America by their astonishing elevation (which, after being long contested,
has at last been confirmed by accurate measurements), they can not, from
their geographical position, present the same inexhaustible variety of
phenomena by which the latter are characterized. The impression produced by
the grander aspects of nature dies not depend exclusively on height. The
chain of the Himalaya is placed far beyond the limits of the torrid zone,
and scarcely is a solitary palm-tree to be found in the beautiful valleys of
Kumaoun and Garhwal.*
[Footnote] *The absence of palms and tree-ferns on the temperate slopes of
the Himalaya is shown in Don's 'Flora Nepalensis', 1825, and in the
remarkable series of lithographs of Wallich's 'Flora Indica', whose
catalogue contains the enormous number of 7683 Himalaya species, almost all
phanerogamic plants, which have as yet been but imperfectly classified. In
Nepaul (lat. 26 1/2 degrees to 27 1/4 degrees) there has hitherto been
observed only one species of palm, Chamaerops martiana, Wall. ('Plantae
Asiat.', lib. iii., p. 5,211), which is found at the height of 5250 English
feet above the level of the sea, in the shady valley of Bunipa. The
magnificent tree-fern, Alsophila brunoniana, Wall. (of which a stem 48 feet
long has been in the possession of the British Museum since 1831), does not
grow in Nepaul, but is found on the mountains of Silhet, to the northwest of
Calcutta, in lat. 24 degrees 50 minutes. The Nepaul fern, Paranema
cyathoides, Don, formerly known as Sphaeroptera barbata, Wall. ('Plantae
Asiat.', lib. i., p. 42, 48), is indeed, nearly related to Cyathea, a
species of which I have seen in the South American Missions of Caripe,
measuring 33 feet in height; this is not, however, properly speaking a tree.
On the southern slope of the ancient Paropamisus, in the latitudes of 28
degrees and 34 degrees, nature no longer displays the same abundance of
tree-ferns and arborescent grasses, heliconias and orchideous plants, which
in tropical
p 30
regions are to be found even on the highest plateaux of the mountains. On
the slope of the Himalaya, under the shade of the Deodora and the
broad-leaved oak, peculiar to these Indian Alps, the rocks of granite and of
mica schist are covered with vegetable forms almost similar to those which
characterize Europe and Northern Asia. The species are not identical, but
closely analogous in aspect and physiognomy, as, marsh parnassia, and the
prickly species of Ribes.* The chain of the Himalaya is also wanting in the
imposing phenomena of volcanoes, which in the Andes and in the Indian
Archipelago often reveal to the inhabitants, under the most terrific forms,
the existence of the forces pervading the interior of our planet.
[footnote] *Ribes nubicola, R. glaciale, R. grossularia. The species which
compose the vegetation of the Himalaya are four pines, notwithstanding the
assertion of the ancients regarding Eastern Asia (Strabo, lib. 11, p. 510,
Cas.), twenty-five oaks, four birches, two chestnuts, seven maples, twelve
willows, fourteen roses, three species of strawberry, seven species of
Alpine roses ('rhododendra'), one of which attains a height of 20 feet, and
many other northern genera. Large white apes, having black faces, inhabit
the wild chestnut-tree of Kashmir, which grows to a height of 100 feet, in
lat. 33 degrees (see Carl von Hugel's 'Kaschmir', 1840, 2d pt. 249). Among
the Coniferae, we find the Pinus deodwara, or deodara (in Sanscrit,
'dewa-daru', the timber of the gods), which is nearly allied to Pinus
cedrus. Near the limit of perpetual snow flourish the large and showy
flowers of the Gentiana venusta, G. Moorcroftiana, Swertia purpurescens, S.
speciosa, Parnassia armata, P. nubicola, Poenia Emode, Tulipa stellata; and
besides varieties of European genera peculiar to these Indian mountains,
true European species as Leontodon taraxacum, Prunella vulgaris, Galium
aparine, and Thlaspi arvense. The heath mentioned by Saunders, in Turner's
'Travels', and which had been confounded with Calluna vulgaris, is an
Andromeda, a fact of the greatest importance in the geography of Asiatic
plants. If I have made use, in this work, of the unphilosophical
expressions of European genera, 'European' special, 'growing wild in Asia',
etc., it has been in consequence of the old botanical language, which,
instead of the idea of a large dissemination, or, rather, of the coexistence
of organic productions, has dogmatically substituted the false hypothesis of
a migration, which, from predilection for Europe, is further assumed to have
been from west to east.
Moreover, on the southern declivity of the Himalaya, where the ascending
current deposits the exhalations rising from a vigorous Indian vegetation,
the region of perpetual snow begins at an elevation of 11,000 or 12,000 feet
above the level of the sea,* thus setting a limit to the development of
organic
p 31
life in a zone that is nearly 3000 feet lower than that to which it attains
in the equinoctial region of the Cordilleras.
[footnote] *On the southern declivity of the Himalaya, the limit of
perpetual snow is 12,978 feet above the level of the sea; on the northern
declivity, or, rather, on the peaks which rise above the Thibet, or
Tartarian plateau, this limit is at 16,625 feet from 30 1/2 degrees to 32
degrees of latitude, while at the equator, in the Andes of Quito, it is
15,790 feet. Such is the result I have deduced from the combination of
numerous data furnished by Webb, Gerard, Herbert, and Moorcroft. (See my
two memoirs on the mountains of India, in 1816 and 1820, in the 'Ann. de
Chimie et de Physique', t. iii., p. 303; t. xiv., p. 6, 22, 50.) The
greater elevation to which the limit of perpetual snow recedes on the
Tartarian declivity is owing to the radiation of heat from the neighboring
elevated plains, to the purity of the atmosphere, and to the infrequent
formation of snow in an air which is both very cold and very dry.
(Humboldt, 'Asie Centrale', t. iii., p. 281-326.) My opinion on the
difference of height of the snow-line on the two sides of the Himalaya has
the high authority of Colebrooke in its favor. He wrote to me in June,
1824, as follows: "I also find, from the data in my possession, that the
elevation of the line of perpetual snow is 13,000 feet. On the southern
declivity, and at latitude 31 degrees, Webb's measurements give me 13,500
feet, consequently 500 feet more than the height deduced from Captain
Hodgson's observations. Gerard's measurements fully confirm your opinion
that the line of snow is higher on the northern than on the southern side."
It was not until the present year (1840) that we obtained the complete and
collected journal of the brothers Gerard, published under the supervision of
Mr. Lloyd. ('Narrative of a Journey from Cawnpoor to the Boorendo Pass, in
the Himalaya, by Captain Alexander Gerard and John Gerard, edited by George
Lloyd', vol. i., p. 292, 311, 320, 327 and 341.) Many interesting details
regarding some localities may be found in the narrative of 'A Visit to the
Shatool, for the Purpose of determining the Line of Perpetual Snow on the
southern face of the Himalaya, in August', 1822. Unfortunately, however,
these travelers always confound the elevation at which sporadic snow falls
with the maximum of the height that the snow-line attains on the Thibetian
plateau. Captain Gerard distinguishes between the summits that rise in the
middle of the plateau, where he states the elevation of the snow-line to be
between 18,000 and 19,000 feet, and the northern slopes of the chain of the
Himalaya, which border on the defile of the Sutledge, and can radiate but
little heat, owing to the deep ravines with which they are intersected. The
elevation of the village of Tangno is given at only 9300 feet, while that of
the plateau surrounding the sacred lake of Maqasa is 17,000 feet. Captain
Gerard finds the snow-line 500 feet lower on the northern slopes, where the
chain of the Himalaya is broken through, than toward the southern
declivities facing Hindostan, and he there estimates the line of perpetual
snow at 15,000 feet. The most striking differences are presented between
the vegetation on the Thibetian plateau and that characteristic of the
southern slopes of the Himalaya. On the latter the cultivation of grain is
arrested at 9974 feet and even there the corn has often to be cut when the
blades are still green. The extreme limit of forests of tall oaks and
deodars is 11,960 feet; that of dwarf birches, 12,983 feet. On the plains,
Captain Gerard found pastures up to the height of 17,000 feet; the cereals
will grow at 14,100 feet, or even at 18,540 feet; birches with tall stems at
14,100 feet, and copse or brush wood applicable for fuel is found at an
elevation of upward of 17,000 feet, that is to say, 1280 feet and above the
lower limits of the snow-line at the equator, in the province of Quito. It
is very desirable that the 'mean' elevation of the Thibetian plateau, which
I have estimated at only about 8200 feet between the Himalaya and the
Kuen-lun, and the difference in the height of the line of perpetual snow on
the southern and on the northern slopes of the Himalaya, should be again
investigated by travelers who are accustomed to judge of the general
conformation of the land. Hitherto simple calculations have too often been
confounded with actual measurements, and the elevations of isolated summits
with that of the surrounding plateau. (Compare Carl Zimmerman's excellent
Hypsometrical Remarks in his 'Geographischen Analyse der Karte von Inner
Asien', 1841, s. 98.) Lord draws attention to the difference presented by
the two faces of the Himalaya and those of the Alpine chain of Hindoo-Coosh,
with respect to the limits of the snow-line. "The latter chain," he says,
"has the table-land to the south, in consequence of which the snow-line is
higher on the southern side, contrary to what we find to be the case with
respect to the Himalaya, which is bounded on the south by sheltered plains,
as Hindoo-Coosh is on the north." It must, however, be admitted that the
hypsometrical data on which these statements are based require a critical
revision with regard to several of their details; but still they suffice to
establish the main fact, that the remarkable configuration of the land in
Central Asia affords man all that is essential to the maintenance of life,
as habitation, food, and fuel, at an elevation above the level of the sea
which in almost all other parts of the globe is covered with perpetual ice.
We must except the very dry districts of Bolivia, where snow is so rarely
met with, and where Pentland (in 1838) fixed the snow-line at 15,667 feet,
between 16 degrees and 17 3/4 degrees south latitude. The opinion that I
had advanced regarding the difference in the snow-line on the two faces of
the Himalaya has been most fully confirmed by the barometrical observations
of Victor Jacquemont, who fell an early sacrifice to his noble and unwearied
ardor. (See his 'Correspondance pendant son Voyage dans l'Inde', 1828 'a'
1832, liv. 23, p. 290, 296, 299.) "Perpetual snow," says Jacquemont,
"descends lower on the southern than on the northern slopes of the Himalaya,
and the limit constantly rises as we advance to the north of the chain
bordering on India. On the Kionbrong, about 18,317 feet in elevation,
according to Captain Gerard, I was still considerably below the limit of
perpetual snow which I believe to be 19,690 feet in this part of Hindostan."
(This estimate I consider much too high.)
[Footnote continues] The same traveler says, "To whatever height we rise on
the southern declivity of the Himalaya, the climate retains the same
character, and the same division of the seasons as in the plains of India;
the summer solstice being every year marked by the same prevalence of rain
which continues to fall without intermission until the autumnal equinox.
But a new, a totally different climate begins at Kashmir, whose elevation I
estimate to be 5350 feet, nearly equal to that of the cities of Mexico and
Popayan" ('Correspond. de Jacquemont', t. ii., p. 58 et 74). The warm and
humid air of the sea, as Leopold von Buch well observes, is carried by the
monsoons across the plains of India to the skirts of the Himalaya which
arrest its course, and hinder it from diverging to the Thibetian districts
of Ladak and Lassa. Carl von Hugel estimates the elevation of the Valley of
Kashmir above the level of the sea at 5818 feet, and bases his observation
on the determination of the boiling point of water (see theil 11, s. 155,
and 'Journal of Geog. Soc.', vol. vi., p. 215). In this valley, where the
atmosphere is scarcely ever agitated by storms, and in 34 degrees 7 minutes
lat., snow is found, several feet in thickness, from December to March.
p 32
But the countries bordering on the equator possess another advantage, to
which sufficient attention has not hitherto been
p 33
directed. This portion of the surface of the globe affords in the smallest
space the greatest possible variety of impressions from the contemplation of
nature. Among the colossal mountains of Cundinamarea, of Quito, and of
Peru, furrowed by deep ravines, man is enabled to contemplate alike all the
families of plants, and all the stars of the firmament. There, at a single
glance, the eye surveys majestic palms, humid forests of bambusa, and the
varied species of Musaceae, while above these forms of tropical vegetation
appear oaks, medlars, the sweet-brier, and umbelliferous plants, as in our
European homes. There as the traveler turns his eyes to the vault of
heaven, a single glance embraces the constellation of the Southern Cross,
the Magellanic clouds, and the guiding stars of the constellation of the
Bear, as they circle round the arctic pole. There the depths of the earth
and the vaults of heaven display all the richness of their forms and the
variety of their phenomena. There the different climates are ranged the one
above the other, stage by stage, like the vegetable zones, whose succession
they limit; and there the observer may readily trace the laws that regulate
the diminution of heat, as they stand indelibly inscribed on the rocky walls
and abrupt declivities of the Cordilleras.
Not to weary the reader with the details of the phenomena which I long since
endeavored graphically to represent,* I will here limit myself to the
consideration of a few of the general results whose combination constitutes
the 'physical delineation of the torrid zone.' That which, in the vagueness
of our
p 34
impressions, loses all distinctness of form, like some distant mountain
shrouded from view by a vail of mist, is clearly revealed by the light of
mind, which, by its scrutiny into the causes of phenomena, learns to resolve
and analyze their different elements, assigning to each its individual
character. Thus, in the sphere of natural investigation, as in poetry and
painting, the delineation of that which appeals most strongly to the
imagination, derives its collective interest from the vivid truthfulness
with which the individual features are portrayed.
[footnote] *See, generally my 'Essai sur la Geographie des Plantes, et le
Tableau physique des Regions Equinoxiales', 1807, p. 80-88. On the diurnal
and nocturnal variations of temperature, see Plate 9 of my 'Atlas Geogr. et
Phys. du Nouveau Continent'; and the Tables in my work, entitled 'De
distributione Geographica Plantarum, secundum coeli tempriem, et altitudinem
Montium', 1817, p. 90-116; the meteorological portion of my 'Asie Centrale',
t. iii., p. 212, 224; and, finally, the more recent and far more exact
exposition of the variations of temperature experienced in correspondence
with the increase of altitude on the chain of the Andes, given in
Boussingault's Memoir, 'Sur la profondeur a laquelle on trouve, sous les
Tropiques, la couche de Temperature Invariable.' (Ann. de Chimie et de
Physique, 1833, t. liii., p. 225-247.) This treatise contains the
elevations of 128 points, included between the level of the sea and the
declivity of the Antisana (17,900 feet), as well as the mean temperature of
the atmosphere, which varies with the height between 81 degrees and 35
degrees F.
The regions of the torrid zone not only give rise to the most powerful
impressions by their organic richness and their abundant fertility, but they
likewise afford the inestimable advantage of revealing to man, by the
uniformity of the variations of the atmosphere and the development of vital
forces, and by the contrasts of climate and vegetation exhibited at the
different elevations, the invariability of the laws that regulate the course
of the heavenly bodies, reflected, as it were, in terrestrial phenomena.
Let us dwell, then, for a few moments, on the proofs of this regularity,
which is such that it may be submitted to numerical calculation and
computation.
In the burning plains that rise but little above the level of the sea, reign
the families of the banana, the cycas, and the palm, of which the number of
species comprised in the flora of tropical regions has been so wonderfully
increased in the present day by the zeal of botanical travelers. To these
groups succeed, in the Alpine valleys, and the humid and shaded clefts on
the slopes of the Cordilleras, the tree-ferns, whose thick cylindrical
trunks and delicate lace-like foliage stand out in bold relief against the
azure of the sky, and the cinchona, from which we derive the febrifuge bark.
The medicinal strength of this bark is said to increase in proportion to
the degree of moisture imparted to the foliage of the tree by the light
mists which form the upper surface of the clouds resting over the plains.
Every where around, the confines of the forest are encircled by broad bands
of social plants, as the delicate aralia, the thibaudia, and the
myrtle-leaved Andromeda, while the Alpine rose, the magnificent befaria,
weaves a purple girdle round the spiry peaks. In the cold regions of the
Paramos, which is continually exposed to the fury of storms and winds, we
find that flowering shrubs and herbaceous plants, bearing large and
variegated blossoms, have given place to monocotyledons, whose slender
spikes constitute the sole covering of the soil. This is the zone of the
p 35
grasses, one vast savannah extending over the immense mountain plateaux, and
reflecting a yellow, almost golden tinge, to the slopes of the Cordilleras,
on which graze the lama and the cattle domesticated by the European
colonist. Where the naked trachyte rock pierces the grassy turf, and
penetrates into those higher strata of air which are supposed to be less
charged with carbonic acid, we meet only with plants of an inferior
organization, as lichens, lecideas, and the brightly-colored, dust-like
lepraria, scattered around in circular patches. Islets of fresh-fallen
snow, varying in form and extent, arrest the last feeble traces of vegetable
development, and to these succeeds the region of perpetual snow, whose
elevation undergoes but little change, and may be easily determined. It is
but rarely that the elastic forces at work within the interior of our globe
have succeeded in breaking through the spiral domes, which, resplendent in
the brightness of eternal snow, crown the summits of the Cordilleras; and
even where these subterranean forces have opened a permanent communication
with the atmosphere, through circular craters or long fissures, they rarely
send forth currents of lava, but merely eject ignited scoriae, steam,
sulphureted hydrogen gas, and jets of carbonic acid.
In the earliest stages of civilization, the grand and imposing spectacle
presented to the minds of the inhabitants of the tropics could only awaken
feelings of astonishment and awe. It might, perhaps, be supposed, as we
have already said, that the periodical return of the same phenomena, and the
uniform manner in which they arrange themselves in successive groups, would
have enabled man more readily to attain to a knowledge of the laws of
nature; but, as far as tradition and history guide us, we do not find that
any application was made of the advantages presented by these favored
regions. Recent researches have rendered it very doubtful whether the
primitive seat of Hindoo civilization -- one of the most remarkable phases
in the progress of mankind -- was actually within the tropics. Airyana
Vaedjo, the ancient cradle of the Zend, was situated to the northwest of the
upper Indus, and after the great religious schism, that is to say, after the
separation of the Iranians from the Brahminical institution, the language
that had previously been common to them and to the Hindoos assumed among the
latter people (together with the literature, habits, and conditions of
society) an individual form in the Magodha of Madhya Desa,* a district that
is bounded by the great chain
p 36
of Himalaya and the smaller range of the Vindhya.
[footnote] *See, on the Madhjadeca, properly so called, Lassen's excellent
work, entitled 'Indische Alterthumskunde', bd. i., s. 92. The Chinese give
the name of Mo-kie-thi to the southern Bahar, situated to the south of the
Ganges (see 'Foe-Koue-Ki' by, 'Chy-Fa-Hian', 1836, p. 256). Djambu-dwipa is
the name given to the whole of India; but the words also indicate one of the
four Buddhist continents.
In less ancient times the Sanscrit language and civilization advanced toward
the southeast, penetrating further within the torrid zone, as my brother
Wilhelm von Humboldt has shown in his great work on the Kavi and other
languages of analogous structure.*
[Footnote] *'Ueber die Kawi Sprache auf der Insel Java, nebst einer
Einleitung uber die Verschiedenheit des menschlichen Sprachbaues und ihren
Ein fluss auf die geistige Entwickelung des Menschengrshlecht's' von Wilhelm
v. Humboldt, 1836, bd. i., s. 50519.
Notwithstanding the obstacles opposed in northern latitudes to the discovery
of the laws of nature, owing to the excessive complication of phenomena, and
the perpetual local variations and the distribution of organic forms, it is
to the inhabitants of a small section of the temperate zone that the rest of
mankind owe the earliest revelation of an intimate and rational acquaintance
with the forces governing the physical world. Moreover, it is from the same
zone (which is apparently more favorable to the progress of reason, the
softening of manners, and the security of public liberty) that the germs of
civilization have been carried to the regions of the tropics, as much by the
migratory movement of races as by the establishment of colonies, differing
widely in their institution from those of the Phoenicians or Greeks.
In speaking of the influence exercised by the succession of phenomena on the
greater or lesser facility of recognizing the causes producing them, I have
touched upon that important stage of our communion with the external world,
when the enjoyment arising from a knowledge of the laws, and the mutual
connection of phenomena, associates itself with the charm of a simple
contemplation of nature. That which for a long time remains merely an
object of vague intuition, by degrees acquires the certainty of positive
truth; and man, as an immortal poet has said, in our own tongue -- Amid
ceaseless change seeks the unchanging pole.*
[Footnote] *This verse occurs in a poem of Schiller, entitled 'Der
Spaziergang' which first appeared in 1795, in the 'Horen.'