March, 1849. RANGAMALLY. SAL FOREST. 393 



The great trunks of the trees were often scored by tigers' 

 claws, this animal indulging in the cat-like propensity of 

 rising and stretching itself against such objects. Two 

 species of Billenia were common in the forest, with long 

 grass, Symplocos, Emblica, and Cassia Fistula, now covered 

 with long pods. Several parasitical air-plants grew on the 

 dry trees, as Oberonia, Vanda, and JErides. 



At Ran gam ally, the height of the sandy banks of the 

 Teesta varies from fifteen to twenty feet. The bed is 

 a mile across, and all sand ; * the current much divided, 

 and opaque green, from the glacial origin of most of its 

 head-streams. The west bank was covered with a small 

 Sal forest, mixed with Acacia CatecJm, and brushwood, 

 growing in a poor vegetable loam, over very dry sand. 



The opposite (or Bhotan) bank is much lower, and 

 always flooded during the rains, which is not the case on 

 the western side, where the water rises to ten feet below the 

 top of the bank, or from seven to ten feet above its 

 height in the dry season, and it then fills its whole bed. 

 This information we had from a police Jemadar, who has 

 resided many years on this unhealthy spot, and annually 

 suffers from fever. The Sal forest has been encroached 

 upon from the south, for many miles, within the memory of 

 man, by clearing in patches, and by indiscriminate felling. 



About ten miles north of Rangamally, we came to an 

 extensive flat, occupying a recess in the high west bank, 

 the site of the old capital (Bai-kant-pore) of the Jeelpigoree 

 Rajah. Hemmed in as it is on three sides by a dense 

 forest, and on all by many miles of malarious Terai, it 

 appears sufficiently secure from ordinary enemies, during a 

 great part of the year. The soil is sandy, overlying gravel, 



* Now covered with Anthistivia grass, fifteen feet high, n little Sissoo, and 

 Bombax. 



