Tungu July 29 1849

Please send me some Rupees

My dear B
I must now proceed with my story of the Pass which I do with feelings of great self-gratification, in which I doubt not you and Campbell join. During the whole way we did not pass a patch of snow, nor did I see any except up a glacier bound or rather ice-bound gully facing [S.E.] There was not a particle for 1000 - I should say 1500ft up the flanks of Chomiomo in Kinchin - jow and the top of the pass had a good many flowers - but no bush even of dwarf Rhododendron. The weather was wretchedly cold, with strong S. wind and we were sodden by the previous rain as usual I have sickness of stomach and a wretched headache. I cannot tell you how depressing these symptoms are, the head feels bound in a vice, the temples throb at every step and when I stoop the feeling is as if a knife went through the brain. These headaches last all night and till next morning. I can't eat when I get back to camp and I call Heaven to witness that I'll never go up to 15,000 again. Geree lies N.W., if I made out aright from the top of the pass and its water's flow into the Thlonok by the lateral valley west of the Zemy on which I dwelt at some length in June the way is difficult and hardly frequented but crosses no height so great as Kongra Lama, than which Geree is considerably lower - Kambajong the military part (not Geree as I erroneously told you) is half a day N.W. of Geree and its waters flow into the Arun! this I had from 4 independent authorities. The first water shed into the Yarron is consierably N. of Kambajong! This if true is most marvellous, for Kambajong must be well East of Kinchin. All the country south of Kambajong and thence south of the road to Dobtah i.e. at the back of Kinchin, is a tractless mass of mountains, high but not much snowed Kinchin is visible from Dobtah alone, but from no where East of that. Now as far as I can guess the relative positions of these place is thus - see other sheet

[DRAWING OF A MAP]

Now the Patchien flows we all know N.W. into the Yarron and if these other watersheds are right, I can only reconcile them with the idea of a triangular lofty plateau, from Powhunry beyond Kinchin, pointing towards the Yarron dipping N.E. to the Patchien and N.W. to the Arun water sheds. After all river sheds and water courses are much anomalous and inexplicable in all table-land and plain countries e.g. the African rivers and the Australian where [?] elevations throw waters out if all reclining and where rivers cut slap through the principal mountain chains. One thing I think is certain, that the Teesta sources and the Arun are both between Kinchin and Powhunry and are an [?] way behind the main range, or any range. I fancy Turner's water shed if the Patchien is like this of the Lachen. All the people tell me that Pari flat is a flat in a very broad valley - such a plateau as there but twice as big and I can quite suppose the true Pass N. of Chumulari is like the Kongra Lama and with the features of K.L. Turner's description precisely tallies - my conclusions we know tend to the grandiose and the existence of such remarkable breaks in the chain between Chumulari and Kinchin and the throwing back of the water shed being opposite the Bay of Bengal must have some bearing if we agree with Humboldt, Lyell, Sedgwick and Dean Cockburn that all thr world has been under water. I ascended Chomiomo to I guess 17,000ft the other day, on a due S. exposure, but did not meet with a particle of snow there except what fell the previous night for we had a good fall at 14,000ft upwards and 4 inches fell on Kongra Lama. I cam on Chomiomo to the flat top of a ridge of flat stones, which suddenly dipped N and the snow fell and fogs were so thick I dare not go further. Yesterday I made a grand effort for the Perpetual Snow of Kichin-Jow. I went up the Tungu Choo which flows via Kinchin-Jow S. West to the Lachen at Tungu. The road is good - at 10,000ft the stream runs tranquil and pools for miles as does the Lachen at 15,000ft was beautiful rolling plains and hills, no where above 16,000 ft to which the ridge between the Tungu Choo and Lachen rose in isolated low sloping knolls. These flats are all grassy and beautiful, the Tungu Choo runs in a very broad flat bottomed valley amongst them and every where are back "Tents" of Thibetan Argali sheep and wool goats of two varieties - it is a splendid place I have been twice over these flats once on pony back gallopping for miles and miles in every direction as free as the wind. Kinchin-Jow rises out of these undulating meadows on to which it is planted by short abrupt [?] [?] on to which it abruptly descends in snowy precipices divided in this case by a [foss/fose?] - the water drain = which [foss/fose?] is deep broad bottomed - abruptly divides perpetual snow and rocky debris from grass meadow-land. The ascent from 15,000 to 17,000ft was very slow and slight at 17,000ft I came abruptly on s steep rocky narrow spur of rick and a little beyond it, on the Perpetual Snow in sheer cliffs of ice and snow reaching to the summit. i.e. 4000ft high, and several hundred thick. Kinchin-Jow you know presents a [wall?] face to the South. my course was North to about the middle of the mass of Kinchin, and so steep is this wall and little broken by [?] angles, that this tremendous snow barrier, stretched E and W at a uniform level for many miles. It was a most stupendous sight. Unfortunately the weather was very bad, a dense curtain of mist hung over all the upper part of the Mts. from under which the great snow bed descended [?] on a cliff of [debris?] to the East and against a short rocky spur to the West. I never conceived any thing so grant with your hands you might almost touch the snow the grass and rock. It snowed and sleeted more heavily than I ever saw it in the Himal. and we could get no shelter, for the ice and rock were too dangerous to crouch under - We spend two hours most wretched ones as [usual?] and I took Temp of Boiling Water most carefully - Now the water of all this tremendous mass of snow is, for 5 miles at least, collected into a stream which as the height of the [?] you might drink it up! and which for 4 miles doe snot flow at all. For many furlongs you see no drainage whatever from the Snow. I asked many people about the table-land and have collected much curious information. It snows here at 15,000ft not uncommon throughout the Summer. The other night 4 miles thick fell, the same as at Kongra Lama but neither this nor two nights rain, not the literally [?] snow and sleet I experienced swells the Tungu Choo, to speak of. The people laugh when I speak of this. Country rivers in comparison with the drainage of Kinchin Junga and all the ranges south of this. They say this is Cheen - the same Cheen that goes from Samdong to [Dijauli?] and the sun [takes?] up above snow water! we drink snow in Winter, in Summer catch the cloud in the little rills and pools you see - I was very much struck with the river or rather [hill] courses of this table-land south of Kinchinjow, and the impossibility of tracing these courses and even on finding the way without compass or guide, the elevations are so low and the valleys so [?] and similar. The people tell me that in Chien there are no villages off the main road, nor any roads but the main. This and their utter ignorance of the compass, or Pole-star is incompatible with their being any extent of plain and I am inclined to abolish that word, as being necessarily comparative with the plains of India of Africa, of Australia, or La Plata[e?] and [professing] that we confine ourselves to the terai plateau and Table-land neither of which involve my idea of continuity of level surface - such as the afore-said countries present. I have read Strachey with some profit; though it contains nothing absolutely new, it is the best expose of facts I have seen - still he stumbles sadly and it is neither the [?] a man of [?] nor gentleman. I shall have heaps of notes for you - it is not worth your while taking up the matter of the note to which in any discussion I maintain as to the Sub.Himal. I shall not even allude. Profound contempt is all it deserves when such men as Falconer Royle and Madden and Hodgson and Waugh, as geologists, men of science or surveyors of practical experience take the same voice as we do, i.e. [coxcomby?] of such a note from a pedant profoundly ignorant of any and all of our several branches of science or art, is rather [amusing?] the more so as you very properly judge him out of his own mouth - throughout Strachey's paper there is a tone of snubbing all predecessors [?] and the gravest want of acknowledging the authors of many parts, which hence read as his own. He is a small fish after all. By the way whilst [Thomas] is denying all plateau features even [?] Thibet, Strachey is calling all Plains. Certainly Thomas's picture of the Ladak territory is not promising and the definition of the relative amount of breadth of valley and slope to that of Mt. belts dividing them, appears conclusive about that part, but I speak from memory and read his little [?] - one thing is flat - that the very [?] country he denies plain features to and Strachey calls plains Thomson's conception of the real axis from [?] to [?] is a grand one, and reminds me of the Guernsey Parson who prayed for Guernsey, Jersey, Alderney, Sark and the adjacent Islands of Great Britain and Ireland - still I suppose T has head something of a meridianal belt there - away and the greater mess he makes of his conclusions therefrom, the better pleased you may be who can put things in their right places - Now there is something very Griffithian Strachey, Thomson and the whole gang up there - The whole tone of T's correspondence is changed and I am convinced that neither a soldier's life not a jungle one is improving at all. I find myself adopting a supercilious tone which I pray may not merge into Strachey's dogmatical disagreeable style - but depend upon it the retaliatory style is unsuited to Philosophy and on this Humboldt never has commented himself - by this Buckland has lost himself and Babbage, and many others and so I would beseech you to abstain from answering Strachey, except by an essay not aimed at him, but in which his view may possibly come under notice though upon my honor it is beneath notice from the like of you. As to Thomson the less said the better, till I see him, his [?] range is lunatic - Mts. of the moon. In the mean time I am too busy with this curious country here to dwell much on the N.W., if you can lay hold of the information as to the course of the waters between Kambajong and Dijauli it would be most important all I can make out is that the [R] is the first into the Yarron which flows from E and W range of hills several marches north of Kambajong. These hills are well marked and on these alone the Kiang is found! along the road to [Dijauli/Dejauli?] I therefore guess it to belong to the Northern part of the triangular plateau and to separate the "flowing Yarron" from the Arun waters. Do make up your notes of the [Pelian?] rupees from Nepal. Except that there is a road from [Dijauli/Dejauli?] to Ladak via Mansarovar and [?] we know nought ot that my track and by the way Thomson is ignorant of that road though Strachey mentions it and the people here know it but no one but Lamas and the China mail frequent it, they understand it is a good road all along. As to any Thibet penetration in this quarter it is ridiculously out of the question, till very different relations are established with Sikkim and Thibet and I now regard my [Guandara/Gandara?] hope, faint as it was as supremely ridiculous. In the N.W. it is different, there the people are [?] up to the frontier here you have Sikkim opposition for all [?] up to the great range and Sikkim and Cheen hence on to the frontier:- Chien and [Lepas] after that - and I do not imagine one could go far except by the main road - when we have to leave to travel unmolested in Sikkim without a Rajah's guide, guard and [spy?] a little may be done by bribing these Lachen and Lachoong Soubahs, but they could not carry you beyond Geree and Cheen and Sikkim - [Bhote] are so inextricably mixed for 20 miles South of the frontier that I doubt anything being done N. of Kongra Lama - Indeed no results of consequence can be obtained except by a journey all the way to the Yarron - Kongra Lama is distinctly the top of the Plateau in this meridien 15,500 ft and it [?] thence to [Dijauli/Dejauli?] mpe 15.200 is the [?] as [?] so that it is probable [Dijauli/Dejauli?] will not prove more than 12,000 thence you [sink?] all the way to I hope where walnuts grow and which all the world says is much warmer than [Dijauli/Dejauli?] your Petien [?] alone offers hopes of clearing up particulars-west of this it is altogether a puzzle. I have made a great hold in the geography here, but only to offer more difficulties and greater then we supposed the original ones were.
July 30
Since writing the above I have been pumping the people and by means of [?] the ground [stones] etc they give a very consistent view of the country. I cross question repeatedly and level all manner of big blows at their information and they stand it better than I expected, nor does any thing contradict Campbell's [routes/notes?] in the information I got in E. Nepal all agree Geree is N.W from Kongra Lama - Kambajong N.W. again or more westerly and thence the route is [N?] to Dejauli. Breathing is affected at 3 several crossings en route to Dejauli one between Geree and Kambajong, a second N. of Kambajong and a third considered the greatest range of all, is in the Yarron range, [4?] marches north of Dejauli and hence probably Campbells [Kianglah?] at least the Kiand is found on the S. face of the range and there only en route to Dejauli. The ridge is rounded and not snowed - all the waters north of Kambajong s far north s this range (about 4 marches and these from the South and West face of this range flow to the Arun - there from North of it - to the Yarron - The Lachen Soubah most particularly indicated this, said a river comes from the S. face, another from the West face and meeting soon from, he believes the head of the Arun. Kinchin junga is S.W. of Kambajong and S E of Dobtah, he does not know anything of the country and that triangle - no body does that he knows or I have asked all are bare mountains with very little Snow west of [?] along the Mts. between Kambajong and the Thlonde, he says there is very little snow, all is mountainous table land like Kongra and Cholamoo but the villages Geree and Kambajong are much below the level of the Mts. Just as Geree is mch below that of Kongra Lama. Chomiomo they say is the only high Mt. W. of Kinchin-jow till you come to Kinchinjunga which is only seen from Dobtah -this wholly agrees with what I saw. I saw from Tukchan early in June and from the Zemu on the 1st July. The jungle and crossing the river are the only impediments in the way of getting up the Zemu as I tried and so on to Geree the road is hardly kept open. The other route further up the Thlonok is better, but longer and leads to Kambajong the head of both streams, like those of the Lachen are on table-land, west of Chomiomo and North of it rather but not quite so high as Kongra Lama plateaux (i.e. Cholamoo) a traveller here feels so bewildered that he hardly knows how these beautified thibetans can come to the just conclusions they do - [?] I resume Waugh's Powhunry is they say lower than Kinchinjunga a very little lower than Chumulari too - Kinchinjow lower than Poyhunry but higher than Chomiomo all quite true and yet there probably is not 2000ft between them and they are not in sight together. All the country West of the Geree and North of the Thlonok is Thibetan and in the Soubah of Kambajong:- so they told the truth about my being in Cheen the latter half of July. I forgot all about Darwin's letter twice. I have another which I must really answer and will send you anon - he advises me not to be too [?] about Glacier Action ancient, but says Lyell considers my Yangma Terrace as certainly ancient glaciel action. I am reading the Athenaeum instruc with great gusto as usual - Dean Cockburn is miserable trash, I am very pleased to have seen it however. The Singtam Soubah, now my guide, is a very civil well behaved man but evidently instructed to get me out of the country as fast as he possibly can really this is most aggravating and insulting considering the nature of my duties and their absorbing interest. I cannot tell you half the worry worry the Rajah has put me to - now I should like to get him soundly drubbed. Campbell seems to have said that I will return without delay as soon as soon as I have been to the Lachong frontier, I hope this remediable, if not it is fatal to my finishing the Sikkim Flora and disastrous - but I think I must misunderstand him - after failing to bully me out of the country to apply to the govt. is almost incredible - but he has brass enough for any thing I hate the very name of Sikkim Rajah

Ever yr affectionate
Jos. D. Hooker

Lachen alias Lamteng
August 3rd 1849

My dear Brian
Your letter of 23d and its charmante enclosure from Lord Carlisle reached me an hour ago and though I have little to [add] but of continued success in my [herborigations?] I take up my pen to thank you for your warm and flattering congratulations, all you say will I hope [?] me to future exertion, and it is the more agreeable for being written in your ignorance of my late successful tour to the frontier, where results have so much overtaken my most sanguine expectations. I cannot tell you how heartily glad I am that Lord D should have heard of me through you, and that that tire and spoke should have formed part of my wheel of fortune. I had no idea of Campbells having made the application, it is very kind of him and the help is truly acceptable, though what I should never have sanctioned his his applying for, thank God I was not asked. I am as you know in some foolish matters as proud as Lucifer and the dread of its being thought that I had curried favour with my Lord for future advantage, and if being quoted as a precedent for similar calls on the [?] purse, are either of them a sufficient reason to prevent my being accesory to any application in my favour [to-boot] I am well satisfied that for many reasons Borneo is not the place for me and that the £300 is far better employed in the Himalaya I wish they might make it £300 additional but that I cannot expect and it may be only £300 for 1850 instead of the £400 I have hitherto had. n'importe, my father gives without a grudge, and I cost him far more than the £200 he allows me here, when at home. I cannot tell you how disappointing this season is, I have been inthe Mts. all day for views, but not one glimpse do I get of the glorious scenary surrounding me. All is thick fog and showers of rain we have very little and I should not complain I collected just 20 new plants today and really I cannot keep pace with my duties at all. I am further [?] by finding seed-time begun! and now I must do something for Kew proper i.e. the gardens - In my conscience I believe I ought not to leave this, August and September and October will be seeding months, all of them and to spend the flowering season in pursuit of my branch pure Botany and go back when the Kew duties should commence would not be doing my duty. There too are the hardy plants calculated to withstand our Winter in England, these particularly demand my attention - so I must with your approval and Campbells consent struggle on here. Still too I find whole natural orders wanting and cannot doubt but that their flowering season is to come and I should collect wood and dry fruits for Kew Museum, which I have hitherto not had time to do. I am now well inured to my vagabond life and in the full spirit of hard work the Sikkim Royal can offer no objection to my going on as I have done but what insolence and the rude desire for me to begone may dictate and further I think I can see much less jealousy and objections to my visiting Lachoong far from any inhabited Tartar district than alienated the Lachen frontier. My conduct too at Lachen must, or ought to dispell any real or pretended alarm as to my motives and objects. Not that the home Govt. has behaved so handsomely (considering how hard up it is) the continuing my life of labor at its maximum is the more imperative now that another year is to be spent in the Himal, I feel as if my duties were tripled. What would be left undone in 2 years might be excused on the grounds of 24 months being too little noone can say but that 3 years is enough if well employed and please God spare me health and strength they shall be one thing is fortunate my curiosity about Thibet is rather quenched, I mean in so far, as that. I one hoped that a two or three days March therein would have effected much - now I am convinced that nothing short of the whole journey hence to [Shigtigi?] in Dobtah will add much to what I have done but I may exaggerate my own performance, though in truth it adds little to boast of - I hope my letters will enable you to judge accurately if if its results and must beg you explicitly to demand of me further information upon any point. One thing I forgot to tell you - that falls of 2-4 inches of snow are not uncommon throughout the Summer, on all the table-land south of KinchinJhow and Kongra and upon the three Thibetan ranges on route to Llasa, but it never, or very rarely remains the day - this argues [?] a great power of nocturnal and solar radiation and how Strachey can deny the effect of the latter reaching the P.S. far within the northern limit of the P.S. belt is wonderful.
Choongtam all safe August 6th
I close in haste, very busy writing to my Father. I send you his letter and Falconer's. convey my father's greatful acknowledgement to Campbell. Yours of the 16th and 18th only arrived yesterday and shall be answered anon.
Ever yr. affectionate [?]
J.D. Hooker
I shall be a week here sorting my plants It was Darwin's Geology of S. America not the "Journal" I asked for. Confound Cathcart for bothering you and leading you to suppose I would apply to him to do anything for me [in your house?] I sent Schleiden (not Scheider's) Schneider's or any other Dutch painter to Cathcart and to this day he has not returned it, ergo I asked him for it I ask boldly
Potatoes
Onions
Pepper
Flour, not the very fine which makes tough Chapatis
Table-rice
Butter
Pray do not send me your Salmon, the substantial necessaries are enough more than I deserve.
Soap no where to be found, pray speed me some, I am awfully badly off "for soap" and use a great deal

Yeumtong Septr 1 1849

My dear B

It is an age since I heard from you and since my visit to Tunkola Pass nothing remarkable has occurred except a run of very bad weather. Dorjiling to all intents and purposes except that the actual fall is nothing to compare now I think it has cleared up again and I hope for a recurrence of the usual Mts. rainy season climate, which is splendid mornings, showery afternoons and cloudy nights. I am getting on to the Doubiah Pass very slowly, for in such foggy weather with snow falling abundantly at 15,000ft it would be no use going far head. This valley is more remarkable for the flatness of its floor on the [N?] flank to which precipitous Mts. dip suddenly - as ever at [abt.] 12,000ft: there is little dip downward, not above 3000ft in 8 or 10 miles all are old lake beds most conspicuously so; divided by ridge of stones [?] [?] [?] [?] I am longing to know what you are about in geography and how the [?] progresses - I am strongly inclined to think that the Plateau of Thibet may prove really more the watershed than the Himal. We have now 3 of your [rivers?] to which it is undoubtedly so, viz the Arun, Teester and Matchiou, all contigeous rivers! you have told me the same of others and same of the Bhotian rivers all reputed so. It would be rather fine to exchange the Himal. altogether and seek the sources of all in an equally high latitude with the Indus Valley and Brahmaputra.

[BELOW IS A DRAWING SHOWING THE GANGES AND B.P. [BRAHMAPUTRA] RIVERS. NEXT TO IT IS THE REQUEST 'DON'T LAUGH AT MY WONDERFUL CHART']

Just see how dogmatical Madden is about the snow line! because Strachey makes it (I doubt not most accurately 15,500 in the N.W. I am to be expected to do ditto here - My [?] conceived before I ever said I know that the snow line extends from the Indus to the Brahma [?] will I expect come out right. Willcox gives it there 14,500 if I remember aright. I think I have found a glacier after all and if so of a totally different character from the [European?[ and only an exaggeration of what are [?] enough and what I call patches of glacial ice filling up a narrow excessively steep gulley and not like the Swiss moraines i.e. a broad valley of little inclination and many miles long. These are all more accumulations of frozen snow then streams of the same as which I understand true glaciers. As to the snow line here it can never be [judged?] if as Strachey does in the [?] our September and October [finds?] all so [?] and are truly [criminal?]. S. says that the N.W. snow line is not lowered till January ours is distinctly in October and most [materially?] Where I now am we have Perpetual Snow abundantly in perfect shade below 13,000 ft this does not affect the snow line I know, but it is a singular circumstance and very common in Sikkim even at 11,000 ft. It shows how feeble the sun's power is to raise the mean temperature of the summer solstice. Can any think be more striking that Thomson's and Madden's remarks the first talking of a fortnight's hot dry weather in July at Simlah, the other of the rains setting in on 25 July! at [Alenevah?] only fancy too fevers a Simlah in May and June to which Grant alludes I do not understand there to be [?] or agues [?] those English fevers so prevalent in hot Autumns in England. Madden talks of [?] the prevailing features [?] elevations in the N.W. now a [?] from Sikkim where at Dorjiling 20 miles within the range of where the eye roams over the greater part of Sikkim. No Pine is visible below 10,000ft By this [?] I have lifted the tropical genera up good 1000ft viz [?] [?] and all flowering [?] I have just found out is totally different from the N.W. None at all alpines flower till May [?] in March! I could draw except a curious parallel of flowering months and Please God will do so when I have the N.W. materials. My future prospects begin to occupy my mind I will not do through such another Sikkim Summer [?] like this nor would it be [?] profitable when the [?] and [?] Nepal. [?] latter is now [?] expensive [?] too expensive as you see that £300 is all the govt. give for next year except [?] F. applies for more and both her and I think it better to draw its [?] now and press the giving me a settles position and salary on my return. I should not however flinch at taxing the old gentleman for £300 more he could not afford me as he lives at great expense and has not allowances whatever Pray don't send me more wine and spirits - I do not divide a bottle of wine in a week and the brandy is really untouched. I send in a lot of roots for Campbell's and your garden. I hope they will live [basically?] the young pines require both care and [?] which your [?] cannot have however I [?] in future. I am [?] by the affair of the [?] which I have detailed [?]. The deeper insight [?] into these people the more clearly I see that the Rajah's orders are and were that I was not to be treated as a gentleman nor considered as such in Sikkim. Could I tell you the insolences given for me to my servants you would be as disgusted and shocked as I am that [an] Englishman, an officer and a gentleman should receive such treatment at the hands of a bare breeched dependant of the British Crown. It is not as I [told] Campbell as if I were where I had no right to be. He [thinks?] I have told him of the grave matters only [supported?] [?] insolence and spite displayed [?] whose word efforts like [?] water wears away stone [?] to heaven I have no spite [?] the Rajah, nor can one [?] he be punished or [not] [?] shocked and disgusted I am that such conduct should be suffered for months and months. People at home will not believe it. I don't care whose fault it is G.G's [Deriatus in Agenti?]

Ever your affectionate
J.D. Hooker

Momay Samdong
October 19 1849

My dear Brian
I have just come in and so tired that much as I have to say I can scarcely keep my eyes open - Campbell arrived here before dark and has his letters all but finished to go the first thing tomorrow morning. We have spent the best part of four days in Thibet the little Lama managing capitally and Campbell behaving splendidly and calling forth all my admiration and my fullest confidence in your early opinion of his character. He has [?] [?] me with the confirmation of my suspicions that he did not believe my report of the stupidity and obstructions I had met with Ref the character of the Sikkim authorities. C made up his mind promptly at Tungu to break the border if possible and to leave no stone unturned to do so - His mind once made up he never swerved one inch but carried all through to my [perfect] admiration. Whether altogether right or no is another matter he has not committed himself I firmly believe and has outwitted the Rajahs and Cheen authorities I believe to perfection. The unlucky Singtam Soubah never got a civil word from C and was finally dismissed from Tungu. to the Durbar with face blackened the ruffianly Lachen Peppen who C found to be what I stated, (a half outlaw fearing nor God nor man) was stormed out and threatened with Lepas and what not and when fairly frightened [?] by to the Lama in to obedience and [?] in the matter. At the Pass we were met by the Kambajong Dingpen 12 Lepas and a gang of ruffians of all descriptions We were stopped of course at Kongra Lama the [Peppen] got frightened, the Lama entreated C to wait and see the Cheen authority and I seeing nothing better to do gallopped ahead Campbell keeping the people from following. Once off I stopped not till I reached Cholomoo lakes, up the Lachen river all the way, the pony [?] up of course and late in the day I returned meeting Campbell half way but who had successfully bullied through all obstructions. No hands were laid on either of us but the coolies were stopped and but for the Lama and Peppen no human aid could have got them through nor could we ourselves. In the evening the Soubah came after us and camped, the Dingpen riding a Yak and the Lepchas all looking terrible with [?] and black faces. Next morning after due deliberation we laid a trap and caught the Dingpen inducing him to visit us and to accept a Shawl and a purse of Rupees etc. as escort whereby we now appear in a widely different light from [border breakers?] The poor Devil thereafter (as all along) kept out of our way, but we were bullied and badgered by the ruffianly [Lepas] on all occasions - ascending a [?] [?] the Lachen, the second evening what was my surprise to see due East an enormous [snowed[ Mt. Exactly where Turner places Chumalari I was about [8?] miles north of K. Jhow and had bearings of K. Junga of Doubiah and of Waugh's Chumulari, all of which bearings came in beautifully [crossing?] at my position, as I say proving there to be a huge Mt. due east along the line east from Chomiomo by K.Jhow and Doubiah, and exactly where Turner places his Chumalari. Reporting this to Campbell he agreed at my earnest interception to stop, where we were (on the bank of the Lachen N. of K. Jhow) another day. On the following we again went North, the Lepas in a devil of a rage and endeavouring by threats thus to stop us. We however pushed on to the [?] eminence and again saw and took bearings of the Mt. I also got angles from which I can make a [crude] estimate of the elevation. The cursed Lepas broke that beautiful [Aximuth] Compass Thiallier lent me, not intentionally however but they are rude, insolent, and required the very highest hand Campbell and I could bring to bear on them. A solitary stranger in this part of Thibet would be surely misused and cruelly treated in this part of Thibet. On this side the Mt. was evidently the [?] course and low hills dipping precipitously Eastward was exactly what Turner gives as the bounds of his [lakes?] The view of the Thibetan Konga etc. from [?] feet and 50 or 60 miles all round from East to West was perfect. The Arun valleys waterless at our feet and from the East and North converging to the great valley of the [Chemacho?], a flat sandy plain bounded by tremendous Mt. Cholomo, Dunes of about 10 miles square, spread all around, bounded by the spur of Chomiomo and Doubiah on the West and East, K. Jhow on South and Kambajong range on the North. These plains dip South to the Lachen and North to the Arun feeders which ([dead?] empty valleys of sand) converge as I said above to the Westward. Beyond them 10 miles of plains, the whole Thibetan surface rises into tier after tier of rugged precipitous Mts capped often deeply with snow along almost the whole horizon north towards [Shijatzi] [?] there are breaks [?] N. East where in the extreme distance other snows are seen an immense way off N. West are stupendous snows but so distant that I could not get an angle with the theodolite. Standing as we did at 17,500 ft nearly all the horizon was above our level and the peaks much so, though probably none exceeded 22,000 ft except the really distant N.W. South as the sweep of the Himal. snow was unequalled. The line is from some confused map of K. Junga, by Chomiomo, K. Jhow and Doubiah, to Turner Chumalari (which I call is because the Lepas did etc.) thence the Himal [trended] still to Northward of East by some grand tremendously snowed peaks. North of said Chumulari. Waugh's Chumalari I think is a Mt on the S spur from Turner's c. The bed of the Lachen is a broad sandy flat, occasionally grassed full of holes of the tailessrat and fox of [?] Campbell saw one. I saw two Kiang (as did many of the people) two antelope Hodgsonii, a great flock of small antelopes, plenty of Hares a great many birds. Your Shikari was so knocked up that he was in tent all day and knocked nothing down. Swallows, Hawks, Vultures, Ravens, Stone Chats, Finches, Geese, Ducks and other water birds were in great plenty, also no lack of plants but all burnt up. North of this the country becomes still more sterile not a habitation is any where visible, roads are quite trackless, except by experience and to find one's way over such a wilderness without guides is utterly impossible. There is no snow at 19 and 20,000ft very little water or grass anywhere. The cold intense at night and the wind and dust at day most grievous Campbell's people are nearly all knocked up, all mine [hearty?] C himself ditto but suffering from sore eyes, nose and lips of all which I have recovered long ago. Last night we slept at Cholomo Lakes, and this morning came over Doubiah pass hither. I ascended to nearly 20,000 ft to look out for cross bearings for Chumalari but in vain. I found a fine bed of Fossiliferous Limestone in situ! and yesterday one of fine state at the back of K. Jhow. I have [?] [?] from the South, a real live shell in the ponds (anquinea) and various [?] plants, quite Siberian in type, in Sept I might not have reaped a capital harvest. We often wished that you could have seen all we saw, but [?] [?] your name was constantly in our mouths and is yet but with no real wish that you should be here - it is a desperate life, literally and truly, up at these passes. God bless you where you are dear B. The Dingpen and Lepas accompanied us to the Doubiah Pass this morning or rather did C and the party for I lingered on the Thibet side till late and have just arrived here walking since dawn and very tired. My two boys and the pony which I loaded with stores knocked up and are left behind poor souls. I send a letter of [Thomson's] just arrived by Kangla he means Kiong La and he mistakes me about Turner's Pass. See what he says of Strachey and let it dispute the illusion that there is a solid [clique] in that corner of the Himal. should I care what all [?] to do with him? I have engaged a good K. N. for my future travels. I cannot get on with [?] except for plants.
Yr ever affectionate
J.D. Hooker

May 29th 1850

My dear Brian

We have reached [Daua?] at last after a most tedious passage the whole way from Kinchenjunga which has excited even the placid [Jim's?] temper against the miserable Bengalis at [Namp?] we had great difficulty in getting a boat at all to go in and it was only after much delay and trouble that Bell succeeded in procuring a very dirty [Budgeroo?] with a rascally lazy crew at an exorbitant price R80 for 6 days voyage to take us on to [Daua?]. We had two other boats for our people and things, the crew of one of which [?] [?] requiring us to put into [Pubna?] for another. The winds were foul the whole way and often stormy the weather good but hot. I wrote you from Moldah a pretty enough place from [Rampine] I really had nothing to say to you perhaps know it one of those everlasting green flats with good [houses?] and Mango [?]. The inhabitants are very stupid people, will not have even a book club so that Bell who is perhaps the only man who would care for one is obliged to have recourse to Moors [?] and Calcutta. The weather was hot, the T. rising to 106 every day. I sent all my baskets of plants thence to Calcutta in excellent order the beautiful [?] flowering through the chinks of the baskets and all flourishing. The Bells I need not say received us with the greatest hospitality and made our vexatious delays otherwise very agreeable. Mrs. Bell still plays remarkably well with taste and feeling and I am sure I taxed her good nature to the very utmost. On the voyage from [Rampine?] nothing succeeded a more detestable country than these plains of India is inconceivable that so many long miles of country should in a tropical climate like this be so utterly devoid of interest in its people, animals, plants and geology is quite astonishing to me. Even [Tun?] with whom has [?] [?] fought the battle for India was disgusted and we find ourselves obliged to pass the whole day reading and idling. I took my temperature as usual and studied a little Humboldt, Hamilton, Herbert [Gerard] etc. works in whose contents I found myself lamentable deficient in Humboldt's especially who I have just found out utterly compounds I hope with Dejauli! does not even place the latter in his hap at all - and strangest of all takes Turner's temp. of [Teecho-Loombo?] as a datum for calculating the elevation of Llasa. I have recalculated the same data using however as the auxiliaries of absolute [?] of my own instead of Humboldt's guesses on the [?] of heat in ascending above 7000ft between the parallels of 24 [degrees] and 29 [degrees] and find [Shigatzi] to be between 13,500 - 14,200ft which curiously enough tallies with my conclusion drawn from the reports of its [?] in Turner and from what the people told me - Humboldt makes I hope (meaning [Shigatzi?]) 1000 or a little over it - and assumes that as the mean elev. of the country between the [?] and snows immeasurably under the [mark?] I am sure he is. I have also carefully gone through his evidences of the Mt. chains without much satisfaction. By the way just look at [?] position of Llasa if I understand aright, it is due North or nearly so of Dejauli - but I am not clear about it and [?] gives no details. [Punetalia?] and its rivers are however what [?] to me most which must pass from Thibet to Bhotan from far behind the shows through the [?] [?] of [?] country which I saw between Chumulari and the [?] on [?] where the snowy chain is I believe as completely broken as at [?] and to the west of K. Junga. All I see and read throws the water-shed further behind the snowy Himal. than ever. Reducing the latter to more or less meridinal spurs from a map of greater magnitude and real importance behind. I see a good deal and plod over still - Pembertons and Griffiths and wilcox and others scattered reports and papers as to rivers. My father has received the Rhod. drawings and is greatly pleased with them. Also he has received the [?] from Bethune about the maps and is looking out for a publisher. - He begs me to give you his affec. regards and to thank you very much for the paper on the Himal. which he has read with great interest. Poor Humboldt had just followed to the grave one of his earliest friends Professor Kunth who cut his throat in presence of his family! Buckland is put into a mad house. Not a syllable about the house at Kew [?] is the new chief C for the dept of Woods under which Kew falls. Mr [Gode] goes to the other as [?] with £1000 a year. J. Philipps my father's ally comes on as commisioner in his department what is pleasant all well and mourning is the only other news. I am greatly pleased with Daua it is much the prettiest and [mint?] place I have seen in [Melia?] - the streets broad, clean and sweet, the verdure fresh and lucid, Palms and Bananas sprouting over white walls, neat thatch cottages, beautifully clean with the area and [?] cool and shady alleys no stench or filth. The many ruins are not the nasty dirty uncouth piles, or absurd affectations of [?] and art that Benares shews but picturesque groups of mosques, minarets and temples. Along every road there is much to look at. No one thing really fine or striking but every [?] in keeping. There is no such thing as a blind wall to the street - no [?] building however insignificant, without some [?] or ornament and the word of the balconies [?] doors and [?] is always remarkably pretty often beautiful. The pillars look [?] none of the nasty [bellied?] on Rope-twist columns so offensive to the eye but clean and [?] prettily moulded capitals and lovely friezes and pediments, which appear thoroughly Byzantine to me. There is nothing fine about the place. Not one object worth travelling 10 miles for, but there is every thing that is picturesque throughout the crumbling town, and outside all is real verdure and I find [?] in freedom. At last, fun the everlasting succession of black Mango topes, [ghastly?] fan Palms, 7 ashy green [dusty dirty?] Bamboo clumps which with an [?] fig form the charm of the tropic East of this. The people too are a more industrious people are mainly Mohamedan and [Armenian]! and it is quite a delight to watch the boats and boating. The population is considered greatly exaggerated at 60,000 (sixty thousand) and does not increase. The Soonderbands are draining the population when the rice for the Calcutta market is now being grown. The houses of the Europeans are truly magnificent and I doubt there being any station in India equal to this [Chowringry?] is not handsomer, not half as beautiful - here too the European houses are actually half in the native town and yet are neither annoyed with dogs, nasty poojas, nor nastier smells - To conclude our host Atherton is a very anxious fellow and we start tomorrow to reach [Pundeah?] in 10 days. I am anxious to hear how you are and hope to find a letter from you at [Chura/Chuwa?] which will be my address for 6 months I suppose at least.
Pray give my best regards to all who my care to think of
Your ever affectionate
J.D. Hooker
Tun sends his best regards

[NOTE IN MARGIN]
I regret to find that my [kind?] [?] left in debt 3R to your sais which shall be accounted for

Canterbury January 3[r]d 1845

The Trustees of the British Museum

My Lords and Gentlemen
I have this day delivered to the Agent of the Museum at this place the following articles in continuation of the series of drawings and specimens illustrative of the Zoology of Nepal and Tibet already presented to the Museum
Drawings of Animals 15 +
Drawings of Birds 70 = 85

Skins of Mammals 402 +
Skins of Birds 4444 = 4846

Osteological specimens of Mammals 406+
Osteological specimens of Birds 663 = 1069
Grand Total as per details Lists delivered to Mr Gerrard 5996

The osteological Specimens have been added to the others in compliance with a suggestion of the Keeper of the Zoological department after inspection of them, and I believe they will be found of high value not only in helping to determine the important question of the true nature and limits of species, but also in forwarding the great end of natural classification not to speak of the aids they will afford towards [fixing?] the particular species of my large Collection upon a firm basis. I shall be glad to learn that the Trustees ratify the suggestion of their Officer.
This branch of the Collection, like the others, is rich in duplicates of which assuming that the originals are permanently deposited in the Museum, it is my request that one series may be hereafter delivered to the College of Surgeons if desired by that institution.
The drawings now presented, amounting to eighty one constitute the regularly numbered sequel of the series to which they belong (20 inches by 12) and which series they nearly complete. What remains to conclude the set shall be prepared and sent as soon as may be. Meanwhile I recommend that prompt measures be taken by the Museum to secure possession of those which went before them and which having fallen into various hands do not seem to be, all of them, forth-coming as they ought to be. The numbered Catalogues according to wh[ich] these drawings were prepared and despatched from India, will afford a ready clue to the amount of drawings that ought to be forthcoming according to the Catalogues adverted to, the number of Species is as follows -
Mammals of Nepal 126
Birds of Nepal 656
Mammals of Tibet 47
Most of these species were separately delineated and of many of them there were several delineations in this series of drawings, not, to mention the larger series preceding it and which likewise, so far as carried, ought to be forthcoming and has been presented to the Museum

Signed
B.H. Hodgson

Memos of Mr. Hodgson's Zoology

The species are:- Mammals of Nepal 126 - Mammals of Tibet 47 - Birds of Nepal 656

The Collections consist of Drawings of skins and of skeletons
The Drawings amount to 108 plates of anatomical delineations and 814 of ordinary fig. of Beast and Bird, the skins now brought to England and delivered to Brit. Mus. consist 402 Mammals and 4444 Birds
The osseous specimens delivered with them amount to 1069
Besides the above wh[ich] have been just now handed over by me to
the Museum, a large collection of specimens and drawings was made
over in Jany 1843 by my father, whereof I find Memo as follows:-
Drawings delivered to Mr Hawkins 709
Bird Skins - 408, Quadr. Skins - 49
The specimens and drawings having been presented to Brit. Mus. the desideration now is to ascertain that the whole are procured and properly preserved