Habitat of Himalayan Birds 



directions by some powerful shrinkage of the 

 earth's crust, due perhaps to cooling ; and the 

 result is such a jumble of contorted rock 

 masses, that it looks as if some great castle 

 had been blown up by dynamite and its walls 

 hurled in all directions. The great central 

 masses, however, consist generally of crystalline 

 granite, gneiss, and quartz rock, protruding 

 from the bowels of the earth and shoving up 

 the stratified envelope of rocks nearly 6 miles 

 above sea-level. . . . The higher you get up 

 . . . the rougher and more difficult becomes 

 the climbing ; the valleys are deeper and more 

 cut into ravines, the rocks more fantastically 

 and rudely torn asunder, and the very vitals of 

 the earth exposed ; while the heights above 

 tower to the skies. The torrents rushing from 

 under the glaciers which flow from the snow- 

 clad summits roar and foam, eating their way 

 ever into the misty gorges." 



Those who have not visited the Himalayas 

 may perhaps best obtain an idea of the nature 

 of the country from a brief description of that 

 traversed by a path leading from the plain to 

 the snowy range. Let us take the path from 

 Kathgodam, the terminus of the Rohilkhand 

 and Kumaun railway, to the Pindari glacier. 



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