136 DORJJLING. * Chap. V. 



generous disposition, keep the wallet of the Bijooa always 

 full. 



Such are some of the prominent features of this people, 

 who inhabit the sub-Himalayas, between the Nepalese 

 and Bhotan frontiers, at elevations of 3000 to 6000 feet. 

 In their relations with us, they are conspicuous for their 

 honesty, their power as carriers and mountaineers, and their 

 skill as woodsmen ; for they build a waterproof house with 

 a thatch of banana leaves in the lower, or of bamboo in the 

 elevated regions, and equip it with a table and bedsteads 

 for three persons, in an hour, using no implement but their 

 heavy knife. Kindness and good humour soon attach them 

 to your person and service. A gloomy-tempered or morose 

 master they avoid, an unkind one they flee. If they serve 

 a good hills-man like themselves, they will follow him with 

 alacrity, sleep on the cold, bleak mountain exposed to the 

 pitiless rain, without a murmur, lay down the heavy burden 

 to carry their master over a stream, or give him a helping 

 hand up a rock or precipice — do anything, in short, but 

 encounter a foe, for I believe the Lepcha to be a veritable 

 coward.* It is well, perhaps, he is so : for if a race, nume- 

 rically so weak, were to embroil itself by resenting the 

 injuries of the warlike Ghorkas, or dark Bhotanese, the 

 folly would soon lead to destruction. 



Before leaving the Lepchas, it may be worth mentioning 

 that the northern parts of the country, towards the Tibet 

 frontier, are inhabited by Sikkim Bhoteeas f (or Kumpas), 



* Yet, dui-ing the Ghorka war, they displayed many instances of courage : when 

 so hard pressed, however, that there was little choice of evils. 



t Bhote is the general name for Tibet (not Bhotan), and Kumpa is a large 

 province, or district, in that country. The Bhotanese, natives of Bhotan, or of 

 the Dhurma country, are called Dhurma people, in allusion to their spiritual 

 chief, the Dhurma Rajah. They are a darker and more powerful race, rude, tur- 

 bulent, and Tibetan in language and religion, with the worst features of those 

 people exaggerated. The various races of Nepal are too numerous to be alluded 



