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

here the previous year, by which a village was

destroyed, together with twelve of its inhabitants, and all the

cattle. The fragments of rock precipitated are sometimes of enormous size, but being a soft mica-schist, are soon removed by weathering.

It is in the rainy season that landslips are most frequent, and

shortly after rain they are pretty sure to be heard far or near.

I crossed the debris of the great one alluded to, on the first march beyond Singtam: the whole face of the mountain appeared more or less torn up for fully a mile, presenting a confused mass of white

micaceous clay, full of angular masses of rock. The path was very

difficult and dangerous, being carried along the steep slope, at an angle, in some places, of 35 degrees; and it was constantly shifting, from the continued downward sliding, and from the action of streams, some of which are large, and cut deep channels. In one I had the

misfortune to lose my only sheep, which was carried away by the

torrent. These streams were crossed by means of sticks and ricketty bamboos, and the steep sides (sometimes twenty or thirty feet high), were ascended by notched poles.

The weather continued very hot for the elevation (4000 to 5000 feet), the rain brought no coolness, and for the greater part of the three marches between Singtam and Chakoong, we were either wading through deep mud, or climbing over rocks. Leeches swarmed in incredible

profusion in the streams and damp grass, and among the bushes: they got into my hair, hung on my eyelids, and crawled up my legs and down my back. I repeatedly took upwards of a hundred from my legs, where the small ones used to collect in clusters on the instep: the sores which they produced were not healed for five months afterwards, and I retain the scars to the present day. Snuff and tobacco leaves are the best antidote, but when marching in the rain, it is impossible to

apply this simple remedy to any advantage. The best plan I found to be rolling the leaves over the feet, inside the stockings, and

powdering the legs with snuf.

Another pest is a small midge, or sand-fly, which causes intolerable itching, and subsequent irritation, and is in this respect the most insufferable torment in Sikkim; the minutest rent in one's clothes is detected by the acute senses of this insatiable bloodsucker, which is itself so small as to be barely visible without a microscope.

We daily arrived at our camping-ground, streaming with blood, and

mottled with the bites of peepsas, gnats, midges, and mosquitos,

besides being infested with ticks.

As the rains advanced, insects seemed to be called into existence in countless swarms; large and small moths, cockchafers, glow-worms, and cockroaches, made my tent a Noah's ark by night, when the candle was burning; together with winged ants, May-flies, flying earwigs, and

many beetles, while a very large species of Tipula

(daddy-long-legs) swept its long legs across my face as I wrote my

journal, or plotted off my map. After retiring to rest and putting

out the light, they gradually departed, except a few which could not find the way out, and remained to disturb my slumbers.

Chakoong is a remarkable spot in the bottom of the valley, at an

angle of the Lachen-Lachoong, which here receives an affluent from

Gnarem, a mountain 17,557 feet high, on the Chola range to the east.*

[This is called Black Rock in Col. Waugh's map. I doubt Gnarem being a generally known name: the people hardly recognise the mountain as sufficiently conspicuous to bear a name.] There is no village, but

some grass huts used by travellers, which are built close to the

river on a very broad flat, fringed with alder, hornbeam, and birch: the elevation is 4,400 feet, and many European genera not found about Dorjiling, and belonging to the temperate Himalaya, grow intermixed with tropical plants that are found no further north. The birch,

willow, alder, and walnut grow side by side with wild plantain,

Erythrina, Wallichia palm, and gigantic bamboos: the _Cedrela

Toona, figs, _Melastoma, Scitamineae, balsams, Pothos, peppers, and gigantic climbing vines, grow mixed with brambles, speedwell,

Paris, forget-me-not, and nettles that sting like poisoned arrows.

The wild English strawberry is common, but bears a tasteless fruit: its inferiority is however counterbalanced by the abundance of a

grateful yellow raspberry. Parasitical Orchids (Dendrobium nobile,

and densiflorum, etc.), cover the trunks of oaks, while

Thalictrum and Geranium grow under their shade. Monotropa and Balanophora, both parasites on the roots of trees (the one a native of north Europe and the other of a tropical climate), push their

leafless stems and heads of flowers through the soil together: and

lastly, tree-ferns grow associated with the Pteris aquilina (brake) and Lycopodium clavatum of our British moors; and amongst mosses, the superb Himalayan Lyellia crispa,* [This is one of the most

remarkable mosses in the Himalaya mountains, and derives additional interest from having been named after the late Charles Lyell, Esq., of Kinnordy, the father of the most eminent geologist of the present day.] with the English Funaria hygrometrica.

The dense jungles of Chakoong completely cover the beautiful flat

terraces of stratified sand and gravel, which rise in three shelves to 150 feet above the river, and whose edges appear as sharply cut as if the latter had but lately retired from them. They are continuous with a line of quartzy cliffs, covered with scarlet rhododendrons,

and in the holes of which a conglomerate of pebbles is found, 150

feet above the river. Everywhere immense boulders are scattered

about, some of which are sixty yards long: their surfaces are

water-worn into hollows, proving the river to have cut through nearly 300 feet of deposit, which once floored its valley. Lower down the

valley, and fully 2000 feet above the river, I had passed numerous

angular blocks resting on gentle slopes where no landslips could

possibly have deposited them; and which I therefore refer to ancient glacial action: one of these, near the village of Niong, was nearly square, eighty feet long, and ten high.

It is a remarkable fact, that this hot, damp gorge is never

malarious; this is attributable to the coolness of the river, and to the water on the flats not stagnating; for at Choongtam, a march

further north, and 1500 feet higher, fevers and ague prevail in

summer on similar flats, but which have been cleared of jungle, and are therefore exposed to the sun.

I had had constant headache for several mornings on waking, which I did not fail to attribute to coming fever, or to the unhealthiness of the climate; till I accidentally found it to arise from the wormwood, upon a thick couch of the cut branches of which I was accustomed to sleep, and which in dry weather produced no such effects.* [This

wormwood (Artemisia Indaca) is one of the most common Sikkim plants at 2000 to 6000 feet elevation, and grows twelve feet high: it is a favourite food of goats.]

From Chakoong to Choongtam the route lay northwards, following the

course of the river, or crossing steep spurs of vertical strata of

mica-schist, that dip into the valley, and leave no space between

their perpendicular sides and the furious torrent. Immense landslips seamed the steep mountain flanks; and we crossed with precipitation one that extended fully 4000 feet (and perhaps much more) up a

mountain 12,000 feet high, on the east bank: it moves every year, and the mud and rocks shot down by it were strewn with the green leaves and twigs of shrubs, some of the flowers on which were yet fresh and bright, while others were crushed: these were mixed with gigantic

trunks of pines, with ragged bark and scored timbers. The talus which had lately been poured into the valley formed a gently sloping bank, twenty feet high, over which the Lachen- Lachoong rolled, from a pool above, caused by the damming up of its waters. On either side of the pool were cultivated terraces of stratified sand and pebbles, fifty feet high, whose alder-fringed banks, joined by an elegant cane

bridge, were reflected in the placid water; forming a little spot of singular quiet and beauty, that contrasted with the savage grandeur of the surrounding mountains, and the headstrong course of the

foaming torrent below, amid whose deafening roar it was impossible to speak and be heard.

Illustration--CANE-BRIDGE AND TUKCHAM MOUNTAIN.

The mountain of Choongtam is about 10,000 feet high; it divides the Lachen from the Lachoong river, and terminates a lofty range that

runs for twenty-two miles south from the lofty mountain of

Kinchinjhow. Its south exposed face is bare of trees, except clumps of pines towards the top, and is very steep, grassy, and rocky,

without water. It is hence quite unlike the forest-clad mountains

further south, and indicates a drier and more sunny climate. The

scenery much resembles that of Switzerland, and of the north-west

Himalaya, especially in the great contrast between the southern and northern exposures, the latter being always clothed with a dense

vegetation. At the foot of this very steep mountain is a broad

triangular flat, 5,270 feet above the sea, and 300 feet above the

river, to which it descends by three level cultivated shelves.

The village, consisting of a temple and twenty houses, is placed on the slope of the hill. I camped on the flat in May, before it became very swampy, close to some great blocks of gneiss, of which many lie on its surface: it was covered with tufts of sedge (like _Carex

stellulata_), and fringed with scarlet rhododendron, walnut,

Andromeda, E1aeagnus (now bearing pleasant acid fruit), and small trees of a Photinia, a plant allied to hawthorn, of the leaves of which the natives make tea (as they do of _Gualtheria, Andromeda,

Vaccinium,_ and other allied plants). Rice, cultivated* [Choongtam is in position and products analogous to Lelyp, on the Tambur (vol. i, Chapter IX). Rice cultivation advances thus high up each valley, and at either place Bhoteeas replace the natives of the lower valleys.]

in pools surrounded by low banks, was just peeping above ground; and scanty crops of millet, maize, and buckwheat flourished on the

slopes around.

The inhabitants of Choongtam are of Tibetan origin; few of them had seen an Englishman before, and they flocked out, displaying the most eager curiosity: the Lama and Phipun (or superior officer) of the

Lachoong valley came to pay their respects with a troop of followers, and there was lolling out of tongues, and scratching of ears, at

every sentence spoken, and every object of admiration. This

extraordinary Tibetan salute at first puzzled me excessively, nor was it until reading MM. Huc and Gabet's travels on my return to England, that I knew of its being the ton at Lhassa, and in all civilised

parts of Tibet.

As the valley was under the Singtam Soubah's authority, I experienced a good deal of opposition; and the Lama urged the wrath of the gods against my proceeding. This argument, I said, had been disposed of

the previous year, and I was fortunate in recognising one of my

Changachelling friends, who set forth my kindly offices to the Lamas of that convent, and the friendship borne me by its monks, and by

those of Pemiongchi. Many other modes of dissuading me were

attempted, but with Meepo's assistance I succeeded in gaining my

point. The difficulty and delays in remittance of food, caused by the landslips having destroyed the road, had reduced our provisions to a very low ebb; and it became not only impossible to proceed, but

necessary to replenish my stores on the spot. At first provisions

enough were brought to myself, for the Rajah had