1839.] Capt. Pembertons Mission to Bootan, 1837-38. 277 



never saw any of that scrambling into the jungle on the part of the 

 coolies which so generally occurs in Assam and Burmah, where every 

 second or third plant is a favourite dish. 



Of their medicinal plants I am quite ignorant. Our guide, Chillong 

 Soobah, who had a great leaning to the practice of physic, assured me 

 that the Booteas were quite ignorant of any medicine whatever ; but 

 this is so contrary to the prevailing practice among barbarous and semi- 

 barbarous nations, that I place no confidence in the assertion. 



Of the mineral productions of the country I had no opportunity of 

 learning any thing. The only article of this nature that I saw turned 

 to account was clay for pottery ; and this was only met with at Punuk- 

 ka. In short, whatever the resources of the country are, one thing is 

 at least certain, that they have not yet been developed ; and I give 

 the greater part of the nation credit for being amongst the most idle and 

 most useless on the face of the globe. 



Of the agriculture of Bootan little is to be said, as so very large 

 a proportion of the supplies is derived from the Plains. The state 

 in which the little agriculture is, that is carried on, argues as little 

 in favour of the amount of agricultural skill they possess, as the un- 

 cultivated state of the Dooars does in favour of their numerical extent, 

 or of that of their Plain subjects. 



Of Cerealia, or culmiferous plants, they have the following sorts : 

 rice, wheat, barley, raggy, millet, maize ; and of farinaceous grains, 

 not the produce of culmiferous plants, they have buckwheat; and 

 of Atriplex, one or two species of the leguminous grains. They 

 cultivate one or two species of Phaseolus, one of which is the Phaseo- 

 lus, Max ; the Oror, Cytisus Casan ; the Pea, Pisum satirun. 



The only oily seeded plant I saw, and of this only fragments, was 

 the Tel, Sesamum orientate ; I saw no reason however for supposing 

 that they manufactured this oil themselves. 



Of the culmiferous plants, rice forms the staple article of food, and 

 is perhaps exclusively used by the chiefs and their adherents, and the 

 very numerous establishments of priests. It is only the staple article 

 viewing the Dooars as forming part of Bootan, for in the interior 

 the proportion borne by this grain to that of either wheat or barley 

 is very small. 



Most of the spots available from situation and elevation are cultiva- 

 ted in rice, but in all I saw, judging from the remains of the stubble, 

 the crops must have been small. The cultivation is conducted in the 

 ordinary manner, as is likewise the mode of preparing the slopes for 

 irrigation, or in other words, terracing : as might be expected it is 

 generally a summer crop, and in all places of sufficient elevation, is 



