The Nepaulese emigrate in large numbers to British Sikkim, where they find ready employment in the tea-gardens. British Sikkim has been called a "Cave of Adullam" for Nepaul, whose draconian laws cause offenders to flee across the border for safety.
The Bhootea race is chiefly interesting from its woman-kind. Tall and handsome are the Bhootea women, with a circlet of gold or silver framing their broad, beaming faces. They wear magnificent silver girdles, and curiously wrought necklaces, with earrings so massive that the thin strip of flesh, drawn out in the lobe of the ear, barely supports their weight. They have curious amulets set with turquoise-stones which, though much cracked and flawed, suit the quaint setting and design. The Bhooteas are followers of the red-capped sect of Lamas, a kind of Buddhism, but they offer propitiatory sacrifices to evil spirits, as may be seen by the array of bamboo staffs about their huts, from which float cotton streamers and rags with type prayers, set up to frighten the spirits away.
These Bhootea women have an enormous capacity for carrying weights, being usually employed as porters at the station. They support the whole weight on their heads, suspending it by a string passed round the forehead. It is told how a Bhootea woman once carried a grand piano from Pukabari to Darjeeling in three days, and arrived quite fresh!
During the winter many Thibetans may be seen, coming through that mysterious and forbidden pass into Sikkim for trading purposes. In their encampments it is common to see one woman in the same tent with five or six men, as polyandry prevails among the Thibetans. Most of those rough little ponies, with their creels balanced on either side with merchandise, that we met toiling up in files, come from Thibet.
Ghoom, the highest railway station in the Old World, if not in the universe, was reached in fog. It is 7400 feet above the level of the sea. From here we ran downhill for four miles, till a turn round the angle of a jutting rock brought Darjeeling in view. A gleam of sunshine, weak and watery owing to the vapoury clouds it pierced through, showed us the hill-side, dotted with innumerable pretty bungalows.
Darjeeling lies partly in a basin formed by the mountains, and here is the bazaar and native quarter. On a mount which you would almost think Nature had purposely thrown up midway in the valley for it, stands the Eden Sanatorium. Such a pretty, ornate building it is, where people suffering from the fever of the plains come up to be nursed by the clever Sisters of Mercy from Clewer. There is accommodation for first, second, and third class patients, so all degrees can avail themselves of the Sanatorium.
Immediately under the high mount of the Observatory Hill, on the highest ground of all, lies the pretty stone church and the white villa mansion called the Shrubberies, the official residence of the Lieutenant-Governor.
Darjeeling was originally established as a sanatorium for the invalid soldiers of all the British troops in India. A cantonment was founded at Jellaphor, 700 feet higher than Darjeeling, making in all a height of 7969 feet above the level of the sea. There was a time when for soldiers to come to India, meant it was very questionable whether they would ever return. Darjeeling has been the means of restoration to thousands of England's sons, fever stricken on the plains of Bengal.
Arrived at the barnlike station, the porters—two Bhootea women, carried our luggage up to Woodland's Hotel. The dreariness of this abode could hardly be overdrawn. Dark and chill were the rooms, scant and bad the fare, and great depression ensued under such sad circumstances.