EXCURSION TO TERAI
Dispatch
collections—Acorns—Heat—Punkabaree—Bees—Vegetation—Haze—Titalya—
Earthquake—Proceed to Nepal frontier—Terai, geology of—Physical
features of Himalayan valleys—Elephants, purchase of,
etc.—Riverbeds—Mechi river—Return to Titalya—Leave for Teesta—Climate
of plains—Jeelpigoree—Cooches—Alteration in the appearance of country
by fires, etc.—Grasses—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
Titalya 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 grass-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 grass 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 _Acanthaceæ,
Bauhinia, Dillenia, Bombax,_ etc. Of these the former are abundant, and
render the jungle gay with large and delicate white, red, and purple
blossoms. Coarse, 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 Titalya,
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,[122] 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.
[122] 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.
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 _0sbeckia_ gay with blossoms like dog-roses,
were abundant; the former especially under trees, where the seeds are
dropped by birds.
At Titalya 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
passing 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 assumed 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.[123]
[123] 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
constituents 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 shores. 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 coarser.
The alluvium of the Gangetic valley is both interstratified with the
gravel, and passes into it, and was no doubt deposited in deep water,
whilst the coarser matter[124] was accumulating at the foot of the
mountains.
[124] 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.
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 masses of rock. Such accumulations 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,[125] or by a depression of the mountain mass equal to 8000
feet, since the formation of these moraines.
[125] 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.
The country about Titalya 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-grass. 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 circumference 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 thorny jujube bushes, occasionally tenanted by
the _Florican,_ which scours these downs like a bustard. Sometimes a
solitary fig, or a thorny 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 grasshoppers 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 grasses 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 _Phœnix_ 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 grass is very rich, partly
owing to the moisture of the climate, and partly to the retiring waters
of the rivers; both circumstances 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 Titalya, 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 grassy 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 space, 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°; one laid on grass during the
night falling 7° below that temperature: dew forms, but never
copiously: by 10 a.m. the temperature has risen to 75°, and the faint
easterly morning breezes die away; the haze thickens, and covers the
sky with a white veil, the thermometer rising to 82° 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°,
and the minimum at night is not below 55°: 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°, and the dew-point 22° lower, indicating great
drought. The temperature at Calcutta was 7° 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
classes 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 class, 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 assistance; but the Conches were so shy and
difficult to deal with, that we were generally left to our own
resources.
Grass 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-grasses which abound in the Terai forest; and the
troops cantoned at Titalya (a central position in these plains) from
1816 to 1828, confirm this statement as far as their immediate
neighbourhood is concerned.
These gigantic _Gramineæ_ 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
grass-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 grass is
formed of _Andropogon acicularis, Cynodon Dactylon,_[126] 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.
[126] Called “Dhob.” This is the best pasture grass in the plains of
India, and the only one to be found over many thousands of square
miles.
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 instituted 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 pawn, 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 clusters 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 _0sbeckia_ was common along the roadsides, and, with a
_Clerodendron,_[127] 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_).
[127] _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 god of peace; milk, honey, flowers,
fruit, amrit (ambrosia), etc., being offered to the pacific gods, 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.
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 glass 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.
I anticipated some novelty from a visit to a Durbar (court) so distant
from European influence as that of the Rajah of Jeelpigoree. All
Eastern courts, subject to the Company, are, however, now shorn of much
of their glory; and the condition of the upper classes is greatly
changed. Under the Mogul rule, the country was farmed out to Zemindars,
some of whom assumed the title of Rajah: they collected the revenue for
the Sovereign, retaining by law ten per cent. on all that was realized:
there was no intermediate class, the peasant paying directly to the
Zemindar, and he into the royal treasury. Latterly the Zemindars have
become farmers under the Company’s rule; and in the adjudication of
their claims, Lord Cornwallis (then Governor-General) made great
sacrifices in their favour, levying only a small tribute in proportion
to their often great revenues, in the hope that they would be induced
to devote their energies, and some of their means, to the improvement
of the condition of the peasantry. This expectation was not realized:
the younger Zemindars especially, subject to no restraint (except from
aggressions on their neighbours), fell into slothful habits, and the
collecting of the revenue became a trading speculation, entrusted to
“middle men.” The Zemindar selects a number, who again are at liberty
to collect through the medium of several sub-renting classes. Hence the
peasant suffers, and except a generally futile appeal to the Rajah, he
has no redress. The law secures him tenure as long as he can pay his
rent, and to do this he has recourse to the usurer; borrowing in spring
(at 50, and oftener 100 per cent.) the seed, plough, and bullocks: he
reaps in autumn, and what is then not required for his own use, is sold
to pay off part of his original debt, the rest standing over till the
next season; and thus it continues to accumulate, till, overwhelmed
with difficulties, he is ejected, or flees to a neighbouring district.
The Zemindar enjoys the same right of tenure as the peasant: the amount
of impost laid on his property was fixed for perpetuity; whatever his
revenue be, he must pay so much to the Company, or he forfeits his
estates, and they are put up for auction.
One evening we visited the young Rajah at his residence, which has
rather a good appearance at a distance, its white walls gleaming
through a dark tope of mango, betel, and cocoa-nut. A short rude avenue
leads to the entrance gate, under the trees of which a large bazaar was
being held; stocked with cloths, simple utensils, ornaments,
sweetmeats, five species of fish from the Teesta, and the betel-nut.
We entered through a guard-house, where were some of the Rajah’s Sepoys
in the European costume, and a few of the Company’s troops, lent to the
Rajah as a security against some of the turbulent pretenders to his
title. Within was a large court-yard, flanked by a range of buildings,
some of good stone-work, some of wattle, in all stages of disrepair. A
great crowd of people occupied one end of the court, and at the other
we were received by the Dewan, and seated on chairs under a canopy
supported by slender silvered columns. Some slovenly Natch-girls were
dancing before us, kicking up clouds of dust, and singing or rather
bawling through their noses, the usual indelicate hymns in honour of
the Hooli festival; there were also fiddlers, cutting uncouth capers in
rhythm with the dancers. Anything more deplorable than the music,
dancing, and accompaniments, cannot well be imagined; yet the people
seemed vastly pleased, and extolled the performers.
The arrival of the Rajah and his brothers was announced by a crash of
tom-toms and trumpets, while over their heads were carried great gilt
canopies. With them came a troop of relations, of all ages; and amongst
them a poor little black girl, dressed in honour of us in an
old-fashioned English chintz frock and muslin cap, in which she cut the
drollest figure imaginable; she was carried about for our admiration,
like a huge Dutch doll, crying lustily all the time.
The festivities of the evening commenced by handing round trays full of
pith-balls, the size of a nutmeg, filled with a mixture of flour, sand,
and red lac-powder; with these each pelted his neighbour, the thin
covering bursting as it struck any object, and powdering it copiously
with red dust. A more childish and disagreeable sport cannot well be
conceived; and when the balls were expended, the dust itself was
resorted to, not only fresh, but that which had already been used was
gathered up, with whatever dirt it might have become mixed. One rude
fellow, with his hand full, sought to entrap his victims into talking,
when he would stuff the nasty mixture into their mouths.
At the end attar of roses was brought, into which little pieces of
cotton, fixed on slips of bamboo, were dipped, and given to each
person. The heat, dust, stench of the unwashed multitude, noise, and
increasing familiarity of the lower orders, warned us to retire, and we
effected our retreat with precipitancy.
The Rajah and his brother were very fine boys, lively, frank,
unaffected, and well disposed: they have evidently a good guide in the
old Dewan; but it is melancholy to think how surely, should they grow
up in possession of their present rank, they will lapse into slothful
habits, and take their place amongst the imbeciles who now represent
the once powerful Rajahs of Bengal.
We rode back to our tents by a bright moonlight, very dusty and tired,
and heartily glad to breathe the cool fresh air, after the stifling
ordeal we had undergone.
On the following evening the elephants were again in waiting to conduct
us to the Rajah. He and his relations were assembled outside the gates,
mounted upon elephants, amid a vast concourse of people. The children
and Dewan were seated in a sort of cradle; the rest were some in
howdahs, and some astride on elephants’ backs, six or eight together.
All the idols were paraded before them, and powdered with red dust; the
people howling, shouting, and sometimes quarrelling. Our elephants took
their places amongst those of the Rajah; and when the mob had
sufficiently pelted one another with balls and dirty red powder, a
torchlight procession was formed, the idols leading the way, to a very
large tank, bounded by a high rampart, within which was a broad
esplanade round the water.
The effect of the whole was very striking, the glittering cars and
barbaric gaud of the idols showing best by torchlight; while the white
robes and turbans of the undulating sea of people, and the great black
elephants picking their way with matchless care and consideration,
contrasted strongly with the quiet moonbeams sleeping on the still
broad waters of the tank.
Thence the procession moved to a field, where the idols were placed on
the ground, and all dismounted: the Dewan then took the children by the
hand, and each worshipped his tutelary deity in a short prayer dictated
by the attendant Brahmin, and threw a handful of red dust in its face.
After another ordeal of powder, singing, dancing, and suffocation, our
share in the Hooli ended; and having been promised elephants for the
following morning, we bade a cordial farewell to our engaging little
hosts and their staid old governor.
On the 10th of March we were awakened at an early hour by a heavy
thunder-storm from the south-west. The sunrise was very fine, through
an arch 10° high of bright blue sky, above which the whole firmament
was mottled with cirrus. It continued cloudy, with light winds,
throughout the day, but clear on the horizon. From this tinge such
storms became frequent, ushering in the equinox; and the less hazy sky
and rising hygrometer predicted an accession of moisture in the
atmosphere.
We left for Rangamally, a village eight miles distant in a northerly
direction, our course lying along the west bank of the Teesta.
The river is here navigated by canoes, thirty to forty feet long, some
being rudely cut out of a solid log of Sal, while others are built, the
planks, of which there are but few, being sewed together, or clamped
with iron, and the seams caulked with the fibres of the root of Dhak
(_Butea frondosa_), and afterwards smeared with the gluten of
_Diospyros embryopteris._ The bed of the river is here threequarters of
a mile across, of which the stream does not occupy one-third; its banks
are sand-cliffs, fourteen feet in height. A few small fish and
water-snakes swarm in the pools.
The whole country improved in fertility as we advanced towards the
mountains: the grass became greener, and more trees, shrubs, herbs, and
birds appeared. In front, the dark boundary-line of the Sal forest
loomed on the horizon, and to the east rose the low hills of Bhotan,
both backed by the outer ranges of the Himalaya.
Flocks of cranes were abundant over-head, flying in wedges, or breaking
up into “open order,” preparing for their migration northwards, which
takes place in April, their return occurring in October; a small quail
was also common on the ground. Tamarisk (“Jhow”) grew in the sandy bed
of the river; its flexible young branches are used in various parts of
India for wattling and basket-making.
In the evening we walked to the skirts of the Sal forest. The great
trunks of the trees were often scored by tigers’ claws, this animal
indulging in the cat-like propensity of rising and stretching itself
against such objects. Two species of _Dillenia_ were common in the
forest, with long grass, _Symplocos, Emblica,_ and _Cassia Fistula,_
now covered with long pods. Several parasitical air-plants grew on the
dry trees, as _Oberonia, Vanda,_ and _Ærides._
At Rangamally, the height of the sandy banks of the Teesta varies from
fifteen to twenty feet. The bed is a mile across, and all sand;[128]
the current much divided, and opaque green, from the glacial origin of
most of its head-streams. The west bank was covered with a small Sal
forest, mixed with _Acacia Catechu,_ and brushwood, growing in a poor
vegetable loam, over very dry sand.
[128] Now covered with _Anthistiria_ grass, fifteen feet high, a
little _Sissoo,_ and _Bombax._
The opposite (or Bhotan) bank is much lower, and always flooded during
the rains, which is not the case on the western side, where the water
rises to ten feet below the top of the bank, or from seven to ten feet
above its height in the dry season, and it then fills its whole bed.
This information we had from a police Jemadar, who has resided many
years on this unhealthy spot, and annually suffers from fever. The Sal
forest has been encroached upon from the south, for many miles, within
the memory of man, by clearing in patches, and by indiscriminate
felling.
About ten miles north of Rangamally, we came to an extensive flat,
occupying a recess in the high west bank, the site of the old capital
(Bai-kant-pore) of the Jeelpigoree Rajah. Hemmed in as it is on three
sides by a dense forest, and on all by many miles of malarious Terai,
it appears sufficiently secure from ordinary enemies, during a great
part of the year. The soil is sandy, overlying gravel, and covered with
a thick stratum of fine mud or silt, which is only deposited on these
low flats; on it grew many naturalized plants, as hemp, tobacco, jack,
mango, plantain, and orange.
About eight miles on, we left the river-bed, and struck westerly
through a dense forest, to a swampy clearance occupied by the village
of Rummai, which appeared thoroughly malarious; and we pitched the tent
on a narrow, low ridge, above the level of the plain.
It was now cool and pleasant, partly due, no doubt, to a difference in
the vegetation, and the proximity of swamp and forest, and partly also
to a change in the weather, which was cloudy and threatening; much
rain, too, had fallen here on the preceding day.
Brahmins and priests of all kinds are few in this miserable country:
near the villages, and under the large trees, are, every here and
there, a few immature thatched cottages, four to six feet high, in
which the tutelary deities of the place are kept; they are idols of the
very rudest description, of Vishnu as an ascetic (Bai-kant Nath), a
wooden doll, gilt and painted, standing, with the hands raised as if in
exhortation, and one leg crossed over the other. Again, Kartik, the god
of war, is represented sitting astride on a peacock, with the right
hand elevated and holding a small flat cup.
Some fine muscular Cooches were here brought for Mr. Hodgson’s
examination, but we found them unable or unwilling to converse, in the
Cooch tongue, which appears to be fast giving place to Bengalee.
We walked to a stream, which flows at the base of the retiring
sand-cliffs, and nourishes a dense and richly-varied jungle, producing
many plants, as beautiful _Acanthaceæ,_ Indian horse-chesnut, loaded
with white racemes of flowers, gay _Convolvuli,_ laurels, terrestrial
and parasitic _Orchideæ, Dillenia,_ casting its enormous flowers as big
as two fists, pepper, figs, and, in strange association with these, a
hawthorn, and the yellow-flowered Indian strawberry, which ascends
7,500 feet on the mountains, and _Hodgsonia,_ a new _Cucurbitaceous_
genus, clinging in profusion to the trees, and also found 5000 feet
high on the mountains.
In the evening we rode into the forest (which was dry and very
unproductive), and thence along the river-banks, through _Acacia
Catechu,_ belted by _Sissoo,_ which often fringes the stream, always
occupying the lowest flats. The foliage at this season is brilliantly
green; and as the evening advanced, a yellow convolvulus burst into
flower like magic, adorning the bushes over which it climbed.
It rained on the following morning; after which we left for the exit of
the Teesta, proceeding northwards, sometimes through a dense forest of
Sal timber, sometimes dipping into marshy depressions, or riding
through grassy savannahs, breast-high. The coolness of the atmosphere
was delicious, and the beauty of the jungle seemed to increase the
further we penetrated these primæval forests.
Eight miles from Rummai we came on a small river from the mountains,
with a Cooch village close by, inhabited during the dry season by
timber-cutters from Jeelpigoree it is situated upon a very rich black
soil, covered with _Saccharum_ and various gigantic grasses, but no
bamboo. These long grasses replace the Sal, of which we did not see one
good tree.
We here mounted the elephants, and proceeded several miles through the
prairie, till we again struck upon the high Sal forest-bank, continuous
with that of Rummai and Rangamally, but much loftier: it formed one of
many terraces which stretch along the foot of the hills, from
Punkabaree to the Teesta, but of which none are said to occur for eight
miles eastwards along the Bhotan Dooars: if true, this is probably due
in part to the alteration of the course of the Teesta, which is
gradually working to the westward, and cutting away these lofty banks.
The elephant-drivers appeared to have taken us by mistake to the exit
of the Chawa, a small stream which joins the Teesta further to the
eastward. The descent to the bed of this rivulet, round the first spur
of rock we met with, was fully eighty feet, through a very irregular
depression, probably the old bed of the stream; it runs southwards from
the hills, and was covered from top to bottom with slate-pebbles. We
followed the river to its junction with the Teesta, along a flat, broad
gulley, bounded by densely-wooded, steep banks of clay slate on the
north, and the lofty bank on the south: between these the bed was
strewed with great boulders of gneiss and other rocks, luxuriantly
clothed with long grass, and trees of wild plantain, _Erythrina_ and
_Bauhinia,_ the latter gorgeously in flower.
The Sal bank formed a very fine object: it was quite perpendicular, and
beautifully stratified with various coloured sands and gravel: it
tailed off abruptly at the junction of the rivers, and then trended
away south-west, forming the west bank of the Teesta. The latter river
is at its outlet a broad and rapid, but hardly impetuous stream, now
fifty yards across, gushing from between two low, forest-clad spurs: it
appeared about five feet deep, and was beautifully fringed on both
sides with green _Sisso._
Some canoes were here waiting for us, formed of hollowed trunks of
trees, thirty feet long: two were lashed together with bamboos, and the
boatmen sat one at the head and one at the stern of each: we lay along
the bottom of the vessels, and in a second we were darting down the
river, at the rate of at least ten or fifteen miles an hour, the bright
waters leaping up on all sides, and bounding in _jets-d’eau_ between
prows and sterns of the coupled vessels. Sometimes we glided along
without perceptible motion, and at others jolted down bubbling rapids,
the steersmen straining every nerve to keep their bark’s head to the
current, as she impatiently swerved from side to side in the eddies. To
our jaded and parched frames, after the hot forenoon’s ride on the
elephants, the effect was delicious: the fresh breeze blew on our
heated foreheads and down our open throats and chests; we dipped our
hands into the clear, cool stream, and there was “music in the waters”
to our ears. Fresh verdure on the banks, clear pebbles, soft sand, long
English river-reaches, forest glades, and deep jungles, followed in
rapid succession; and as often as we rounded a bend or shot a rapid,
the scene changed from bright to brighter still; so continuing until
dusk, when we were slowly paddling along the then torpid current
opposite Rangamally.[129]
[129] The following temperatures of the waters of the Teesta were
taken at intervals during our passage from its exit to Rangamally, a
distance of fifteen linear miles, and thirty miles following the
bends:—
Exit
Water
Air
2.30 p.m.
62°
3.00 p.m.
62·2°
74°
3.30 p.m.
63·2°
4.00 p.m.
64°
4.30 p.m.
65°
5.00 p.m.
65·4°
72·5° opposite Rummai
5.30 p.m.
66°
6.00 p.m.
66°
71·7° opposite Baikant
The absence of large stones or boulders of rock in the bed of the
Teesta is very remarkable, considering the great volume and rapidity of
the current, and that it shoots directly from the rocky hills to the
gravelly plains. At the _embouchure_ there are boulders as big as the
head, and in the stream, four miles below the exit, the boatmen pointed
out a stone as large as the body as quite a marvel.
They assured us that the average rise at the mouth of the river, in the
rains, was not more than five feet: the mean breadth of the stream is
from seventy to ninety yards. From the point where it leaves the
mountains, to its junction with the Megna, is at this season thirteen
days’ voyage, the return occupying from twenty to twenty-five days,
with the boats unladen. The name “Teesta” signifies “quiet,” this river
being so in comparison with other Himalayan torrents further west, the
Cosi, Konki, etc., which are devastators of all that bounds their
course.
We passed but two crossing-places: at one the river is divided by an
island, covered with the rude chaits and flags of the Boodhists. We
also saw some Cooch fishermen, who throw the net much as we do: a fine
“Mahaser” (a very large carp) was the best fish they had. Of
cultivation there was very little, and the only habitations were a few
grass-huts of the boatmen or buffalo herdsmen, a rare Cooch village of
Catechu and Sal cutters, or the shelter of timber-floaters, who seem to
pass the night in nests of long dry grass.
Our servants not having returned with the elephants from Rummai, we
spent the following day at Rangamally shooting and botanizing. I
collected about 100 species in a couple of hours, and observed perhaps
twice that number: the more common I have repeatedly alluded to, and
excepting some small terrestrial _Orchids,_ I added nothing of
particular interest to my collection.[130]
[130] The following is a list of the principal genera, most of which
are English:—_Polygonum, Quercus, Sonchus, Gnaphalium, Cratagus,
Lobelia, Lactuca, Hydrocotyle, Saponaria, Campanula, Bidens, Rubus,
Oxalis, Artemisia, Fragaria, Clematis, Dioscorea, Potamogeton, Chara,
Veronica, Viola, Smilax._
On the 14th of March we proceeded west to Siligoree, along the skirts
of the ragged Sal forest. Birds are certainly the most conspicuous
branch of the natural history of this country, and we saw many species,
interesting either from their habits, beauty, or extensive
distribution. We noticed no less than sixteen kinds of swimming birds,
several of which are migratory and English. The Shoveller, white-eyed
and common wild ducks; Merganser, Brahminee, and Indian goose (_Anser
Indica_); common and Gargany teal; two kinds of gull; one of Shearwater
(_Rhynchops ablacus_); three of tern, and one of cormorant. Besides
these there were three egrets, the large crane, stork, green heron, and
the demoiselle; the English sand-martin, kingfisher, peregrine-falcon,
sparrow-hawk, kestrel, and the European vulture: the wild peacock, and
jungle-fowl. There were at least 100 peculiarly Indian birds in
addition, of which the more remarkable were several kinds of mina, of
starling, vulture, kingfisher, magpie, quail, and lapwing.
The country gradually became quite beautiful, much undulated and
diversified by bright green meadows, sloping lawns, and deeply wooded
nullahs, which lead from the Sal forest and meander through this varied
landscape. More beautiful sites for fine mansions could not well be,
and it is difficult to suppose so lovely a country should be so
malarious as it is before and after the rains, excessive heat probably
diffusing widely the miasma from small stagnant surfaces. We noticed a
wild hog, absolutely the first wild beast of any size I saw on the
plains, except the hispid hare (_Lepus hispidus_) and the barking deer
(_Stylocerus ratna_). The hare we found to be the best game of this
part of India, except the teal. The pheasants of Dorjiling are poor,
the deer all but uneatable, and the florican, however dressed, I
considered a far from excellent bird.
A good many plants grow along the streams, the sandy beds of which are
everywhere covered with the marks of tigers’ feet. The only safe way of
botanizing is by pushing through the jungle on elephants; an
uncomfortable method, from the quantity of ants and insects which drop
from the foliage above, and from the risk of disturbing pendulous bees’
and ants’ nests.
A peculiar species of willow (_Salix tetrasperma_) is common here;
which is a singular fact, as the genus is characteristic of cold and
arctic latitudes; and no species is found below 5000 feet elevation on
the Sikkim mountain, where it grows on the inner Himalaya only, some
kinds ascending to 16,000 feet.
East of Siligoree the plains are unvaried by tree or shrub, and are
barren wastes of short turf or sterile sand, with the dwarf-palm
(_Phœnix acaulis_), a sure sign of a most hungry soil.
The latter part of the journey I performed on elephants during the heat
of the day, and a more uncomfortable mode of conveyance surely never
was adopted; the camel’s pace is more fatiguing, but that of the
elephant is extremely trying after a few miles, and is so injurious to
the human frame that the Mahouts (drivers) never reach an advanced age,
and often succumb young to spine-diseases, brought on by the incessant
motion of the vertebral column. The broiling heat of the elephant’s
black back, and the odour of its oily driver, are disagreeable
accompaniments, as are its habits of snorting water from its trunk over
its parched skin, and the consequences of the great bulk of green food
which it consumes.
From Siligoree I made a careful examination of the gravel beds that
occur on the road north to the foot of the hills, and thence over the
tertiary sandstone to Punkabaree. At the Rukti river, which flows
south-west, the road suddenly rises, and crosses the first considerable
hill, about two miles south of any rock _in situ._ This river cuts a
cliff from 60 to 100 feet high, composed of stratified sand and
water-worn gravel: further south, the spur declines into the plains,
its course marked by the Sal that thrives on its gravelly soil. The
road then runs north-west over a plain to an isolated hill about 200
feet high, also formed of sand and gravel. We ascended to the top of
this, and found it covered with blocks of gneiss, and much angular
detritus. Hence the road gradually ascends, and becomes clayey.
Argillaceous rocks, and a little ochreous sandstone appeared in
highly-inclined strata, dipping north, and covered with great
water-worn blocks of gneiss. Above, a flat terrace, flanked to the
eastward by a low wooded hill, and another rise of sandstone, lead on
to the great Baisarbatti terrace.
_Bombax, Erythrina,_ and _Duabanga_ (_Lagærstræmia grandiflora_), were
in full flower, and with the profusion of _Bauhinia,_ rendered the
tree-jungle gay: the two former are leafless when flowering. The
Duabanga is the pride of these forests. Its trunk, from eight to
fifteen feet in girth, is generally forked from the base, and the long
pendulous branches which clothe the trunk for 100 feet, are thickly
leafy, and terminated by racemes of immense white flowers, which,
especially when in bud, smell most disagreeably of assafœtida. The
magnificent Apocyneous climber, _Beaumontia,_ was in full bloom,
ascending the loftiest trees, and clothing their trunks with its
splendid foliage and festoons of enormous funnel-shaped white flowers.
The report of a bed of iron-stone eight or ten miles west of Punkabaree
determined our visiting the spot; and the locality being in a dense
jungle, the elephants were sent on ahead.
We descended to the terraces flanking the Balasun river, and struck
west along jungle-paths to a loosely-timbered flat. A sudden descent of
150 feet landed us on a second terrace. Further on, a third dip of
about twenty feet (in some places obliterated) flanks the bed of the
Balasun; the river itself being split into many channels at this
season. The west bank, which is forty feet high, is of stratified sand
and gravel, with vast slightly-worn blocks of gneiss: from the top of
this we proceeded south-west for three miles to some Mechi villages,
the inhabitants of which flocked to meet us, bringing milk and
refreshments.
The Lohar-ghur, or “iron hill,” lies in a dense dry forest. Its
plain-ward flanks are very steep, and covered with scattered
weather-worn masses of ochreous and black iron-stone, many of which are
several yards long: it fractures with faint metallic lustre, and is
very earthy in parts: it does not affect the compass. There are no
pebbles of iron-stone, nor water-worn rocks of any kind found with it.
The sandstones, close by, cropped out in thick beds (dip north 70°):
they are very soft, and beds of laminated clay, and of a slaty rock,
are intercalated with them; also an excessively tough conglomerate,
formed of an indurated blue or grey paste, with nodules of harder clay.
There are no traces of metal in the rock, and the lumps of ore are
wholly superficial.
Below Punkabaree the Baisarbatti stream cuts through banks of gravel
overlying the sandstone (dip north 65°). The sandstone is gritty and
micaceous, intercalated with beds of indurated shale and clay; in which
I found the shaft (apparently) of a bone; there were also beds of the
same clay conglomerate which I had seen at Lohar-ghur, and thin seams
of brown lignite; with a rhomboidal cleavage. In the bed of the stream
were carbonaceous shales, with obscure impressions of fern leaves, of
_Trizygia,_ and _Vertebraria_: both fossils characteristic of the
Burdwan coal-fields (see page 8), but too imperfect to justify any
conclusion as to the relation between these formations.[131]
[131] These traces of fossils are not sufficient to identify the
formation with that of the sewalik hills of North-west India; but its
contents, together with its strike, dip, and position relatively to
the mountains, and its mineralogical character, incline me to suppose
it may be similar. Its appearance in such small quantities in Sikkim
(where it rises but a few hundred feet above the level of the sea,
whereas in Kumaon it reaches 4000 feet), may be attributed to the
greater amount of wearing which it must have undergone; the plains
from which it rises being 1000 feet lower than those of Kumaon, and
the sea having consequently retired later, exposing the Sikkim
sandstone to the effects of denudation for a much longer period.
Hitherto no traces of this rock, or of any belonging to a similar
geological epoch, have been found in the valleys of Sikkim; but when
the narrowness of these is considered, it will not appear strange that
such may have been removed from their surfaces: first, by the action
of a tidal ocean; and afterwards, by that of tropical rains.
Ascending the stream, these shales are seen _in situ,_ overlain by the
metamorphic clay-slate of the mountains, and dipping inwards
(northwards) like them. This is at the foot of the Punkabaree spur, and
close to the bungalow, where a stream and land-slip expose good
sections. The carbonaceous beds dip north 60° and 70°, and run east and
west; much quartz rock is intercalated with them, and soft white and
pink micaceous sandstones. The coal-seams are few in number, six to
twelve inches thick, very confused and distorted, and full of elliptic
nodules, or spheroids of quartzy slate, covered with concentric scaly
layers of coal: they overlie the sandstones mentioned above. These
scanty notices of superposition being collected in a country clothed
with the densest tropical forest, where a geologist pursues his
fatiguing investigations under disadvantages that can hardly be
realized in England, will I fear long remain unconfirmed. I may
mention, however, that the appearance of inversion of the strata at the
foot of great mountain-masses has been observed in the Alleghany chain,
and I believe in the Alps.[132]
[132] Dr. M‘Lelland informs me that in the Curruckpore hills, south of
the Ganges, the clay-slates are overlain by beds of mica-slate,
gneiss, and granite, which pass into one another.
[Illustration: A mech, native of the Sikkim Terai]
A poor Mech was fishing in the stream, with a basket curiously formed
of a cylinder of bamboo, cleft all round in innumerable strips, held
together by the joints above and below; these strips being stretched
out as a balloon in the middle, and kept apart by a hoop: a small hole
is cut in the cage, and a mouse-trap entrance formed: the cage is
placed in the current with the open end upwards, where the fish get in,
and though little bigger than minnows, cannot find their way out.
On the 20th we had a change in the weather: a violent storm from the
south-west occurred at noon, with hail of a strange form, the stones
being sections of hollow spheres, half an inch across and upwards,
formed of cones with truncated apices and convex bases; these cones
were aggregated together with their bases outwards. The large masses
were followed by a shower of the separate conical pieces, and that by
heavy rain. On the mountains this storm was most severe: the stones lay
at Dorjiling for seven days, congealed into masses of ice several feet
long and a foot thick in sheltered places: at Purneah, fifty miles
south, stones one and two inches across fell, probably as whole
spheres.
Ascending to Khersiong, I found the vegetation very backward by the
road-sides. The rain had cleared the atmosphere, and the view over the
plains was brilliant. On the top of the Khersiong spur a tremendous
gale set in with a cold west wind: the storm cleared off at night,
which at 10 p.m. was beautiful, with forked and sheet lightning over
the plains far below us. The equinoctial gales had now fairly set in,
with violent south-east gales, heavy thunder, lightning, and rain.
Whilst at Khersiong I took advantage of the very fair section afforded
by the road from Punkabaree, to examine the structure of the spur,
which seems to be composed of very highly inclined contorted beds (dip
north) of metamorphic rocks, gneiss, mica-slate, clay-slate, and
quartz; the foliation of which beds is parallel to the dip of the
strata. Over all reposes a bed of clay, capped with a layer of
vegetable mould, nowhere so thick and rich as in the more humid regions
of 7000 feet elevation. The rocks appeared in the following succession
in descending. Along the top are found great blocks of very compact
gneiss buried in clay. Half a mile lower the same rock appears, dipping
north-north-east 50°. Below this, beds of saccharine quartz, with seams
of mica, dip north-north-west 20°. Some of these quartz beds are folded
on themselves, and look like flattened trunks of trees, being composed
of concentric layers, each from two to four inches thick: we exposed
twenty-seven feet of one fold running along the side of the road, which
was cut parallel to the strike. Each layer of quartz was separated from
its fellows, by one of mica scales; and was broken up into cubical
fragments, whose surfaces are no doubt cleavage and jointing places. I
had previously seen, but not understood, such flexures produced by
metamorphic action on masses of quartz when in a pasty state, in the
Falkland Islands, where they have been perfectly well described by Mr.
Darwin;[133] in whose views of the formation of these rocks I entirely
concur.
[133] Journal of Geological Society for 1846, p. 267, and “Voyage of
the Beagle”.
The flexures of the gneiss are incomparably more irregular and confused
than those of the quartz, and often contain flattened spheres of highly
crystalline felspar, that cleave perpendicularly to the shorter axis.
These spheres are disposed in layers parallel to the foliation of the
gneiss: and are the result of a metamorphic action of great intensity,
effecting a complete rearrangement and crystallization of the quartz
and mica in parallel planes, whilst the felspar is aggregated in
spheres; just as in the rearrangement of the mineral constituents of
mica-schists, the alumina is crystallized in the garnets, and in the
clay-slates the iron into pyrites.
The quartz below this dips north-north-west 45° to 50°, and alternates
with a very hard slaty schist, dipping north-west 45°, and still lower
is a blue-grey clay-slate, dipping north-north-west 30°. These rest on
beds of slate, folded like the quartz mentioned above, but with
cleavage-planes, forming lines radiating from the axis of each flexure,
and running through all the concentric folds. Below this are the
plumbago and clay slates of Punkabaree, which alternate with beds of
mica-schist with garnets, and appear to repose immediately upon the
carboniferous strata and sandstone; but there is much disturbance at
the junction.
On re-ascending from Punkabaree, the rocks gradually appear more and
more dislocated, the clay-slate less so than the quartz and
mica-schist, and that again far less than the gneiss, which is so
shattered and bent, that it is impossible to say what is _in situ,_ and
what not. Vast blocks lie superficially on the ridges; and the tops of
all the outer mountains, as of Khersiong spur, of Tonglo, Sinchul, and
Dorjiling, appear a pile of such masses. Injected veins of quartz are
rare in the lower beds of schist and clay-slate, whilst the gneiss is
often full of them; and on the inner and loftier ranges, these quartz
veins are replaced by granite with tourmaline.
Lime is only known as a stalactitic deposit from various streams, at
elevations from 1000 to 7000 feet; one such stream occurs above
Punkabaree, which I have not seen; another within the Sinchul range, on
the great Rungeet river, above the exit of the Rummai; a third wholly
in the great central Himalayan range, flowing into the Lachen river.
The total absence of any calcareous rock in Sikkim, and the appearance
of the deposit in isolated streams at such distant localities, probably
indicates a very remote origin of the lime-charged waters.
From Khersiong to Dorjiling, gneiss is the only rock, and is often
decomposed into clay-beds, 20 feet deep, in which the narrow, often
zigzag folia of quartz remain quite entire and undisturbed, whilst
every trace of the foliation of the softer mineral is lost.
At Pacheem, Dorjiling weather, with fog and drizzle, commenced, and
continued for two days: we, reached Dorjiling on the 24th of March, and
found that the hail which had fallen on the 20th was still lying in
great masses of crumbling ice in sheltered spots. The fall had done
great damage to the gardens, and Dr. Campbell’s tea-plants were cut to
pieces.
[Illustration: Pocket-comb used by the mech tribes]
[Illustration: The Himalaya & Tibet]
[Illustration: Sikkim and Eastern Nepal]
[Illustration: View of Kinchinjunga from Singtam, looking
north-westward]