Item 24 - Letter from Joseph Dalton Hooker to Brian Houghton Hodgson

1 letter

Lachen 2 marches above
the village (same place as
before) June 11/[18]49

My dear H
Some coolies have just come in with your letters of 22, 27 and 8 which have greatly pleased and instructed me. The former should have been received long ago and I write one to you dissenting on the topics therein discussed (Rajah etc) should have been thereby modified had to come to hand in proper time. Here I am still with prospects bettered in one respect [worsed] in others. The villagers have all but 3 souls, gone up to the Pass to humbug me, and I am right glad come what may, of my efforts by this route that I did not take the other in the first place. The bridge was completed 2-day with great labour and I crossed to excellent camping ground at the huts opposite from which I found an excellent road back to Lachen on the other side of the Lachen river! bridged over the torrent from the [North?] which we hope may lead to the Pass but whether it does or no is yet uncertain we did not find the road on the other hand the Soubah brings word that this, the great branch is not the Lachen but the other to the East is, so I am all out to this being Campbell's route "round by the Lachen" to the Latang Pass. It rained all yesterday I lay by right glad of the rest for my heel is very sore and a hard bit with a [Bhan?] from [Paleshok?], when cutting through the jungle has notched the knuckle bone of my right hand little finger which prevents me holding on so well as I should. I am right well, very hungry and full of hopes of the future but every hour convinces me, that without Meepo I could do nothing and that my giving up Chin to him, when I did, was most wisely done. Both he Nimbo and all believe that the villagers will have the Chinese down to the border, and Meepo's activity is getting me along by this other route, convinces me that he is not conniving with them, had I not plenty of other proof of that. There are perfect stocks there Bhoteas and [?] neither for King or Kaiser as you say. M wanted to send a complaint to the Rajah which I of course interdicted [?] all [?] agree that the plateau is due N of me, but whether I can get there to any where West of Latang, remains to be seen, you and Campbell may depend upon my every exertion being used and that I have Meepo's [?] help/ To him I have enjoined disregard to the Bhoteas should we be forced to retire on the beaten track I have good reason to know he hates them and that they have treated him ill; and that he is a tenuous Lepcha after all. He is profoundly ignorant of this country of course and I shall have difficulty in persuading him that the Latang Maidan is not that of Chin:- he is so heavily threatened too by the Rajah that I cannot wonder he is anxious. His orders are most peremptory to take me to the Mt. Pass of Lachong and to the bridge which is on the Latang plain, and which, crossing small muddy, there separates Chin from Sikkim. That a bridge is the Pass, all affirms and hence their attempt to pass the bridge over the Lachen (this branch I mean) upon me as the boundary - it once was so - I have now lots of food, very very many thanks for your generous contributions, the gingerbread was a capital hit on its own account and as diverting my attention from the "little Campbell's cake, which I was eating like a Schoolboy yesterday from morning till night you would laugh to see me - who hardly touch sweets at your table, eating them so greedily in the jungle when they are so perfectly delicious. I [vow] that I am out of salt meat and cannot get fowls and eggs, the preserved meats are invaluable and a little goes a long way. Indeed I cannot be grateful enough to you and Campbell to for your liberality. I ought not to so trespass on your kindness, for there are stores at Dorjeeling and I have money issues and this I tried to impress upon Bhaggun, with very limited success - [none] perhaps if he were to tell the truth. My collection still goes on increasing very fast - I found 12 new [kind?] today - all this are of course alpines, and quite to be expected from this elevation, but are new to me and will increase my Sikkim Flora enormously. I am much puzzled what to say about your Shikari and fearful of your supposing that I send them back to Choongtam because they are troublesome - The fact fact is that I do not think [?] a good man at all, and when we get to a wet and cold place I assure you I do not see his face day by day except to complain of want of food or shelter. My reasons for sending them back [are] expressly that I stated, that there was no food for them they did not bring the [?] I gave them and gave their coolies [few?] from Choongtam and there was absolutely nothing to shoot for food or stuffing. But my doubts now are about Lachong when I go there. The red jacket [Danjah?] is very active, never complains, and always busy: always comes with his salaam to shew me his days sport and was much afraid you should think his getting nothing at Lachan idleness - he considered Choongtam an excellent place, as it ought to be, ranging in one hour from the Tropics to the Pine forests [?] of course thought it a happy change to be sent back, because it is war, there - I know you will say "use your own judgement", and my only fear is, lest they should [?] a chance of picking up any thing near the Passes I have lots of food, lots of coolies and housing - they have always had a coolie more than they said that they wanted, and except for food have never been stinted. For my own part I am extremely anxious that some zoological result should turn up from my expedition, for I cannot find time to go out shooting myself., Nimbo carries my gun and has since leaving Lachen but except a Pheasant when he was out with me I have seen no one thing. Kindly let me know whether what they sent from Choongtam is good, they say yes, but so they did of rubbish in Nepal - if not they had better try the snow again and accompany me to Lachong. I am seriously concerned about the extent of repairs your house requires, it will be a ruinous cost, for whatever be the probability of a sale that money is irretrievably sunk an lost, when called for after so few years occupation by yourself - it should not have been so, depend upon it - when counsel had you as to the soundness of the tenement? [?] I assure you with regard to my promise [?] Cheen, I put the Durbar avowedly wholly out of the question. I could not but, consider the [?] of the Rajah's order on the case, which I should have thought would have carried more weight than Campbell, for that alone I never would have given an inch. The question became one of 4 [?] and simply, shall I, with the object of going into Thibet, even reach the passes. Refusing to answer was avowing my intention and that with such an intention Meepo must be my enemy was sure. Without a guide I never could have got on even here, and here I am for 5 days past on the wrong scent, not only as to the branch of the river I should have taken, but as to the road up this even is shut. I have as ill [?] would have it taken the worst of four paths. I doubt not the villagers are laughing in their sleeves - mean time I am keeping them cooling their heels up at the pass, to the number of 120 people! It was the difficulties of the country to which I succumbed and these you see I did not overate. I am deeply obliged by the kind tone with which you sympathise with my disappointment I am perfectly positive that had the people not my assurance that Thibet was not my object, the Lachen road would have been cut off in 20 places. I may be wrong for there is no end to Bhotea deceit, but I do not think Meepo had deceived me - he has never in word or in deed put the smallest obstacle in my way, except in rescinding the Durbar orders not one of which I gave any formal answer to, the last ordering me back, required me either to obey or not to obey and I of course point blank refused to obey it. Except [?] sent it to Campbell and he ordered me so to do. I said over and over again, I receive no orders except from Campbell. Meepo is a devoted Serot of the Rajah and I am inclined to think knows and cares little about the Dewan. C. I think attaches too much importance to the Dewan, who I never hear even spoken of with the most ordinary respect in Sikkim while the Raja is always spoken of with hearty good will. I cannot conceive anyone like Meepo not betraying it had he been schooled by the Dewan - Again, what the Quaber said of these roads is perfectly true. I have seen nothing like them anywhere. As to the Lachen Bhotias they are half mad, you never saw such senseless stocks they are not properly as Nivean Bhotias, but the genuine Plateau breed, and firmly believe I am a conjuror and can do them incalculable mischief. They sent for the Lama on account of my shooting I am told, to avert the evil you never saw such an alarm as the gun created. I doubt if you could bribe some of them to touch it. They squat down at a great distance from my Tent to look in and if you say Boh boo, run like mad people. I have read Strachey's Snow line report which Campbell sent me it is not perfectly clear - certainly our Snow line is much lower than his - and I shall make very accurate observations here where I am now, being N. of the greater ranges of this meridian - This valley runs E and W and the snow is certainly over 100 or 1000ft lower on the S flank than on the North. I have seen no glaciers but abundance of snow 30ft deep at 10,000ft and below that, at 11,000 beds 60ft I think but the genuine freely exposed P.S. I take to be at 13,500ft on the S. flank of the valley and 14,500 on the North if any thing I am making it too high on both flanks but remember last Winters fall was very severe and this is not the height of the melting season.

Ever with again. Every grateful acknowledgement for your kindness
Yrs affectionate[ly]
Jos. D. Hooker