THE COLONIES OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE. 277 



To return, however, to those magnificent possessions in Asia, de- 

 tailed above, we cannot perhaps do better than lay before our readers 

 such facts and statements as will instruct and interest the public, refer- 

 ring to the work adverted to for the fullest information on every pos- 

 sible topic, whether historical, topographical, commercial, warlike, or 

 statistical the honourable East India Company having munificently 

 furnished Mr. Martin with very many valuable documents, nevej 

 before published nay, never even printed and which, at a very 

 heavy expense, have now for the first time been made accessible to 

 the nation at large. 



It will thence be seen how very diversified in aspect and climate 

 are the possessions now under the government of the East India 

 Company. An idea is prevalent that British India is a scorching tro- 

 pical clime all swamp or plain : the very reverse is the case ; the 

 best exemplification of the truth of which will be seen on a perusal 

 of the following animated description of the country bordering on and 

 comprising the far-famed and justly celebrated Himalaya Mountains, 

 as surveyed by the Messrs. Gerard, from whose diary for the month 

 of June we ma'ke the following extract : 



" Rol, a small district in Chuara, one of the larger divisions of Basehar, 

 9,350 feet above the level of the sea, and the highest inhabited land without 

 the Himalaya Mountains. Crops wheat, barley, and peas. Road to Buch- 

 kalghat 1 1^800 feet, through fine woods of oak, yew, pine, rhododendron, 

 horse-chesnut, juniper, and long thin bamboos ; flowers abundant, parti- 

 cularly cowslips and thyme ; soil, a rich moist black turf, not unlike peat. 

 Crossed the Shatul pass (15,556 feet), rocks, Mica slate and Gneis huge 

 granite blocks, vast angular fragments of quartz, felspar, &c., jumbled to- 

 gether in the wildest confusion, the route over which was fraught at every 

 step with considerable danger. Upon the snow (two of Mr. Gerard's ser- 

 vants were frozen to death at mid-day, in September the previous year, 

 when crossing this pass) at Shatul were many insects, like musquitoes, 

 which revived as the sun rose ; some birds were seen resembling ravens- 

 mosses were found on a few rocks; the British travellers rested for the 

 night under shelter of a large rock (13,400 feet above the sea), where the 

 steep ascent above them, of 2,200 feet higher, seemed appalling ; here and 

 there a rock projected its black head ; all else was a dreary solitude of un- 

 fathomable snow, aching to the sight, and without trace of a path ; when 

 the snow was melted, plenty of lovely flowers were found, but no bushes. 

 The snow was soft at mid-day, and afforded good footing ; but the suffer- 

 ing caused by the elevation as it affected the breathing and head was very 

 great. On the 9th June, the temperature did not rise above 41 deg. at 

 noon, it was 24 deg. and 26 deg. at sunrise in the evening it snowed. On 

 the llth June our adventurous countrymen began their descent on the 

 opposite side of the pass, along the dell of the Andreti (a branch of the 

 Pabar river) rising near Shatul, and halted on the bank of a rivulet named 

 Dingru, just above the forest limit. The lowest point in the dell was 

 11,000 feet; leeks were gathered at 12,000 feet; the ground was a rich 

 sward, cut up in groves by a large kind of field rat without a tail ( Mus 

 Typhlus). The roads to the most frequented passes lie upon the gentle ac- 

 clivity ; the difference in the elevation of the forest is very remarkable, in 

 some instances exceeding 1,000 feet. The general height of the forest on 

 the south face of the Himalaya is about 11,800 to 12,000 feet above the sea ; 

 oaks and pines reach that elevation, birches reach a few feet higher, arid 

 juniper was observed at 13,300 feet! A Tagno village (8,800 feet) abun- 



