288 THE SECOND HIMALAYAN JOUENEY 



was swept away. Kinchin, as he was named, is first referred . 

 to in a letter at the end of the Nepaul expedition : 



I have brought from the Snows a most grand Bhotea 

 dog, about which I must write to dear Bessy, and a droll 

 puppy of a breed which I hope will live in the Plains. The 

 former is a huge and savage creature, but a faithful watch ; 

 he does not bite me, but has already so served three of 

 my servants, chiefl;^ at night. If you know a book called 

 * Youatt on the Dog,' and can refer to it, you will find 

 a splendid wood-cut of this — ' the Thibet Mastiff.' 



The results of the Nepaul expedition being completed, from 

 February 27 to March 24 he was in the plains. Happily the 

 Sikkim Terai was free from the malariaj so deadly elsewhere, 

 and he was able to reassure his parents, who would naturally 

 be alarmed by the sudden death not only of his late companions, 

 Mr. Williams^ and his assistant on the Survey, who had im- 

 prudently camped in a most unhealthy jungle, but of his uncle 

 and almost contemporary, Gurney Turner, who had entered 

 the medical service of the E.I.C. 



A reasonably good collection, as he modestly calls it, was the 

 result, though in the densely wooded Terai ' the only safe way 

 of botanising is by pushing through the jungle on elephants ; 

 an uncomfortable method, for the quantities of ants and 

 insects which drop from the foliage above, and from the risk 

 of disturbing pendulous bees' and ants' nests.' Geological 

 research in dense tropical forests was exhausting, but he made 

 many notes, including traces of inversion of the strata, as at 

 the foot of other great mountain ranges, such as the Alleghanies 

 and the Alps. By the Mechi river, the western boundarj^ of 



^ The following is characteristic : ' If, as I fear is the case, the widow of 

 Williams (of the Geological Survey) is left destitute — (she has six children) — 

 there ought to be a small sum raised for her by the officers of the Geological 

 Survey. I have written to Reeks about it, and requested that, if this be done, 

 he would apply to jou for £10 in my name ; for during the two months I spent 

 with poor Williams, he wo aid not allow me to spend a shilling for board or 

 travelling erpenses. Reeks will only set down my name for £2 25., and give 

 the rest under a fictitious signature ; for neither could some of my brother 

 officers afford so much, nor are they called upon to give it by obligations to the 

 deceased.' (To his mother, Feb. 1, 1849. Trenham Reeks, who died in 1879, 

 was Registrar of the School of Mines, and Curator and Librarian of the Museum 

 of Practical Geology.) 



