Books: Himalayan Journals (Complete)

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Illustration--DR. FALCONER'S RESIDENCE, CALCUTTA BOTANIC GARDENS,
FROM SIR L. PEEL'S GROUNDS.

I devoted a few days to the Calcutta Botanic Gardens, where I found
my kind friend Dr. Falconer established, and very busy.
The destruction of most of the palms, and of all the noble tropical
features of the gardens, during Dr. Griffith's incumbency, had
necessitated the replanting of the greater part of the grounds, the
obliteration of old walks, and the construction of new: it was also
necessary to fill up tanks whose waters, by injudicious cuttings,
were destroying some of the most valuable parts of the land, to drain
many acres, and to raise embankments to prevent the encroachments of
the Hoogly: the latter being a work attended with great expense, now
cripples the resources of the garden library, and other valuable
adjuncts; for the trees which were planted for the purpose having
been felled and sold, it became necessary to buy timber at an
exorbitant price.

The avenue of Cycas trees (_Cycas circinalis_), once the admiration
of all visitors, and which for beauty and singularity was unmatched
in any tropical garden, had been swept away by the same unsparing
hand which had destroyed the teak, mahogany, clove, nutmeg, and
cinnamon groves. In 1847, when I first visited the establishment,
nothing was to be seen of its former beauty and grandeur, but a few
noble trees or graceful palms rearing their heads over a low ragged
jungle, or spreading their broad leaves or naked limbs over the
forlorn hope of a botanical garden, that consisted of open clay beds,
disposed in concentric circles, and baking into brick under the
fervid heat of a Bengal sun.

The rapidity of growth is so great in this climate, that within eight
months from the commencement of the improvements, a great change had
already taken place. The grounds bore a park-like appearance; broad
shady walks had replaced the narrow winding paths that ran in
distorted lines over the ground, and a large Palmetum, or collection
of tall and graceful palms of various kinds, occupied several acres
at one side of the garden; whilst a still larger portion of ground
was being appropriated to a picturesque assemblage of certain closely
allied families of plants, whose association promised to form a novel
and attractive object of study to the botanist, painter, and
landscape gardener. This, which the learned Director called in
scientific language a Thamno-Endogenarium, consists of groups of all
kinds of bamboos, tufted growing palms, rattan canes (_Calami_),
_Dracaenae,_ plantains, screw-pines, (_Pandani_, and such genera of
tropical monocotyledonous plants. All are evergreens of most vivid
hue, some of which, having slender trailing stems, form magnificent
masses; others twine round one another, and present impenetrable
hillocks of green foliage; whilst still others shoot out broad long
wavy leaves from tufted roots; and a fourth class is supported by
aerial roots, diverging on all sides and from all heights on the
stems, every branch of which is crowned with an enormous plume of
grass-like leaves.* [Since I left India, these improvements have been
still further carried out, and now (in the spring of 1853) I read of
five splendid _Victoria_ plants flowering at once, with _Euryale
ferox,_ white, blue, and red water-lilies, and white, yellow and
scarlet lotus, rendering the tanks gorgeous, sunk as their waters are
in frames of green grass, ornamented with clumps of _Nipa fruticans_
and _Phoenix paludosa._]

The great _Amherstia_ tree had been nearly killed by injudicious
treatment, and the baking of the soil above its roots. This defect
was remedied by sinking bamboo pipes four feet and a half in the
earth, and watering through them--a plan first recommended by Major
M`Farlane of Tavoy. Some fine _Orchideae_ were in flower in the,
gardens, but few of them fruit; and those _Dendrobiums_ which bear
axillary viviparous buds never do. Some of the orchids appear to be
spread by birds amongst the trees; but the different species of
_Vanda_ are increasing so fast, that there seems no doubt that this
tribe of air-plants grows freely from seed in a wild state, though we
generally fail to rear them in England.

The great Banyan tree (_Ficus Indica_) is still the pride and
ornament of the garden. Dr. Falconer has ascertained satisfactorily
that it is only seventy-five years old: annual rings, size, etc.,
afford no evidence in such a case, but people were alive a few years
ago who remembered well its site being occupied in 1782 by a Kujoor
(Date-palm), out of whose crown the Banyan sprouted, and beneath
which a Fakir sat. It is a remarkable fact that the banyan hardly
ever vegetates on the ground; but its figs are eaten by birds, and
the seeds deposited in the crowns of palms, where they grow, sending
down roots that embrace and eventually kill the palm, which decays
away. This tree is now eighty feet high, and throws an area 300 feet*
[Had this tree been growing in 1849 over the great palm-stove at Kew,
only thirty feet of each end of that vast structure would have been
uncovered: its increase was proceeding so rapidly, that by this time
it could probably cover the whole. Larger banyans are common in
Bengal; but few are so symmetrical in shape and height. As the tree
gets old, it breaks up into separate masses, the original trunk
decaying, and the props becoming separate trunks of the different
portions.] in diameter into a dark, cool shade. The gigantic limbs
spread out about ten feet above the ground, and from neglect during
Dr. Wallich's absence, there were on Dr. Falconer's arrival no more
than eighty-nine descending roots or props; there are now several
hundreds, and the growth of this grand mass of vegetation is
proportionably stimulated and increased. The props are induced to
sprout by wet clay and moss tied to the branches, beneath which a
little pot of water is hung, and after they have made some progress,
they are inclosed in bamboo tubes, and so coaxed down to the ground.
They are mere slender whip-cords before reaching the earth, where
they root, remaining very lax for several months; but gradually, as
they grow and swell to the size of cables, they tighten, and
eventually become very tense. This is a curious phenomenon, and so
rapid, that it appears to be due to the rooting part mechanically
dragging down the aerial. The branch meanwhile continues to grow
outwards, and being supplied by its new support, thickens beyond it,
whence the props always slant outwards from the ground towards the
circumference of the tree.

_Cycas_ trees abound in the gardens, and, though generally having
only one, or rarely two crowns, they have sometimes sixteen, and
their stems are everywhere covered with leafy buds, which are
developed on any check being given to the growth of the plant, as by
the operation of transplantation, which will cause as many as 300
buds to appear in the course of a few years, on a trunk eight
feet high.

During my stay at the gardens, Dr. Falconer received a box of living
plants packed in moss, and transported in a frozen state by one of
the ice ships from North America:* [The ice from these ships is sold
in the Calcutta market for a penny a pound, to great profit; it has
already proved an invaluable remedy in cases of inflammation and
fever, and has diminished mortality to a very appreciable extent.]
they left in November, and arriving in March, I was present at the
opening of the boxes, and saw 391 plants (the whole contents) taken
out in the most perfect state. They were chiefly fruit-trees, apples,
pears, peaches, currants, and gooseberries, with beautiful plants of
the Venus' fly-trap (_Dionaea muscipula_). More perfect success never
attended an experiment: the plants were in vigorous bud, and the day
after being released from their icy bonds, the leaves sprouted and
unfolded, and they were packed in Ward's cases for immediate
transport to the Himalaya mountains.

My visit to Calcutta enabled me to compare my instruments with the
standards at the Observatory, in which I was assisted by my friend,
Capt. Thuillier, to whose kind offices on this and many other
occasions I am greatly indebted.

I returned to Dorjiling on the 17th of April, and Dr. Thomson and I
commenced our arrangements for proceeding to the Khasia mountains.
We started on the 1st of May, and I bade adieu to Dorjiling with no
light heart; for I was leaving the kindest and most disinterested
friends I had ever made in a foreign land, and a country whose
mountains, forests, productions, and people had all become endeared
to me by many ties and associations. The prospects of Dorjiling
itself are neither doubtful nor insignificant. Whether or not Sikkim
will fall again under the protection of Britain, the station must
prosper, and that very speedily. I had seen both its native
population and its European houses doubled in two years; its
salubrious climate, its scenery, and accessibility, ensure it so
rapid a further increase that it will become the most populous
hill-station in India. Strong prejudices against a damp climate, and
the complaints of loungers and idlers who only seek pleasure,
together with a groundless fear of the natives, have hitherto
retarded its progress; but its natural advantages will outweigh these
and all other obstacles.

I am aware that my opinion of the ultimate success of Dorjiling is
not shared by the general public of India, and must be pardoned for
considering their views in this matter short-sighted. With regard to
the disagreeables of its climate, I can sufficiently appreciate them,
and shall be considered by the residents to have over-estimated the
amount and constancy of mist, rain, and humidity, from the two
seasons I spent there being exceptional in these respects. Whilst on
the one hand I am willing to admit the probability of this,* [I am
informed that hardly a shower of rain has fallen this season, between
November 1852, and April 1853; and a very little snow in February
only.] I may be allowed on the other to say that I have never visited
any spot under the sun, where I was not told that the season was
exceptional, and generally for the worse; added to which there is no
better and equally salubrious climate east of Nepal, accessible
from Calcutta.

All climates are comparative, and fixed residents naturally praise
their own. I have visited many latitudes, and can truly say that I
have found no two climates resembling each other, and that all alike
are complained of. That of Dorjiling is above the average in point of
comfort, and for perfect salubrity rivals any; while in variety,
interest, and grandeur, the scenery is unequalled.

From Sikkim to the Khasia mountains our course was by boat down the
Mahanuddy to the upper Gangetic delta, whose many branches we
followed eastwards to the Megna; whence we ascended the Soormah to
the Silhet district. We arrived at Kishengunj, on the Mahanuddy, on
the 3rd of May, and were delayed two days for our boat, which should
have been waiting here to take us to Berhampore on the Ganges: we
were, however, hospitably received by Mr. Perry's family.

The approach of the rains was indicated by violent easterly storms of
thunder, lightning, and rain; the thermometer ranging from 70 degrees
to 85 degrees. The country around Kishengunj is flat and very
barren; it is composed of a deep sandy soil, covered with a short
turf, now swarming with cockchafers. Water is found ten or twelve
feet below the surface, and may be supplied by underground streams
from the Himalaya, distant forty-five miles. The river, which at this
season is low, may be navigated up to Titalya during the rains; its
bed averages 60 yards in width, and is extremely tortuous; the
current is slight, and, though shallow, the water is opaque.
We slowly descended to Maldah, where we arrived on the 11th: the
temperature both of the water and of the air increased rapidly to
upwards of 90 degrees; the former was always a few degrees cooler
than the air by day, and warmer by night. The atmosphere became drier
as we receded from the mountains.

The boatmen always brought up by the shore at night; and our progress
was so slow, that we could keep up with the boat when walking along
the bank. So long as the soil and river-bed continued sandy, few
bushes or herbs were to be found, and it was difficult to collect a
hundred kinds of plants in a day: gradually, however, clumps of trees
appeared, with jujube bushes, _Trophis, Acacia,_ and _Buddleia,_ a
few fan-palms, bamboos, and Jack-trees. A shell (_Anodon_) was the
only one seen in the river, which harboured few water-plants or
birds, and neither alligators nor porpoises ascend so high.

On the 7th of May, about eighty miles in a straight line from the
foot of the Himalaya, we found the stratified sandy banks, which had
gradually risen to a height of thirteen feet, replaced by the hard
alluvial clay of the Gangetic valley, which underlies the sand: the
stream contracted, and the features of its banks were materially
improved by a jungle of tamarisk, wormwood (_Artemisia_), and white
rose-bushes (_Rosa involucrata_), whilst mango trees became common,
with tamarinds, banyan, and figs. Date and _Caryota_ palms, and
rattan canes, grew in the woods, and parasitic Orchids on the trees,
which were covered with a climbing fern (_Acrosticum scandens_), so
that we easily doubled our flora of the river banks before arriving
at Maldah.

This once populous town is, like Berhampore, now quite decayed, since
the decline of its silk and indigo trades: the staple product, called
"Maldy," a mixture of silk and cotton, very durable, and which washes
well, now forms its only trade, and is exported through Sikkim to the
north-west provinces and Tibet. It is still famous for the size and
excellence of its mangos, which ripen late in May; but this year the
crop had been destroyed by the damp heats of spring, the usual
north-west dry winds not having prevailed.

The ruins of the once famous city of Gour, a few miles distant, are
now covered with jungle, and the buildings are fast disappearing,
owing to the bricks being carried away to be used elsewhere.

Below Maldah the river gets broader, and willow becomes common.
We found specimens of a _Planorbis_ in the mud of the stream, and saw
apparently a boring shell in the alluvium, but could not land to
examine it. Chalky masses of alligators' droppings, like coprolites,
are very common, buried in the banks, which become twenty feet high
at the junction with the Ganges, where we arrived on the 14th.
The waters of this great river were nearly two degrees cooler than
those of the Mahanuddy.

Rampore-Bauleah is a large station on the north bank of the Ganges,
whose stream is at this season fully a mile wide, with a very slow
current; its banks are thirty feet above the water. We were most
kindly received by Mr. Bell, the collector of the district, to whom
we were greatly indebted for furthering us on our voyage: boats being
very difficult to procure, we were, however, detained here from the
16th to the 19th. I was fortunate in being able to compare my
barometers with a first-rate standard instrument, and in finding no
appreciable alteration since leaving Calcutta in the previous April.
The elevation of the station is 130 feet above the sea, that of
Kishengunj I made 131; so that the Gangetic valley is nearly a dead
level for fully a hundred miles north, beyond which it rises;
Titalya, 150 miles to the north, being 360 feet, and Siligoree, at
the margin of the Terai, rather higher. The river again falls more
considerably than the land; the Mahanuddy, at Kishengunj, being about
twenty feet below the level of the plains, or 110 above the sea;
whereas the Ganges, at Rampore, is probably not more than eighty
feet, even when the water is highest.

The climate of Rampore is marked by greater extremes than that of
Calcutta: during our stay the temperature rose above 106 degrees, and
fell to 78 degrees at night: the mean was 2.5 degrees higher than at
Calcutta, which is 126 miles further south. Being at the head of the
Gangetic delta, which points from the Sunderbunds obliquely to the
north-west, it is much damper than any locality further west, as is
evidenced by two kinds of _Calamus_ palm abounding, which do not
ascend the Ganges beyond Monghyr. Advancing eastwards, the dry
north-west wind of the Gangetic valley, which blows here in
occasional gusts, is hardly felt; and easterly winds, rising after
the sun (or, in other words, following the heating of the open dry
country), blow down the great valley of the Burrampooter, or
south-easterly ones come up from the Bay of Bengal. The western head
of the Gangetic delta is thus placed in what are called "the
variables" in naval phraseology; but only so far as its superficial
winds are concerned, for its great atmospheric current always blows
from the Bay of Bengal, and flows over all northern India, to the
lofty regions of Central Asia.

At Rampore I found the temperature of the ground, at three feet
depth, varied from 87.8 degrees to 89.8 degrees, being considerably
lower than that of the air (94.2 degrees), whilst that of a fine
ripening shaddock, into which I plunged a thermometer bulb, varied
little from 81 degrees, whether the sun shone on it or not. From this
place we made very slow progress south-eastwards, with a gentle
current, but against constant easterly winds, and often violent gales
and thunder-storms, which obliged us to bring up under shelter of
banks and islands of sand. Sometimes we sailed along the broad river,
whose opposite shores were rarely both visible at once, and at others
tracked the boat through narrow creeks that unite the many Himalayan
streams, and form a network soon after leaving their mountain valleys.

A few miles beyond Pubna we passed from a narrow canal at once into
the main stream of the Burrampooter at Jaffergunj: our maps had led
us to expect that it flowed fully seventy miles to the eastward in
this latitude; and we were surprised to hear that within the last
twenty years the main body of that river had shifted its course thus
far to the westward. This alteration was not effected by the gradual
working westwards of the main stream, but by the old eastern channel
so rapidly silting up as to be now unnavigable; while the Jummul,
which receives the Teesta, and which is laterally connected by
branches with the Burrampooter, became consequently wider and deeper,
and eventually the principal stream.

Nothing can be more dreary and uninteresting than the scenery of this
part of the delta. The water is clay-coloured and turbid, always
cooler than the air, which again was 4 degrees or 5 degrees below
that of Calcutta, with a damper atmosphere. The banks are of
stratified sand and mud, hardly raised above the mean level of the
country, and consequently unlike those bordering most annually
flooded rivers; for here the material is so unstable, that the
current yearly changes its course. A wiry grass sometimes feebly
binds the loose soil, on which there are neither houses nor
cultivation.

Ascending the Jummul (now the main channel of the Burrampooter) for a
few miles, we turned off into a narrower channel, sixty miles long,
which passes by Dacca, where we arrived on the 28th, and where we
were again detained for boats, the demand for which is rapidly
increasing with the extended cultivation of the Sunderbunds and
Delta. We stayed with Mr. Atherton, and botanised in the
neighbourhood of the town, which was once very extensive, and is
still large, though not flourishing. The population is mostly
Mahometan; the site, though beautiful and varied, is unhealthy for
Europeans. Ruins of great Moorish brick buildings still remain, and a
Greek style of ornamenting the houses prevails to a remarkable degree.

The manufacture of rings for the arms and ancles, from conch-shells
imported from the Malayan Archipelago, is still almost confined to
Dacca: the shells are sawn across for this purpose by semicircular
saws, the hands and toes being both actively employed in the
operation. The introduction of circular saws has been attempted by
some European gentlemen, but steadily resisted by the natives,
despite their obvious advantages. The Dacca muslin manufacture, which
once employed thousands of hands, is quite at an end, so that it was
with great difficulty that the specimens of these fabrics sent to the
Great Exhibition of 1851, were procured. The kind of cotton (which is
very short in the staple) employed, is now hardly grown, and scarcely
a loom exists which is fit for the finest fabrics. The jewellers
still excel in gold and silver filagree.

Pine-apples, plantains, mangos, and oranges, abound in the Dacca
market, betokening a better climate for tropical fruits than that of
Western Bengal; and we also saw the fruit of _Euryale ferox,_* [An
Indian water-lily with a small red flower, covered everywhere with
prickles, and so closely allied to _Victoria regia_ as to be scarcely
generically distinguishable from it. It grows in the eastern
Sunderbunds, and also in Kashmir. The discoverer of Victoria called
the latter "_Euryale Amazonica._" These interestiug plants are
growing side by side in the new Victoria house at Kew. The Chinese
species has been erroneously considered different from the Indian
one.] which is round, soft, pulpy, and the size of a small orange; it
contains from eight to fifteen round black seeds as large as peas,
which are full of flour, and are eaten roasted in India and China, in
which latter country the plant is said to have been in cultivation
for upwards of 3000 years.

The native vegetation is very similar to that of the Hoogly, except
that the white rose is frequent here. The fact of a plant of this
genus being as common on the plains of Bengal as a dog-rose is in
England, and associated with cocoa-nuts, palms, mangos, plantains,
and banyans, has never yet attracted the attention of botanists,
though the species was described by Roxburgh. As a geographical fact
it is of great importance, for the rose is usually considered a
northern genus, and no kind but this inhabits a damp hot tropical
climate. Even in mountainous countries situated near the equator, as
in the Himalaya and Andes, wild roses are very rare, and only found
at great elevations, whilst they are unknown in the southern
hemisphere. It is curious that this rose, which is also a native of
Birma and the Indian Peninsula, does not in this latitude grow west
of the meridian of 87 degrees; it is confined to the upper Gangetic
delta, and inhabits a climate in which it would least of all be
looked for.

I made the elevation of Dacca by barometer only seventy-two feet
above the sea; and the banks of the Dallisary being high, the level
of its waters at this season is scarcely above that of the Bay of
Bengal. The mean temperature of the air was 86.75 degrees during our
stay, or half a degree lower than Calcutta at the same period.

We pursued our voyage on the 30th of May, to the old bed of the
Burrampooter, an immense shallow sheet of water, of which the eastern
bank is for eighty miles occupied by the delta of the Soormah.
This river rises on the Munnipore frontier, and flows through Cachar,
Silhet, and the Jheels of east Bengal, receiving the waters of the
Cachar, Jyntea, Khasia, and Garrow mountains (which bound the Assam
valley to the south), and of the Tipperah hills, which stretch
parallel to them, and divide the Soormah valley from the Bay of
Bengal. The immense area thus drained by the Soormah is hardly raised
above the level of the sea, and covers about 10,000 square miles.
The anastomosing rivers that traverse it, flow very gently, and do
not materially alter their course; hence their banks gradually rise
above the mean level of the surrounding country, and on them the
small villages are built, surrounded by extensive rice-fields that
need no artificial irrigation. At this season the general surface of
the Jheels is marshy; but during the rains, which are excessive on
the neighbouring mountains, they resemble an inland sea, the water
rising gradually to within a few inches of the floor of the huts; as,
however, it subsides as slowly in autumn, it commits no devastation.
The communication is at all seasons by boats, in the management of
which the natives (chiefly Mahometans) are expert.

The want of trees and shrubs is the most remarkable feature of the
Jheels; in which respect they differ from the Sunderbunds, though the
other physical features of each are similar, the level being exactly
the same: for this difference there is no apparent cause, beyond the
influence of the tide and sea atmosphere. Long grasses of tropical
genera (_Saccharum, Donax, Andropogon,_ and _Rottboellia_) ten feet
high, form the bulk of the vegetation, with occasional low bushes
along the firmer banks of the natural canals that everywhere
intersect the country; amongst these the rattan cane (_Calamus_),
rose, a laurel, _Stravadium,_ and fig, are the most common; while
beautiful convolvuli throw their flowering shoots across the water.