Himalayan Journals — Complete: Or, Notes of a Naturalist in Bengal, the Sikkim and Nepal Himalayas, the Khasia Mountains, etc.Hooker, Joseph Dalton
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Himalayan Journals — Complete: Or, Notes of a Naturalist in Bengal, the Sikkim and Nepal Himalayas, the Khasia Mountains, etc.
Hooker, Joseph Dalton
Himalaya Mountains -- Description and travel; Natural history -- Himalaya Mountains
of herbs collected during the day’s march to flavour his food.
My tent was made of a blanket thrown over the limb of a tree; to this
others were attached, and the whole was supported on a frame like a
house. One half was occupied by my bedstead, beneath which was stowed
my box of clothes, while my books and writing materials were placed
under the table. The barometer hung in the most out-of-the-way corner,
and my other instruments all around. A small candle was burning in a
glass shade, to keep the draught and insects from the light, and I had
the comfort of seeing the knife, fork, and spoon laid on a white
napkin, as I entered my snug little house, and flung myself on the
elastic couch to ruminate on the proceedings of the day, and speculate
on those of the morrow, while waiting for my meal, which usually
consisted of stewed meat and rice, with biscuits and tea. My
thermometers (wet and dry bulb, and minimum) hung under a temporary
canopy made of thickly plaited bamboo and leaves close to the tent, and
the cooking was performed by my servant under a tree.
After dinner my occupations were to ticket and put away the plants
collected during the day, write up journals, plot maps, and take
observations till 10 p.m. As soon as I was in bed, one of the Nepal
soldiers was accustomed to enter, spread his blanket on the ground, and
sleep there as my guard. In the morning the collectors were set to
change the plant-papers, while I explored the neighbourhood, and having
taken observations and breakfasted, we were ready to start at 10 a.m.
Following the same ridge, after a few miles of ascent over much broken
gneiss rock, the Ghorkas led me aside to the top of a knoll, 9,300 feet
high, covered with stunted bushes, and commanding a splendid view to
the west, of the broad, low, well cultivated valley of the Tambur, and
the extensive town of Dunkotah on its banks, about twenty-five miles
off; the capital of this part of Nepal, and famous for its manufactory
of paper from the bark of the _Daphne._ Hence too I gained a fine view
of the plains of India, including the course of the Cosi river, which,
receiving the Arun and Tambur, debouches into the Ganges opposite
Colgongl (see p. 95).
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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