Himalayan Journals Part 21

10. I am above all the Lamas of the Dookpa Creed.

11. I am of the best of all Religions--the Dookpa.

12. The punisher of unbelievers.

18. Unequalled in expounding the Shasters.

14. Unequalled in holiness and wisdom.

15. The head (or fountain) of all Religious Knowledge.

16. The Enemy of all false Avatars.

CHAPTER XVII.

EXCURSION TO TERAI.

Dispatch collections--Acorns--Heat--Punkabaree--Bees-- Vegetation--Haze--t.i.talya--Earthquake--Proceed to Nepal frontier--Terai, geology of--Physical features of Himalayan valleys--Elephants, purchase of, etc.--Riverbeds--Mechi river --Return to t.i.talya--Leave for Teesta--Climate of plains-- Jeelpigoree--Cooches--Alteration in the appearance of country by fires, etc.--Gra.s.ses--Bamboos--Cottages--Rajah of Cooch Behar --Condition of people--Hooli festival--Ascend Teesta--Canoes --Cranes--Forest--Baikant-pore--Rummai--Religion--Plants at foot of mountains--Exit of Teesta--Canoe voyage down to Rangamally--English genera of plants--Birds--Beautiful Scenery --Botanizing on elephants--Willow--Siligoree--Cross Terai-- Geology--Iron--Lohar-ghur--Coal and sandstone beds--Mechi fisherman--Hailstorm--Ascent to Khersiong--To Dorjiling-- Vegetation--Geology--Folded quartz-beds--Spheres of feldspar-- Lime deposits.

Having arranged the collections (amounting to eighty loads) made during 1848, they were conveyed by coolies to the foot of the hills, where carts were provided to carry them five days' journey to the Mahanuddy river, which flows into the Ganges, whence they were transported by water to Calcutta.

On the 27th of February, I left Dorjiling to join Mr. Hodgson, at t.i.talya on the plains. The weather was raw, cold, and threatening: snow lay here and there at 7000 feet, and all vegetation was very backward, and wore a wintry garb. The laurels, maples, and deciduous-leaved oaks, hydrangea and cherry, were leafless, but the abundance of chesnuts and evergreen oaks, rhododendrons, _Aucuba, Linonia,_ and other shrubs, kept the forest well clothed. The oaks had borne a very unusual number of acorns during the last season, which were now falling, and strewing the road in some places so abundantly, that it was hardly safe to ride down hill.

The plains of Bengal were all but obscured by a dense haze, partly owing to a peculiar state of the atmosphere that prevails in the dry months, and partly to the fires raging in the Terai forest, from which white wreaths of smoke ascended, stretching obliquely for miles to the eastward, and filling the air with black particles of gra.s.s-stems, carried 4000 feet aloft by the heated ascending currents that impinge against the flanks of the mountains.

In the tropical region the air was scented with the white blossoms of the _Vitex Agnus-castus,_ which grew in profusion by the road-side; but the forest, which had looked so gigantic on my arrival at the mountains the previous year, appeared small after the far more lofty and bulky oaks and pines of the upper regions of the Himalaya.

The evening was sultry and close, the heated surface of the earth seemed to load the surrounding atmosphere with warm vapours, and the sensation, as compared with the cool pure air of Dorjiling, was that of entering a confined tropical harbour after a long sea-voyage.

I slept in the little bungalow of Punkabaree, and was wakened next morning by sounds to which I had long been a stranger, the voices of innumerable birds, and the humming of great bees that bore large holes for their dwellings in the beams and rafters of houses: never before had I been so forcibly struck with the absence of animal life in the regions of the upper Himalaya.

Breakfasting early, I pursued my way in the so-called cool of the morning, but this was neither bright nor fresh; the night having been hazy, there had been no terrestrial radiation, and the earth was dusty and parched; while the sun rose through a murky yellowish atmosphere with ill-defined orb. Thick clouds of smoke pressed upon the plains, and the faint easterly wind wafted large flakes of gra.s.s charcoal sluggishly through the air.

Vegetation was in great beauty, though past its winter prime. The tropical forest of India has two flowering seasons; one in summer, of the majority of plants; and the other in winter, of _Acanthaceae, Bauhinia, Dillenia, Bombax,_ etc. Of these the former are abundant, and render the jungle gay with large and delicate white, red, and purple blossoms. Coa.r.s.e, ill-favoured vultures wheeled through the air, languid Bengalees had replaced the active mountaineers, jackal-like curs of low degree teemed at every village, and ran howling away from the onslaught of my mountain dog; and the tropics, with all their beauty of flower and genial warmth, looked as forbidding and unwholesome as they felt oppressive to a frame that had so long breathed the fresh mountain air.

Mounted on a stout pony, I enjoyed my scamper of sixteen miles over the wooded plains and undulating gravelly slopes of the Terai, intervening between the foot of the mountains and Siligoree bungalow, where I rested for an hour. In the afternoon I rode on leisurely to t.i.talya, sixteen miles further, along the banks of the Mahanuddy, the atmosphere being so densely hazy, that objects a few miles off were invisible, and the sun quite concealed, though its light was so powerful that no part of the sky could be steadily gazed upon.

This state of the air is very curious, and has met with various attempts at explanation,* [Dr. M'Lelland ("Calcutta Journal of Natural History," vol. i, p. 52), attributes the haze of the atmosphere during the north-west winds of this season, wholly to suspended earthy particles. But the haze is present even in the calmest weather, and extreme dryness is in all parts of the world usually accompanied by an obscure horizon. Captain Campbell ("Calcutta Journal of Natural History," vol. ii, p. 44.) also objects to Dr. M'Clelland's theory, citing those parts of Southern India which are least likely to be visited by dust-storms, as possessing an equally hazy atmosphere; and further denies its being influenced by the hygrometric state of the atmosphere.] all unsatisfactory to me: it accompanies great heat, dryness, and elasticity of the suspended vapours, and is not affected by wind. During the afternoon the latter blew with violence, but being hot and dry, brought no relief to my still unacclimated frame. My pony alone enjoyed the freedom of the boundless plains, and the gallop or trot being fatiguing in the heat, I tried in vain to keep him at a walk; his spirits did not last long, however, for he flagged after a few days' tropical heat. My little dog had run thirty miles the day before, exclusive of all the detours he had made for his own enjoyment, and he flagged so much after twenty more this day, that I had to take him on my saddle-bow, where, after licking his hot swollen feet, he fell fast asleep, in spite of the motion.

After leaving the wooded Terai at Siligoree, trees became scarce, and clumps of bamboos were the prevalent features; these, with an occasional banyan, peepul, or betel-nut palm near the villages, were the only breaks on the distant horizon. A powerfully scented _Clerodendron,_ and an _Osbeckia_ gay with blossoms like dog-roses, were abundant; the former especially under trees, where the seeds are dropped by birds.

At t.i.talya bungalow, I received a hearty welcome from Mr. Hodgson, and congratulations on the success of my Nepal journey, which afforded a theme for many conversations.

In the evening we had three sharp jerking shocks of an earthquake in quick succession, at 9.8 p.m., appearing to come up from the southward: they were accompanied by a hollow rumbling sound like that of a waggon pa.s.sing over a wooden bridge. The shock was felt strongly at Dorjiling, and registered by Mr. Muller at 9.10 p.m.: we had accurately adjusted our watches (chronometers) the previous morning, and the motion may therefore fairly be a.s.sumed to have been transmitted northwards through the intervening distance of forty miles, in two minutes. Both Mr. Muller and Mr. Hodgson had noted a much more severe shock at 6.10 p.m. the previous evening, which I, who was walking down the mountain, did not experience; this caused a good deal of damage at Dorjiling, in cracking well-built walls.

Earthquakes are frequent all along the Himalaya, and are felt far in Tibet; they are, however, most common towards the eastern and western extremities of India; owing in the former case to the proximity of the volcanic forces in the bay of Bengal. Cutch and Scinde, as is well known, have suffered severely on many occasions, and in several of them the motion has been propagated through Affghanistan and Little Tibet, to the heart of Central Asia.* [See "Wood's Travels to the Oxus."]

On the morning of the 1st of March, Dr. Campbell arrived at the bungalow, from his tour of inspection along the frontier of Bhotan and the Rungpore district; and we accompanied him hence along the British and Sikkim frontier, as far west as the Mechi river, which bounds Nepal on the east.

Terai is a name loosely applied to a tract of country at the very foot of the Himalaya: it is Persian, and signifies damp. Politically, the Terai generally belongs to the hill-states beyond it; geographically, it should appertain to the plains of India; and geologically, it is a sort of neutral country, being composed neither of the alluvium of the plains, nor of the rocks of the hills, but for the most part of alternating beds of sand, gravel, and boulders brought from the mountains. Botanically it is readily defined as the region of forest-trees; amongst which the Sal, the most valuable of Indian timber, is conspicuous in most parts, though not now in Sikkim, where it has been destroyed. The Terai soil is generally light, dry, and gravelly (such as the Sal always prefers), and varies in breadth, from ten miles, along the Sikkim frontier, to thirty and more on the Nepalese. In the latter country it is called the Morung, and supplies Sal and Sissoo timber for the Calcutta market, the logs being floated down the Konki and Cosi rivers to the Ganges.

The gravel-beds extend uninterruptedly upon the plains for fully twenty miles south of the Sikkim mountains, the gravel becoming smaller as the distance increases, and large blocks of stone not being found beyond a few miles from the rocks of the Himalaya itself, even in the beds of rivers, however large and rapid. Throughout its breadth this formation is conspicuously cut into flat-topped terraces, flanking the spurs of the mountains, at elevations varying from 250 to nearly 1000 feet above the sea. These terraces are of various breadth and length, the smallest lying uppermost, and the broadest flanking the rivers below. The isolated hills beyond are also flat-topped and terraced. This deposit contains no fossils; and its general appearance and mineral const.i.tuents are the only evidence of its origin, which is no doubt due to a retiring ocean that washed the base of the Sikkim Himalaya, received the contents of its rivers, and, wearing away its bluff spurs, spread a talus upwards of 1000 feet thick along its sh.o.r.es. It is not at first sight evident whether the terracing is due to periodic retirements of the ocean, or to the levelling effects of rivers that have cut channels through the deposit. In many places, especially along the banks of the great streams, the gravel is smaller, obscurely interstratified with sand, and the flattened pebbles over-lap rudely, in a manner characteristic of the effects of running water; but such is not the case with the main body of the deposit, which is unstratified, and much coa.r.s.er.

The alluvium of the Gangetic valley is both interstratified with the gravel, and pa.s.ses into it, and was no doubt deposited in deep water, whilst the coa.r.s.er matter* [This, too, is non-fossiliferous, and is of unknown depth, except at Calcutta, where the sand and clay beds have been bored through, to the depth of 120 feet, below which the first pebbles were met with. Whence these pebbles were derived is a curious problem. The great Himalayan rivers convey pebbles but a very few miles from the mountains on to the plains of India; and there is no rock _in situ_ above the surface, within many miles of Calcutta, in any direction.] was acc.u.mulating at the foot of the mountains.

This view is self-evident, and has occurred, I believe, to almost every observer, at whatever part of the base of the Himalaya he may have studied this deposit. Its position, above the sandstones of the Sewalik range in the north-west Himalaya, and those of Sikkim, which appear to be modern fossiliferous rocks, indicates its being geologically of recent formation; but it still remains a subject of the utmost importance to discover the extent and nature of the ocean to whose agency it is referred. I have elsewhere remarked that the alluvium of the Gangetic valley may to a great degree be the measure of the denudation which the Himalaya has suffered along its Indian watershed. It was, no doubt, during the gradual rise of that chain from the ocean, that the gravel and alluvium were deposited; and in the terraces and alternation of these, there is evidence that there have been many subsidences and elevations of the coast-line, during which the gravel has suffered greatly from denudation.

I have never looked at the Sikkim Himalaya from the plains without comparing its bold spurs enclosing sinuous river gorges, to the weather-beaten front of a mountainous coast; and in following any of its great rivers, the scenery of its deep valleys no less strikingly resembles that of such narrow arms of the sea (or fiords) as characterize every mountainous coast, of whatever geological formation: such as the west coast of Scotland and Norway, of South Chili and Fuegia, of New Zealand and Tasmania. There are too in these Himalayan valleys, at all elevations below 600 feet, terraced pebble-beds, rising in some cases eighty feet above the rivers, which I believe could only have been deposited by them when they debouched into deep water; and both these, and the beds of the rivers, are strewed, down to 1000 feet, with ma.s.ses of rock. Such acc.u.mulations and transported blocks are seen on the raised beaches of our narrow Scottish salt water lochs, exposed by the rising of the land, and they are yet forming of immense thickness on many coasts by the joint action of tides and streams.

I have described meeting with ancient moraines in every Himalayan valley I ascended, at or about 7000 or 8000 feet elevation, proving, that at one period, the glaciers descended fully so much below the position they now occupy: this can only be explained by a change of climate,* [Such a change of temperature, without any depression or elevation of the mountains, has been thought by Capt. R. Strachey ("Journal of Geological Society"), an able Himalayan observer, to be the necessary consequence of an ocean at the foot of these mountains; for the amount of perpetual snow, and consequent descent of the glaciers, increasing indirectly in proportion to the humidity of the climate, and the snow-fall, he conjectured that the proximity of the ocean would prodigiously increase such a deposition of snow.--To me, this argument appears inconclusive; for the first effect of such a vast body of water would be to raise the temperature of winter; and as it is the rain, rather than the sun of summer, which removes the Sikkim snow, so would an increase of this rain elevate, rather than depress, the level of perpetual snow.] or by a depression of the mountain ma.s.s equal to 8000 feet, since the formation of these moraines.

The country about t.i.talya looks desert, from that want of trees and cultivation, so characteristic of the upper level throughout this part of the plains, which is covered with short, poor pasture-gra.s.s.

The bungalow stands close to the Mahanuddy, on a low hill, cut into an escarpment twenty feet high, which exposes a section of river-laid sand and gravel, alternating with thick beds of rounded pebbles.

Shortly after Dr. Campbell's arrival, the meadows about the bungalow presented a singular appearance, being dotted over with elephants, brought for purchase by Government. It was curious to watch the arrival of these enormous animals, which were visible nearly two miles across the flat plains; nor less interesting was it to observe the wonderful docility of these giants of the animal kingdom, often only guided by naked boys, perched on their necks, scolding, swearing, and enforcing their orders with the iron goad.

There appeared as many tricks in elephant-dealers as in horse-jockeys, and of many animals brought, but few were purchased.

Government limits the price to about 75 pounds, and the height to the shoulder must not be under seven feet, which, incredible as it appears, may be estimated within a fraction as being three times the circ.u.mference of the forefoot. The pedigree is closely inquired into, the hoofs are examined for cracks, the teeth for age, and many other points attended to.

The Sikkim frontier, from the Mahanuddy westward to the Mechi, is marked out by a row of tall posts. The country is undulating; and though fully 400 miles from the ocean, and not sixty from the top of the loftiest mountain on the globe, its average level is not 300 feet above that of the sea. The upper levels are gravelly, and loosely covered with scattered th.o.r.n.y jujube bushes, occasionally tenanted by the _Florican,_ which scours these downs like a bustard. Sometimes a solitary fig, or a th.o.r.n.y acacia, breaks the horizon, and there are a few gnarled trees of the scarlet _Butea frondosa._

On our route I had a good opportunity of examining the line of junction between the alluvial plains that stretch south to the Ganges, and the gravel deposit flanking the hills. The rivers always cut broad channels with scarped terraced sides, and their low banks are very fertile, from the mud annually spread by the ever-shifting streams that meander within their limits; there are, however, few shrubs and no trees. The houses, which are very few and scattered, are built on the gravelly soil above, the lower level being very malarious.

Thirty miles south of the mountains, numerous isolated flat-topped hills, formed of stratified gravel and sand with large water-worn pebbles, rise from 80 to 200 feet above the mean level, which is about 250 feet above the sea; these, too, have always scarped sides, and the channels of small streams completely encircle them.

At this season few insects but gra.s.shoppers are to be seen, even mosquitos being rare. Birds, however, abound, and we noticed the common sparrow, hoopoe, water-wagtail, skylark, osprey, and several egrets.

We arrived on the third day at the Mechi river, to the west of which the Nepal Terai (or Morung) begins, whose belt of Sal forest loomed on the horizon, so raised by refraction as to be visible as a dark line, from the distance of many miles. It is, however, very poor, all the large trees having been removed. We rode for several miles into it, and found the soil dry and hard, but supporting a prodigious undergrowth of gigantic harsh gra.s.ses that reached to our heads, though we were mounted on elephants. Besides Sal there was abundance of _Butea, Diospyros, Terminalia,_ and _Symplocos,_ with the dwarf _Phoenix_ palm, and occasionally _Cycas._ Tigers, wild elephants, and the rhinoceros, are said to be found here; but we saw none.

The old and new Mechi rivers are several miles apart, but flow in the same depression, a low swamp many miles broad, which is grazed at this season, and cultivated during the rains. The gra.s.s is very rich, partly owing to the moisture of the climate, and partly to the retiring waters of the rivers; both circ.u.mstances being the effects of proximity to the Himalaya. Hence cattle (buffalos and the common humped cow of India) are driven from the banks of the Ganges 300 miles to these feeding grounds, for the use of which a trifling tax is levied on each animal. The cattle are very carelessly herded, and many are carried off by tigers.

Having returned to t.i.talya, Mr. Hodgson and I set off in an eastern direction for the Teesta river, whose embouchure from the mountains to the plains I was anxious to visit. Though the weather is hot, and oppressively so in the middle of the day, there are few climates more delicious than that of these gra.s.sy savannahs from December to March.

We always started soon after daybreak on ponies, and enjoyed a twelve to sixteen miles' gallop in the cool of the morning before breakfast, which we found prepared on our arrival at a tent sent on ahead the night before. The road led across an open country, or followed paths through interminable rice-fields, now dry and dusty. On poor soil a white-flowered _Leucas_ monopolized the s.p.a.ce, like our charlock and poppy: it was apparently a pest to the agriculturist, covering the surface in some places like a sprinkling of snow. Sometimes the river-beds exposed fourteen feet of pure stratified sand, with only an inch of vegetable soil above.

At this season the mornings are very hazy, with the thermometer at sunrise 60 degrees; one laid on gra.s.s during the night falling 7 degrees below that temperature: dew forms, but never copiously: by 10 a.m. the temperature has risen to 75 degrees, and the faint easterly morning breezes die away; the haze thickens, and covers the sky with a white veil, the thermometer rising to 82 degrees at noon, and the west wind succeeding in parching tornados and furious gusts, increasing with the temperature, which attains its maximum in the afternoon, and falling again with its decline at sunset. The evenings are calm; but the earth is so heated, that the thermometer stands at 10 p.m. at 66 degrees, and the minimum at night is not below 55 degrees: great drought accompanies the heat at this season, but not to such a degree as in North-west India, or other parts of this meridian further removed from the hills. In the month of March, and during the prevalence of west winds, the mean temperature was 79 degrees, and the dew-point 22 degrees lower, indicating great drought. The temperature at Calcutta was 7 degrees warmer, and the atmosphere very much damper.

On the second day we arrived at Jeelpigoree, a large straggling village near the banks of the Teesta, a good way south of the forest: here we were detained for several days, waiting for elephants with which to proceed northwards. The natives are Cooches, a Mogul (Mongolian) race, who inhabit the open country of this district, replacing the Mechis of the Terai forest. They are a fine athletic people, not very dark, and formed the once-powerful house of Cooch Behar. Latterly the upper cla.s.ses have adopted the religion of the Brahmins, and have had caste conferred upon them; while the lower orders have turned Mahomedans: these, chiefly agriculturists, are a timid, oppressed cla.s.s, who everywhere fled before us, and were with difficulty prevailed upon even to direct us along our road. A rude police is established by the British Government all over the country, and to it the traveller applies for guides and a.s.sistance; but the Conches were so shy and difficult to deal with, that we were generally left to our own resources.

Gra.s.s is the prevailing feature of the country, as there are few shrubs, and still fewer trees. Goats and the common Indian cow are plentiful; but it is not swampy enough for the buffalo; and sheep are scarce, on account of the heat of the climate. This uniformity of feature over so immense an area is, however, due to the agency of man, and is of recent introduction; as all concur in affirming, that within the last hundred years the face of the country was covered with the same long jungle-gra.s.ses which abound in the Terai forest; and the troops cantoned at t.i.talya (a central position in these plains) from 1816 to 1828, confirm this statement as far as their immediate neighbourhood is concerned.

These gigantic _Gramineae_ seem to be destroyed by fire with remarkable facility at one season of the year; and it is well that this is the case; for, whether as a retainer of miasma, a shelter for wild beasts, both carnivorous and herbivorous, alike dangerous to man, or from their liability to ignite, and spread destruction far and wide, the gra.s.s-jungles are most serious obstacles to civilization. Next to the rapidity with which it can be cleared, the adaptation of a great part of the soil to irrigation during the rains, has greatly aided the bringing of it under cultivation.

By far the greater proportion of this universal short turf gra.s.s is formed of _Andropogon acicularis, Cynodon Dactylon,_* [Called "Dhob."

This is the best pasture gra.s.s in the plains of India, and the only one to be found over many thousands of square miles.] and in sandy places, _Imperata cylindrica_; where the soil is wetter, _Ameletia Indica_ is abundant, giving a heather-like colour to the turf, with its pale purple flowers: wherever there is standing water, its surface is reddened by the _Azolla,_ and _Salvinia_ is also common.

At Jeelpigoree we were waited upon by the Dewan, who governs the district for the Rajah, a boy about ten years old, whose estates are locked up during the trial of an interminable suit for the succession, that has been inst.i.tuted against him by a natural son of the late Rajah: we found the Dewan to be a man of intelligence, who promised us elephants as soon as the great Hooli festival, now commenced, should be over.

The large village, at the time of our visit, was gay with holiday dresses. It is surrounded by trees, chiefly of banyan, jack, mango, peepul, and tamarind: interminable rice-fields extend on all sides, and except bananas, slender betel-nut palms, and sometimes p.a.w.n, or betel-pepper, there is little other extensive cultivation.

The rose-apple, orange, and pine-apple are rare, as are cocoa-nuts: there are few date or fan-palms, and only occasionally poor crops of castor-oil and sugar-cane. In the gardens I noticed jasmine, _Justicia Adhatoda, Hibiscus,_ and others of the very commonest Indian ornamental plants; while for food were cultivated _Chenopodium,_ yams, sweet potatos, and more rarely peas, beans, and gourds. Bamboos were planted round the little properties and smaller cl.u.s.ters of houses, in oblong squares, the ridge on which the plants grew being usually bounded by a shallow ditch. The species selected was not the most graceful of its family; the stems, or culms, being densely crowded, erect, as thick at the base as the arm, copiously branching, and very feathery throughout their whole length of sixty feet.

A gay-flowered _Osbeckia_ was common along the roadsides, and, with a _Clerodendron,_* [_Clerodendron_ leaves, bruised, are used to kill vermin, fly-blows, etc., in cattle; and the twigs form toothpicks.

The flowers are presented to Mahadeo, as a G.o.d of peace; milk, honey, flowers, fruit, amrit (ambrosia), etc., being offered to the pacific G.o.ds, as Vishnu, Krishna, etc.; while Mudar (_Asclepias_), Bhang (_Cannabis sativa_), _Datura,_ flesh, blood, and spirituous liquors, are offered to Siva, Doorga, Kali, and other demoniacal deities.]

whose strong, sweet odour was borne far through the air, formed a low undershrub beneath every tree, generally intermixed with three ferns (a _Polypodium, Pteris,_ and _Goniopteris_).

The cottages are remarkable, and have a very neat appearance, presenting nothing but a low white-washed platform of clay, and an enormous high, narrow, black, neatly thatched roof, so arched along the ridge, that its eaves nearly touch the ground at each gable; and looking at a distance like a gigantic round-backed elephant.

The walls are of neatly-platted bamboo: each window (of which there are two) is crossed by slips of bamboo, and wants only gla.s.s to make it look European; they have besides shutters of wattle, that open upwards, projecting during the day like the port-hatches of a ship, and let down at night. Within, the rooms are airy and clean: one end contains the machans (bedsteads), the others some raised clay benches, the fire, frequently an enormous Hookah, round wattled stools, and various implements. The inhabitants appeared more than ordinarily well-dressed; the men in loose flowing robes of fine cotton or muslin, the women in the usual garb of a simple thick cotton cloth, drawn tight immediately above the breast, and thence falling perpendicularly to the knee; the colour of this is a bright blue in stripes, bordered above and below with red.