THE SNOW-LINE. 33 J 



an almost e^ual northern latitude (from 30 45' to 31), the 

 enow-line on the southern declivity of the Himalaya lies at an 

 elevation of 12,982 feet, which is about the same as the height 

 which we might have assigned to it from a comparison with 

 other mountain chaini ; on the northern declivity, however, 

 under the influence of the high lands of Thibet (whose mean 

 elevation appears to be about 11,510 feet), the snow-line is 

 situated at a height of 16,030 feet. This phenomenon, which 

 has long been contested both in Europe and in India, and 

 whose causes I have attempted to develop in various works, 

 published since 1820,* possesses other grounds of interest than 



As the volcano of Aconcagua was not at that time in a state of eruption, 

 we must not ascribe the remarkable phenomenon of the absence of 

 snow to the internal heat of the mountain (to the escape of heated air 

 through fissures), as is sometimes the case with Cotopaxi. Gillies, in 

 the Journal of Natural Science, 1830, p. 316. 



* See my Second Mlmoire sur les Montagues de V Inde, in the Annalet 

 de Ckimie et de Physique, t. xiv., p. 5-55 ; and Asie Centrale, t. iii., p. 

 281327. While the most learned and experienced travelers in India, 

 Ct.lebrooke, Webb, and Hodgson, Victor Jacquemont, Forbes Royle, 

 Carl von Hiigel, and Vigne, who have all personally examined the 

 Himalaya range, are agreed regarding the greater elevation of the 

 enow-line on the Thibetian side, the accuracy of this statement is called 

 in question by John Gerard, by the geognosist MacClelland, the editor 

 of the Ca'cutta Journal, and by Captain Thomas Hutton, assistant sur- 

 veyor of the Agra Division. The appearance of my work on Central 

 Asia gave rise to a rediscnssion of this question. A recent number (vol. 

 iv., January, 1844) of MacClelland and Griffith's Calcutta Journal of 

 Natural History contains, however, a very remarkable and decisive no- 

 tice of the determination of the snow-line in the Himalayas. Mr. Bat- 

 ten, of the Bengal service, writes as follows from Camp Semulka, on the 

 Cosillah River, Kumaon: "In the July, 1843, No. 14 of your valuable 

 Journal of Natural History, which I have only lately had the opportuni- 

 ty of seeing, I read Captain Hutton's paper on the snow of the Hima- 

 layas, and as I differed almost entirely from the conclusions so confi- 

 dently drawn by that gentleman, 1 thought it right, for the interest 

 of scientific truth, to prepare some kind of answer ; as, however, on a 

 more attentive perusal, I find that you yourself appear implicitly to 

 adopt Captain Hutton's views, and actually use these words, * We have 

 long been conscious of the error here so well pointed out by Captain 

 Hutton, in common with every one who has visited the Himalayas, 1 I feel 

 more inclined to address you, in the first instance, and to ask whether 

 you will publish a short reply which I meditate ; and whether your 

 note to Captain Hutton's paper was written after your own full and 

 careful examination of the subject, or merely on a general kind of ac- 

 quiescence with the fact and opinions of your able contributor, who is 

 so well known and esteemed as a collector of scientific data ? Now I 

 am one who have visited the Himalaya on the western side ; I have 

 crossed the Borendo or Boorin Pass into the Buspa Valley, in Lower 

 Kanawar, returning into the Rowaien Mountains of Gbtirwal by the 

 Koopin Pass; I have visited the source of the Jumna at Jumnootiee; 



