[159] The eastern afterwards proved to be the Lachen.
On one occasion I ascended the steep hill at the fork; it was dry and rocky, and crowned with stunted pines. Stacks of different sorts of pine-wood were stored on the flat at its base, for export to Tibet, all thatched with the bark of Abies Brunoniana. Of these the larch (Larix Griffithii, “Sah”), splits well, and is the most durable of any; but the planks are small, soft, and white.[[160]] The silver fir (Abies Webbiana, “Dunshing”) also splits well; it is white, soft, and highly prized for durability. The wood of Abies Brunoniana (“Semadoong”) is like the others in appearance, but is not durable; its bark is however very useful. The spruce (Abies Smithiana, “Seh”) has also white wood, which is employed for posts and beams.[[161]] These are the only pines whose woods are considered very useful; and it is a curious circumstance that none produce any quantity of resin, turpentine, or pitch; which may perhaps be accounted for by the humidity of the climate.
[160] I never saw this wood to be red, close-grained, and hard, like that of the old Swiss larch; nor does it ever reach so great a size.
[161] These woods are all soft and loose in grain, compared with their European allies.
Pinus longifolia (called by the Lepchas “Gniet-koong,” and by the Bhoteeas “Teadong”) only grows in low valleys, where better timber is abundant. The weeping blue juniper (Juniperus recurva, “Deschoo”), and the arboreous black one (called “Tchokpo”)[[162]] yield beautiful wood, like that of the pencil cedar,[[163]] but are comparatively scarce, as is the yew (Taxus baccata, “Tingschi”), whose timber is red. The “Tchenden,” or funereal cypress, again, is valued only for the odour of its wood: Pinus excelsa, “Tongschi,” though common in Bhotan, is, as I have elsewhere remarked, not found in east Nepal or Sikkim; the wood is admirable, being durable, close-grained, and so resinous as to be used for flambeaux and candles. On the flat were flowering a beautiful magnolia with globular sweet-scented flowers like snow-balls, several balsams, with species of Convallaria, Cotoneaster, Gentian, Spiræa, Euphorbia, Pedicularis, and honeysuckle. On the hill-side were creeping brambles, lovely yellow, purple, pink, and white primroses, white-flowered Thalictrum and Anemone, berberry, Podophyllum, white rose, fritillary, Lloydia, etc. On the flanks of Tukcham, in the bed of a torrent, I gathered many very alpine plants, at the comparatively low elevation of 10,000 feet, as dwarf willows, Pinguicula, (a genus not previously found in the Himalaya), Oxyria, Adrosace, Tofieldia, Arenaria, saxifrages, and two dwarf heath-like Andromedas.[[164]] The rocks were all of gneiss, with granite veins, tourmaline, and occasionally pieces of pure plumbago.
[162] This I have, vol. i. [p. 256,] referred to the J. excelsa of the north-west Himalaya, a plant which under various names is found in many parts of Europe and many parts of Europe and North America; but since then Dr. Thomson and I have had occasion to compare my Sikkim conifers with the north-west Himalayan ones and we have found that this Sikkim species is probably new, and that J. excelsa is not found east of Nepal.
[163] Also a juniper, from Bermuda (J. Bermudiana).
[164] Besides these, a month later, the following flowered in profusion: scarlet Buddleia? gigantic lily, yellow jasmine, Aster, Potentilla, several kinds of orchids, willow-herb (Epilobium), purple Roscœa, Neillia, Morina, many grasses and Umbelliferæ. These formed a rank and dense herbaceous, mostly annual vegetation, six feet high, bound together with Cuscuta, climbing Leguminosæ, and Ceropegia. The great summer heat and moisture here favour the ascent of various tropical genera, of which I found in August several Orchideæ (Calanthe, Microstylis, and Cœlogyne), also Begonia, Bryonia, Cynanchum, Aristolochia, Eurya, Procris, Acanthaceæ, and Cyrtandraseæ.
Our guide had remained at Lamteng, on the plea of a sore on his leg from leech-bites: his real object, however, was to stop a party on their way to Tibet with madder and canes, who, had they continued their journey, would inevitably have pointed out the road to me. The villagers themselves now wanted to proceed to the pasturing-grounds on the frontier; so the Phipun sent me word that I might proceed as far as I liked up the east bank of the Zemu. I had explored the path, and finding it practicable, and likely to intersect a less frequented route to the frontier (that crossing the Tekonglah pass from Bah, see [p. 13]), I determined to follow it. A supply of food arrived from Dorjiling on the 5th of June, reduced, however, to one bag of rice, but with encouraging letters, and the assurance that more would follow at once. My men, of whom I bad eight, behaved admirably, although our diet had for five days chiefly consisted of Polygonum (“Pullop-bi”), wild leeks (“Lagook”), nettles and Procris (an allied, and more succulent herb), eked out by eight pounds of Tibet meal (“Tsamba”), which I had bought for ten shillings by stealth from the villagers. What concerned me most was the destruction of my plants by constant damp, and the want of sun to dry the papers; which reduced my collections to a tithe of what they would otherwise have been.
From Zemu Samdong the valley runs north-west, for two marches, to the junction of the Zemu with the Thlonok, which rises on the north-east flank of Kinchinjunga: at this place I halted for several days, while building a bridge over the Thlonok. The path runs first through a small forest of birch, alder, and maple, on the latter of which I found Balanophora[[165]] growing abundantly: this species produces the great knots on the maple roots, from which the Tibetans form the cups mentioned by MM. Huc and Gabet. I was so fortunate as to find a small store of these knots, cleaned, and cut ready for the turner, and hidden behind a stone by some poor Tibetan, who had never retained to the spot: they had evidently been there a very long time.