand for which is rapidly

increasing with the extended cultivation of the Sunderbunds and

Delta. We stayed with Mr. Atherton, and botanised in the

neighbourhood of the town, which was once very extensive, and is

still large, though not flourishing. The population is mostly

Mahometan; the site, though beautiful and varied, is unhealthy for

Europeans. Ruins of great Moorish brick buildings still remain, and a Greek style of ornamenting the houses prevails to a remarkable degree.

The manufacture of rings for the arms and ancles, from conch-shells imported from the Malayan Archipelago, is still almost confined to

Dacca: the shells are sawn across for this purpose by semicircular

saws, the hands and toes being both actively employed in the

operation. The introduction of circular saws has been attempted by

some European gentlemen, but steadily resisted by the natives,

despite their obvious advantages. The Dacca muslin manufacture, which once employed thousands of hands, is quite at an end, so that it was with great difficulty that the specimens of these fabrics sent to the Great Exhibition of 1851, were procured. The kind of cotton (which is very short in the staple) employed,