NOTES. CV11 



or by the emission of heated gasses through fissures (Gillies, in the " Journal 

 of Nat. Sciences," 1830, p- 316). 



(^ p- 330. See my " Second Memoire sur les Montagues de 1'Inde," in 

 the " Annales de Chimie et de Physique," T. xiv. pp; 5 55, and " Asie 

 centrale," T- iii. pp. 281327. The fact of the greater elevation of the 

 snow -line on the Thibetian side of the Himalaya was supported by the most 

 experienced and best informed Indian travellers Colebrooke, Webb, and 

 Hodgson, Victor Jacquemont, Forbes Koyle, Carl von Huge], and "Vigne, 

 all of whom knew the mountains by personal examination. It was, however, 

 treated as doubtM by John Gerard ; the geologist Mac Clelland, editor of 

 the " Calcutta Journal ;" and Lieutenant Thomas Hutton, assistant-surveyor 

 of the Agra division. The publication of my work on Central Asia occasioned 

 the renewal of the discussion. A recent number of a journal published in 

 India (Mac Clelland and Griffiths' " Calcutta Journal of Natural History," 

 Vol. iv. January 1844), contains a remarkable notice, which seems nearly 

 conclusive as to the limits of snow on the Himalaya. Mr. Batten, of the 

 Bengal service, writes from the camp of Semulka, on the river of Cosillah, in 

 the province of Kumaoon : " I have only recently read, and with surprise, the 

 statements of Lieut. Thomas Hutton respecting the limits of perpetual snow 

 I feel it a duty towards science to contradict these assertions, because Mr. 

 Mac Clelland goes so far as to speak of the ' service which Lieut. Hutton 

 has rendered to science by dispelling a widely-prevailing error' (Journal of 

 the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Vol. ix. Calcutta, 1840, pp. 575, 578, 

 and 580). It is an erroneous assertion that every traveller in the 

 Himalaya must participate in Button's doubts. I am one of those by 

 whom the western portion of our great chain of mountains has been most 

 visited. I have gone through the Borendo pass into the Buspa valley and 

 the lower Kimawur, and have returned by the lofty pass of Rupin in the 

 mountains of Gurwal. I visited the sources of the Jumna at Jumnotri, aud 

 from thence the tributaries of the Ganges, from Mundakni and Vischnu- 

 Aluknunda to Kadaruath and the celebrated snowy peak of Nundidevi. I have 

 repeatedly crossed the Niti pass to the highlands of Thibet; and the settlement 

 of Bhote-Mehals was established by me. My residence in the very midst of 

 the mountains has for the last six years brought me constantly into intercouj-sc 

 with travellers, both European and native, who I carefully interrogated, and 

 from whom I was able to derive the best information respecting the aspect of 

 the country. All the knowledge gained in these different ways, by personal 

 observation and by the relations of others, has led me to a conviction which 

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