184 9. J excursion from Darjiling to TonyU. 443 



descent, which owing to the late torrents of rain, was most fatiguing and 

 slippery ; it again commenced to drizzle at noon, nor was it till we had 

 descended to 6000 feet, that we imerged from the region of clouds. 

 Then I met with a species of Balanophona, pushing through the soil ; 

 it is a new species, monoicous, the earliest flowering of any in Sikkim, 

 and may be distinguished from its congeners by its cyathiform involucre 

 round the middle of the pedicel. 



By dark we arrived at Simonbong, having descended 5000 feet at the 

 rate of 1000 feet an hour, and here we were kindly received by the 

 Lama, who gave us his temple for the accommodation of the whole 

 party. "We were surprised at this, both because the Sikkim authorities 

 had falsely represented the Lamas as very averse to Europeans, and 

 because he might well have hesitated, before giving ingress to a promis- 

 cuous horde of some 30 people, into a sacred building, when the little 

 valuables on the altar, &c. were quite at our disposal. He made but 

 one request, that the Hindus should not smoke their hookahs inside. 



Simonbong is one of the smallest and poorest Gumpas (or monas- 

 teries) in Sikkim,* unlike the better class, it is built of wooden beams 

 only, and has no monuments, except the Chaits mentioned on our way 

 up the mountain. It consists of one large room, with small sliding 

 shutter-windows, raised on a stone foundation, and roofed with shingles 

 of wood ; opposite the door, which is at one end, (the east,) the altar is 

 placed, of wood, chequered with black white and red diagonally ; to the 

 right and left are shelves with a few MS. books, wrapped in silk ; a 

 model of Symbonath at Nepal, in wood ; a praying cylinder, and some 

 implements for common purposes, bags of Juniper, &c. On the shelves 

 are English wine bottles and glasses, with tufts of Abies Webbiana, 

 Rhododendrons and peacocks' feathers. 



On the altar seven little brass cups are ranged, full of water ; a large 

 shell carved with the sacred lotus ; a brass jug from Lhassa, of beautiful 



* There are upwards of 20 Lama establishments in Sikkim, numbering 800 monks. 

 Many of these are of excellent masonry, Chinese in architecture, gorgeously decorat- 

 ed, and for so poor a country, richly endowed. During my more recent travels in 

 Sikkim I have visited many, been an inmate in the monasteries, and met with the 

 greatest kindness and hospitality from the good fathers. As the first European who 

 has ever lived with the monks, this was the less to be expected. Dr. Campbell, who 

 afterwards joined me, and whose delightful society I visited others, records the 

 same opinion of these good-humored people, 



3 M 



