INDIA
From Tibet to Simla
Right up in Tibet lie the sources of the Sutlej, the largest affluent of the Indus. With irresistible force it breaks through the Himalayas in order to get down to the sea, and its valley affords us an excellent road from the highlands of Tibet to the burning lowlands of India. On this journey we pass through a succession of belts of elevation, and find that various animals and plants are peculiar to different heights. The tiger does not go very high up on the southern flanks of the Himalayas, but the snow leopard is not afraid of cold. The tame yak would die if he were brought down to denser strata of air, and Marco Polo's sheep would waste away on the forest-clothed heights; but wolves, foxes and hares occur as frequently in India as in Tibet.
The boundaries of the flora are more sharply defined. Below the limit of eternal snow (13,000 feet) ranunculus and anemones, pedicularis and primulas are found just as they are in our higher latitudes with corresponding conditions of temperature. At 12,000 feet lies the limit of forest, beyond which the birch does not go, but where pine-trees still thrive. Between 10,000 and 6000 feet are woods of the beautiful and charming conifer called the Himalayan cedar, which is allied to the cedar of Lebanon. At 7000 feet the limit of subtropical woods is crossed, and the oak and the climbing rose are seen. Just below 3500 feet the tropical forest is entered, with acacias, palms, bamboos, and all the floral wealth of the Indian jungle.
The Sutlej grows bigger and bigger the further we descend, and we ride on shaking bridges across innumerable tributaries. The atmosphere becomes denser, and breathing easier. We no longer have a singing in the ears, or palpitations or headache as on the great heights, and the cold has been left behind. Even in the early morning the air is warm, and soon come days when we look back with regret to the cool freshness up in Tibet. One of my dogs, a great shaggy Tibetan, suffered severely from the increasing heat, and one fine day he turned right about and went back to Tibet.
PLATE XII. SIMLA.
The first town that we come to is called Simla (Plate XII.). It is not large, having barely 15,000 inhabitants, but it is one of the most beautiful towns in the world, and one of the most powerful, for in its cedar groves stands a palace, and in the palace an Imperial throne. The Emperor is the King of England, whose power over India is entrusted to a Viceroy. In summer enervating heat prevails over the lowlands of India, and all Europeans who are not absolutely tied to their posts move up to the hills. The Viceroy and his staff, the government officials, the chief officers of the army, civil servants and military men all fly with their wives up to Simla, where the leaders of society live as gaily as in London. During this season the number of inhabitants rises to 30,000.
The houses of Simla are built like swallows' nests on steep slopes. The streets, or rather roads, lie terraced one above another. The whole town is built on hills surrounded by dizzy precipices. Round about stand forests dark and dense; but between the cedars are seen far off to the southwest the plains of the Punjab and the winding course of the Sutlej, and to the north the masses of the Himalayas with their eternal snowfields. It is delightful to go up to Simla from the sultriness of India, and perhaps still more delightful to come down to Simla from the piercing cold of Tibet.