Soon after my arrival I received letters from Dr. Campbell, who had strongly and repeatedly represented to the Rajah his opinion of the treatment I was receiving; and this finally brought an explicit answer, to the effect that his orders had been full and peremptory that I should be supplied with provisions, and safely conducted to the frontier. With these came letters on the Rajah's part from Tchebu Lama to the Lachen Phipun, ordering him to take me to the pass, but not specifying its position; fortunately, however, Dr. Campbell sent me a route, which stated the pass to be at Kongra Lama, several marches beyond this, and in the barren country of Tibet.
On the 5th of July the Singtam Soubah arrived from Chola (the Rajah's summer residence): he was charged to take me to the frontier, and brought letters from his highness, as well as a handsome present, consisting of Tibet cloth, and a dress of China silk brocaded with gold: the Ranee also sent me a basket of Lhassa sweetmeats, consisting of Sultana raisins from Bokhara, sliced and dried apricots from Lhassa, and Diospyros fruit from China (called "Gubroon" by the Tibetans). The Soubah wanted to hurry me on to the frontier and back at once, being no doubt instigated to do so by the Dewan's party, and by his having no desire to spend much time in the dreary lofty regions I wanted to explore. I positively refused, however, to start until more supplies arrived, except he used his influence to provide me with food; and as he insisted that the frontier was at Tallum Samdong, only one march up the Lachen, I foresaw that this move was to be but one step forward, though in the right direction. He went forward to Tallum at once, leaving me to follow.
The Lamteng people had all migrated beyond that point to Tungu, where they were pasturing their cattle: I sent thither for food, and procured a little meal at a very high price, a few fowls and eggs; the messenger brought back word that Tungu was in Tibet, and that the villagers ignored Kongra Lama. A large piece of yak-flesh being brought for sale, I purchased it; but it proved the toughest meat I ever ate, being no doubt that of an animal that had succumbed to the arduous duties of a salt-carrier over the passes: at this season, however, when the calves are not a month old, it was in vain to expect better.
Large parties of women and children were daily passing my tent from Tungu, to collect arum-roots at the Thlonok, all with baskets at their backs, down to rosy urchins of six years old: they returned after several days, their baskets neatly lined with broad rhododendron leaves, and full of a nauseous-looking yellow acid pulp, which told forcibly of the extreme poverty of the people. The children were very fair; indeed the young Tibetan is as fair as an English brunette, before his perennial coat of smoke and dirt has permanently stained his face, and it has become bronzed and wrinkled by the scorching sun and rigorous climate of these inhospitable countries. Children and women were alike decked with roses, and all were good-humoured and pleasant, behaving with great kindness to one another, and unaffected politeness to me.
During my ten days' stay at Zemu Samdong, I formed a large collection of insects, which was in great part destroyed by damp: many were new, beautiful, and particularly interesting, from belonging to types whose geographical distribution is analogous to that of the vegetation. The caterpillar of the swallow-tail butterfly (Papilio Machaon), was common, feeding on umbelliferous plants, as in England; and a Sphynx (like S. Euphorbiae) was devouring the euphorbias; the English Cynthia Cardui (painted-lady butterfly) was common, as were "sulphurs," "marbles," Pontia (whites), "blues," and Thecla, of British aspect but foreign species. Amongst these, tropical forms were rare, except one fine black swallow-tail. Of moths, Noctuae and Geometrae abounded, with many flies and Tipulae. Hymenoptera were scarce, except a yellow Ophion, which lays its eggs in the caterpillars above-mentioned. Beetles were most rare, and (what is remarkable) the wood-borers (longicorns and Curculio) particularly so. A large Telephora was very common, and had the usual propensity of its congeners for blood; lamellicorns were also abundant.
On the 11th of July five coolies arrived with rice: they had been twenty days on the road, and had been obliged to make great detours, the valley being in many places impassable. They brought me a parcel of English letters; and I started up the Lachen on the following day, with renewed spirits and high hopes. The road first crossed the Zemu and the spur beyond, and then ascended the west bank of the Lachen, a furious torrent for five or six miles, during which it descends 1000 feet, in a chasm from which rise lofty black pine-clad crags, topped by snowy mountains, 14,000 to 16,000 feet high. One remarkable mass of rock, on the east bank, is called "Sakya-zong" (or the abode of Sakya, often pronounced Thakya, one of the Boodhist Trinity); at its base a fine cascade falls into the river.
Above 11,000 feet the valley expands remarkably, the mountains recede, become less wooded, and more grassy, while the stream is suddenly less rapid, meandering in a broader bed, and bordered by marshes, covered with Carex, Blysmus, dwarf Tamarisk, and many kinds of yellow and red Pedicularis, both tall and beautiful. There are far fewer rhododendrons here than in the damper Zemu valley at equal elevations, and more Siberian, or dry country types of vegetation, as Astragali of several kinds, Habenaria, Epipactis, dandelion, and a caraway, whose stems (called in Tibet "Gzira") are much sought for as a condiment.* [_Umbelliferae abound here; with sage, Ranunculus, Anemone, Aconites, Halenia, Gentians, Panax, Euphrasia, speedwell, Prunella vulgaris, thistles, bistort, Parnassia, purple orchis, Prenanthes, and Lactuca. The woody plants of this region are willows, birch, Cotoneaster, maple, three species of Viburnum, three of Spiraea, Vaccinium, Aralia, Deutzia, Philadelphus, rhododendrons, two junipers, silver fir, larch, three honeysuckles, Neillia, and a Pieris, whose white blossoms are so full of honey as to be sweet and palatable.] The Singtam Soubah and Lachen Phipun received me at the bridge (Samdong), at Tallum, and led me across the river (into Cheen they affirmed) to a pretty green sward, near some gigantic gneiss boulders, where I camped, close by the river, and 11,480 feet above the sea.
The village of Tallum consists of a few wretched stone huts, placed in a broad part of the valley, which is swampy, and crossed by several ancient moraines, which descend from the gulleys on the east flank.* [I have elsewhere noticed that in Sikkim, the ancient moraines above 9000 feet are almost invariably deposited from valleys opening to the westward.] The cottages are from four to six feet high, without windows, and consist of a single apartment, containing neither table, chair, stool, nor bed; the inmates huddle together amid smoke, filth, and darkness, and sleep on a plank; and their only utensils are a bamboo churn, copper, bamboo, and earthenware vessels, for milk, butter, etc.
Grassy or stony mountains slope upwards, at an angle of 20 degrees,* [At Lamteng and up the Zemu the slopes are 40 degrees and 50 degrees, giving a widely different aspect to the valleys.] from these flats to 15,000 feet, but no snow is visible, except on Kinchinjhow and Chomiomo, about fifteen miles up the valley. Both these are flat-topped, and dazzlingly white, rising into small peaks, and precipitous on all sides; they are grand, bold, isolated masses, quite unlike the ordinary snowy mountains in form, and far more imposing even than Kinchinjunga, though not above 22,000 feet in elevation.
Herbaceous plants are much more numerous here than in any other part of Sikkim; and sitting at my tent-door, I could, without rising from the ground, gather forty-three plants,* [In England thirty is, on the average, the equivalent number of plants, which in favourable localities I have gathered in an equal space. In both cases many are seedlings of short-lived annuals, and in neither is the number a test of the luxuriance of the vegetation; it but shows the power which the different species exert in their struggle to obtain a place.] of which all but two belonged to English genera. In the rich soil about the cottages were crops of dock, shepherd's-purse, Thlaspi arvense, Cynoglossum of two kinds (one used as a pot-herb), balsams, nettle, Galeopsis, mustard, radish, and turnip. On the neighbouring hills, which I explored up to 15,000 feet, I found many fine plants, partaking more or less of the Siberian type, of which Corydalis, Leguminosae, Artemisia, and Pedicularis, are familiar instances. I gathered upwards of 200 species, nearly all belonging to north European genera. Twenty-five were woody shrubs above three feet high, and six were ferns; [Cryptogramma crispa, Davallia, two Aspidia, and two Polypodia. I gathered ten at the same elevation, in the damper Zemu valley (see chapter xix, note). I gathered in this valley a new species of the remarkable European genus Struthiopteris, which has not been found elsewhere in the Himalaya.] sedges were in great profusion, amongst them three of British kinds: seven or eight were Orchideae, including a fine Cypripedium.