DARJEELING TO TONGLO. 117 
tearing through the infested jungles, and always institute a thorough 
examination as soon as I get home. To Leeches* I am indifferent 
now, also Papsas, and other wholesome-looking blood-suckers ; but in 
ticks, as in bugs, there is something revolting to me :—the very writing 
about them makes the flesh creep. 
We rested the men, whose sodden burthens pressed heavily on their 
backs, close by a pool of water, wherein grew a very fine Carez, and: 
on its banks a Chrysosplenium, some Urticee and Cyperacee, with two 
species of Ranunculus. The latter genus does not occur at a lower 
elevation on these mountains: and these are poor little species, with 
creeping stems and small yellow flowers. Their appearance was the 
first symptom of entering the botanical region above that of Darjee- 
ling, where Ranunculacee, Crucifere, certain Leguminose, Gramineae, 
and Composite abound upwards towards the snow. 
The ascent to the summit was along the bed of a watercourse, now 
brimming over, but which we were already too wet to heed, the rain 
continuing to pour down with unabated violence. On the banks grew 
a creeping Anagallis? (like 4. tenella) and a Primula, one or two 
slender Carices, and some other alpine plants. 
Tonglo top, which we reached in the afternoon, is a rather broad 
flat ridge, covered with a low forest vegetation, very swampy in the 
depressions, where broad pools of water, full of Zris, occur. Rhodo- 
dendrons are the prevailing trees, but I have already described them. 
The rocks which crop out at the top are all broken masses of gneiss 
and mica-schist, with garnets. The soil is a deep spongy black vege- 
table mould; or, where the rock is disintegrated, a gravelly sand; - 
neither appears naturally retentive of moisture, but the constant rains 
keep both in a state of saturation. 
Commencing with the smaller vegetation, Carer was the prevailing - 
genus, covering the ground like long grass, of which latter a few tufts 
only were intermixed. Anagallis, and a blue-flowered juga? were 
* I cannot but think that the extraordinary abundance of these danelides in all 
the grazing-grounds of Sikkim, may cause the death of many animals. Some marked - 
instances of murrain have followed very wet seasons, when Leeches swarm in unusual 
numbers; and the disease in the cattle, deseribed to me by the Lepchas, and which == 
