286 KHASIA MOUNTAINS. Chap. XXIX. 



Lailang-kot is another village full of iron forges, from a 

 height near which a splendid view is obtained over the 

 Churra flat. A few old and very stunted shrubs of laurel 

 and Sgmplocos grow on its bleak surface, and these are 

 often sunk from one to three feet in a well in the 

 horizontally stratified sandstone. I could only account for 

 this by supposing it to arise from the drip from the trees, 

 and if so, it is a wonderful instance of the wearing effects 

 of water, and of the great age which small bushes 

 sometimes attain. 



The vegetation is more alpine at Kala-panee (elevation, 

 5,300 feet) ; Benthamia, Kadsura, Stauntonia, Illiciiim, 

 Actinidia, Helwingia, Cori/lopsis, and berberry — all Japan 

 and Chinese, and most of them Dorjiling genera — appear 

 here, with the English yew, two rhododendrons, and 

 BiicMandia. There are no large trees, but a bright green 

 jungle of small ones and bushes, many of which are very 

 rare and curious. Luculia Pinceana makes a gorgeous 

 show here in October. 



The sandstone to the east of Kala-panee is capped by 

 some beds, forty feet thick, of conglomerate worn into 

 cliffs ; these are the remains of a very extensive horizontally 

 stratified formation, now all but entirely denuded. In the 

 valley itself, the sandstone alternates with alum shales, 

 which rest on a bed of quartz conglomerate, and the latter 

 on black greenstone. In the bed of the river, whose 

 waters are beautifully clear, are hornstone rocks, dipping 

 north-east, and striking north-west. Beyond the Kala- 

 panee the road ascends about 600 feet, and is well quarried 

 in hard greenstone ; and passing through a narrow gap of 



wood on the right of this road, near the village of Surureem, as an excellent 

 botanical station : the trees are chiefly Rhododendron arbore'um, figs, oaks, laurels, 

 magnolias, and chestnuts, on whose limbs are a profusion of Orchidece, and 

 amongst which a Rattan palm occurs. 



