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

country people's dread of incurring the Dewan's displeasure.

The Lachen valley being pronounced impracticable in the height of the rains, a month later, it behoved me to attempt it first, and it

possessed the attraction of leading to a frontier described as far to the northward of the snowy Himalaya, on a lofty plateau, whose plants and animals were different from anything I had previously seen.

After a week the coolies arrived with supplies: they had been delayed by the state of the paths, and had consequently consumed a great part of my stock, reducing it to eight days' allowance. I therefore

divided my party, leaving the greater number at Choongtam, with a

small tent, and instructions to forward all food to me as it arrived.

I started with about fifteen attendants, on the 25th of May, for

Lamteng, three marches up the Lachen.

Descending the step-formed terraces, I crossed the Lachen by a good cane bridge. The river is a headstrong torrent, and turbid from the vast amount of earthy matter which it bears along; and this character of extreme impetuosity, unbroken by any still bend, or even swirling pool, it maintains uninterruptedly at this season from 4000 to 10,000

feet. It is crossed three times, always by cane bridges, and I cannot conceive any valley of its nature to be more impracticable at such a season. On both sides the mountains rose, densely forest-clad, at an average angle of 35 degrees to 40 degrees, to 10,000 and 15,000 feet.

Its extreme narrowness, and the grandeur of its scenery, were alike recalled to my mind, on visiting the Sachs valley in the Valais of

Switzerland; from which, however, it differs in its luxuriant forest, and in the slopes being more uniform and less broken up into those

imposing precipices so frequent in Switzerland, but which are wanting in the temperate regions of the Sikkim Himalaya.

At times we scrambled over rocks 1000 feet above the river, or

descended into gorges, through whose tributary torrents we waded, or crossed swampy terraced flats of unstratified shingle above the

stream; whilst it was sometimes necessary to round rocky promontories in the river, stemming the foaming torrent that pressed heavily

against the chest as, one by one, we were dragged along by powerful Lepchas. Our halting-places were on flats close to the river, covered with large trees, and carpeted with a most luxuriant herbage, amongst which a wild buckwheat (Polygonum*) [Polygonum cymosum, Wall.

This is a common Himalayan plant, and is alsu found in the Khasia

mountains.] was abundant, which formed an excellent spinach: it is

called "Pullop-bi"; a name I shall hereafter have occasion to mention with gratitude.

A few miles above Choongtam, we passed a few cottages on a very

extensive terrace at Tumlong; but between this and Lamteng, the

country is uninhabited, nor is it frequented during the rains.

We consequently found that the roads had suffered, the little bridges and aids to climb precipices and cross landslips had been carried

away, and at one place we were all but turned back. This was at the Taktoong river, a tributary on the east bank, which rushes down at an angle of 15 degrees, in a sheet of silvery foam, eighteen yards

broad. It does not, where I crossed it, flow in a deep gulley, having apparently raised its bed by an accumulation of enormous boulders;

and a plank bridge was thrown across it, against whose slippery and narrow foot-boards the water dashed, loosening the supports on either bank, and rushing between their foundation stones.

My unwilling guide had gone ahead with some of the coolies: I had

suspected him all along (perhaps unjustly) of avoiding the most

practicable routes; but when I found him waiting for me at this

bridge, to which he sarcastically pointed with his bow, I felt that had he known of it, to have made difficulties before would have been a work of supererogation. He seemed to think I should certainly turn back, and assured me there was no other crossing (a statement I

afterwards found to be untrue); so, comforting myself with the hope that if the danger were imminent, Meepo would forcibly stop me, I

took off my shoes, and walked steadily over: the tremor of the planks was like that felt when standing on the paddle-box of a steamer, and I was jerked up and down, as my weight pressed them into the boiling flood, which shrouded me with spray. I looked neither to the right

nor to the left, lest the motion of the swift waters should turn my head, but kept my eye on the white jets d'eau springing up between

the woodwork, and felt thankful when fairly on the opposite bank: my loaded coolies followed, crossing one by one without fear or

hesitation. The bridge was swept into the Lachen very shortly

afterwards.

Towards Lamteng, the path left the river, and passed through a wood of Abies Smithiana.* [Also called A. Khutrow and Morinda. I had not before seen this tree in the Himalaya: it is a spruce fir, much resembling the Norway spruce in general appearance, but with longer pendulous branches. The wood is white, and considered indifferent,

though readily cleft into planks; it is called "Seh."] Larch appears at 9000 feet, with Abies Brunoniana. An austere crab-apple, walnut, and the willow of Babylon (the two latter perhaps cultivated), yellow jessamine and ash, all scarce trees in Sikkim, are more or less

abundant in the valley, from 7000 to 8000 feet; as is an ivy, very

like the English, but with fewer and smaller yellow or reddish

berries; and many other plants,* [Wood-sorrel, a white-stemmed

bramble, birch, some maples, nut gigantic lily (Lilium giganteum), Euphorbia, Pedicularis, Spiraea, Philadelphus, Deutzia, Indigofera,

and various other South Europe and North American genera.] not found at equal elevations on the outer ranges of the Himalaya.

Chateng, a spur from the lofty peak of Tukcham,* ["Tuk" signifies

head in Lepcha, and "cheam" or "chaum," I believe, has reference to the snow. The height of Tukcham has been re-calculated by Capt. R.

Strachey, with angles taken by myself, at Dorjiling and Jillapahar, and is approximate only.] 19,472 feet high, rises 1000 feet above the west bank of the river; and where crossed, commands one of the finest alpine views in Sikkim. It was grassy, strewed with huge boulders of gneiss, and adorned with clumps of park-like pines: on the summit was a small pool, beautifully fringed with bushy trees of white rose, a white-blossomed apple, a Pyrus like Aria, another like

mountain-ash, scarlet rhododendrons (arboreum and barbatum),

holly, maples, and Goughia,* [This fine plant was named (Wight,

"Ic. Plant.") in honour of Capt. Gough, son of the late

commander-in-chief, and an officer to whom the botany of the

peninsula of India is greatly indebted. It is a large and handsome

evergreen, very similar in foliage to a fine rhododendron, and would prove an invaluable ornament on our lawns, if its hardier varieties were introduced into this country.] a curious evergreen laurel-like tree: there were also Daphnes, purple magnolia, and a pink

sweet-blossomed Sphaerostema. Many English water-plants*

[Sparganium, Typha, Potamogeton, Callitriche, Utricularia, sedges and rushes.] grew in the water, but I found no shells; tadpoles,

however, swarmed, which later in the season become large frogs.

The "painted-lady " butterfly (Cynthia Cardui), and a pretty "blue"

were flitting over the flowers, together with some great tropical

kinds, that wander so far up these valleys, accompanying Marlea,

the only subtropical tree that ascends to 8,500 feet in the interior of Sikkim.

The river runs close tinder the eastern side of the valley, which

slopes so steeply as to appear for many miles almost a continuous

landslip, 2000 feet high.

Lamteng village, where I arrived on the 27th of May, is quite

concealed by a moraine to the south, which, with a parallel ridge on the north, forms a beautiful bay in the mountains, 8,900 feet above the sea, and 1000 above the Lachen. The village stands on a grassy

and bushy flat, around which the pine-clad mountains rise steeply to the snowy peaks and black cliffs which tower above. It contains about forty houses, forming the winter-quarters of the inhabitants of the valley, who, in summer, move with their flocks and herds to the

alpine pastures of the Tibet frontier. The dwellings are like those described at Wallanchoon, but the elevation being lower, and the

situation more sheltered, they are more scattered; whilst on account of the dampness of the climate, they are raised higher from the

ground, and the shingles with which they are tiled (made of _Abies

Webbiana_) decay in two or three years. Many are painted lilac, with the gables in diamonds of red, black, and white: the roofs are either of wood, or of the bark of Abies Brunoniana, held down by large

stones: within they are airy and comfortable. They are surrounded by a little cultivation of buck-wheat, radishes, turnips, and mustard.

The inhabitants, though paying rent to the Sikkim Rajah, consider

themselves as Tibetans, and are so in language, dress, features, and origin: they seldom descend to Choongtam, but yearly travel to the

Tibetan towns of Jigatzi, Kambajong, Giantchi, and even to Lhassa,

having always commercial and pastoral transactions with the Tibetans, whose flocks are pastured on the Sikkim mountains during summer, and who trade with the plains of India through the medium of these

villagers.

Illustration--LAMTENG VILLAGE.

The snow having disappeared from elevations below 11,000 feet, the

yaks, sheep, and ponies had just been driven 2000 feet up the valley, and the inhabitants were preparing to follow, with their tents and

goats, to summer quarters at Tallum and Tungu. Many had goitres and rheumatism, for the cure of which they flocked to my tent;

dry-rubbing for the latter, and tincture of iodine for the former,

gained me some credit as a doctor: I could, however, procure no food beyond trifling presents of eggs, meal, and more rarely, fowls.

On arriving, I saw a troop of large monkeys* [Macacus Pelops?

Hodgson. This is a very different species from the tropical kind seen in Nepal, and mentioned at vol. i, Chapter XII.] gambolling in a wood of Abies Brunoniana: this surprised me, as I was not prepared to

find so tropical an animal associated with a vegetation typical of a boreal climate. The only other quadrupeds seen here were some small earless rats, and musk-deer; the young female of which latter

sometimes afforded me a dish of excellent venison; being, though

dark-coloured and lean, tender, sweet, and short-fibred. Birds were scarce, with the exception of alpine pigeons (Columba leuconota), red-legged crows (Corvus graculus, L.), and the horned pheasant

(Meleagris Satyra, L.). In this month insects are scarce, Elater

and a black earwig being the most frequent: two species of Serica

also flew into my tent, and at night moths, closely resembling

European ones, came from the fir-woods. The vegetation in the,

neighbourhood of Lamteng is European and North American; that is to say, it unites the boreal and temperate floras of the east and west hemispheres; presenting also a few features peculiar to Asia. This is a subject of very great importance in physical geography; as a

country combining the botanical characters of several others, affords materials for tracing the direction in which genera and species have migrated, the causes that favour their migrations, and the laws that determine the types or forms of one region, which represent those of another. A glance at the map will show that Sikkim is,

geographically, peculiarly well situated for investigations of this kind, being centrically placed, whether as regards south-eastern Asia or the Himalayan chain. Again, the Lachen valley at this spot is

nearly equi-distant from the tropical forests of the Terai and the

sterile mountains of Tibet, for which