CHAPTER XIV 



SUBALPINE REGIONS : HEAT, RAIN, AND DRIPPING 

 JUNGLES 



Having parted with our Bhotia shikaris and faithful 

 yak-drivers, who were excellent intelligent fellows and 

 wonderful mountaineers, the time had come for recom- 

 mencing the survey work. My pleasant companion also 

 had schools to inspect in the Dharma valley. Therefore, 

 with mutual regrets, we had to part, each on his separate 

 route. My path lay down, down perpetually into the 

 steamy hot and reeking climate of the lower hills, still 

 immersed in cloud and rain, the final burst of the monsoon. 



I commenced my march south-westward to the Pindar 

 valley, where the Commissioners' instructions to report 

 on and survey the extensive area of forests there existing 

 must be carried out. 



To reach the Pindar it was necessary, for a few marches, 

 to' descend the defile of the Gori river, blocked up by 

 vast beds of snow, and quite impassable lower down, and 

 to cross westward by the Gula Dhura over a series of 

 ranges which spring from the great mountain mass of 

 Nanda Devi and its fellow peaks, crossing also the valleys 

 of the Ram Ganga and Sarju rivers where they first issue 

 from the snow. This was an arduous and trying march. 

 I was, however, joined by the native surveying staff, 

 who had not come into Tibet ; and where native officials 

 march the arrangements generally go smoothly, as they 



