176 FLORA INDICA. 



2. Bhotan. 



Bhotan is at present one of the least accessible parts of the 

 Himalaya^ and is only known to us by the narratives of Tur- 

 ner and of Pemberton; for Mr. Bogle, who passed through 

 it in 1774;, has left no record of his journey. Captain Turner 

 traversed the most westerly part of the province, from the 

 plains of Bengal to the towns of Tashisudon and Panaka, and, 

 after a short residence in Tibet, returned by the same route to 

 India ; he has not, in his ' Travels,' given any details of the 

 vegetation. 



Major Pemberton, who was accompanied by Mr. Griffith, 

 entered Bhotan a little to the west of the meridian of Gowa- 

 hatti, in Assam, and crossed a range of mountains into the 

 valley of the Monas river, whence he travelled in a westerly 

 direction across high mountains to the valley of the Pa-chu. 

 This river, which rises to the eastward of Chumalari, in Tibet, 

 has an almost due south course to the plains ; but the Monas 

 as well as the Subansiri have a south-west course in Bhotan : 

 higher up they probably run south-east, and bend round to 

 south-west in a curve somewhat parallel to that of the Yarn 

 or Dihong, which afterwards becomes the Brahmaputra. 



In western Bhotan the mountain-ranges are lofty and rug- 

 ged, and the river-courses very deep and generally narrow. 

 At Panaka the Pa-chu is only 3700 feet above the sea, though 

 eighty miles distant from the plains ; and the Monas, where 

 Pemberton and Griffith crossed it, is only 1400 feet, while the 

 range south of it attains an elevation of 9500 feet. In their 

 journey from the Monas to Panaka, these travellers crossed 

 ridges 12,400 feet in height. On their return to India they 

 followed Captain Turner's route. 



The mountain mass which descends from the axis of the 

 Himalaya to separate the Monas from the Subansiri attains an 

 elevation of at least 24,000 feet as far south as latitude 28°. 

 Three peaks upon this are visible from the Khasia mountains, 

 and spurs descending from it were ascended to an elevation 



