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ported fresh to India if they can stand the rough journey by 

 bullock cart. Curiously enough, the most characteristic trees 

 of the valley, the Lombardy poplar and the chenar {Platanus 

 orientalis) are not indigenous but are supposed to have been 

 introduced in Mogul times. Rice is possibly the most valuable 

 crop and the hillsides are terraced and irrigated with great care. 

 Wheat, barley and maize are staple crops and all our common 

 vegetables grow readily. 



In Kashmir the tree line is close to 11,500 ft. and Betida 

 Bhojpattra, a white birch, forms thickets at the upper limit. 

 Picea Webbiana gets up to the extreme limit of forest, and below 

 this are dense forests of Cedrus Deodara, Abies Smithiana, and 

 Pinus excelsa mixed with Taxus baccata, Pavia, Juniperus, 

 Juglans, Celtis, Ulmus, Primus, Fraxinus, Acer and like temperate 

 types. 



A noticeable thing in this part of the Himalaya is the absence 

 of a distinct band of rhododendron. Such a band, in many 

 places so impenetrable that travel is impossible, is found clear 

 along the outer Himalaya from China to the northwest of India. 

 Oaks, too, are nowhere prominent as in the outer Himalaya. 



Above the tree line and in the forest glades there are extensive 

 Alpine meadows and there is a wealth of flowering plants that is 

 remarked upon by every traveller. Very few of the genera are 

 peculiar to Asia and almost all of them are related to our own 

 or European types. Many species, even, as Caltha palustris, 

 Batrachium tricophyllum, Ranunculus sceleraius, Aqiiilegia vul- 

 garis, Papaver dubium, Saponaria Vaccaria, Malva rotundifolia, 

 Geranium Robertianum, Epilobium latifolium and Stellaria media 

 are found in both worlds. 



After spending a couple of weeks in the valley of Kashmir, 

 which is 5,000 feet or over, we moved on toward the "Great 

 Range" of the Himalayas that separates the wooded, beautiful 

 country that we have just been in from the arid Tibetan wastes 

 on the other side. Beyond Kashmir there is no cart road, and 

 all provisions and baggage have to be taken on the backs of ponies 

 or coolies. The stages where tents can be pitched, or where 

 there are government two-room rest houses, are about fifteen 



