558 Notes upon a Tour in the Siklcim Himalayah Mountains. [No. 6. 



inhabit these forests ; their note is like a plaintive run upon a flageo- 

 let. 



At the entrance to all the Lepcha clearances I observed forked 

 sticks about eight feet in height supporting numerous wooden 

 swords, minature baskets full of rice, eggs, the crops of fowls filled 

 with rice, little bundles of herbs and flowers, fowls' legs and small 

 baskets of raw cotton ; these are offerings made to an invisible 

 being who is said to reside on the banks of the Cholamo Lake in 

 Thibet, whence the Teesta river (Lachen) takes its rise, and who 

 is said to wield a great sword, with which he deals out death and 

 destruction, as well as sickness and famine. The wooden swords 

 are to deprecate his wrath ; the productions of the earth and of 

 their farms are offered partly as free-will offerings of gratitude for 

 their abundant harvests, and partly as votive offerings. 



At 8 a. M. we crossed a foaming cascade, which was descending over 

 gneiss rocks with a headlong pace down the face of the mountain 

 towards the Kullait. At 9 a. m. we were at the bottom of a deep 

 hot valley, in which flows the Eennier stream, this is a large deep 

 and rocky river flowing from Heeloo. Looking up the valley I per- 

 ceived that the forest trees, crowning the heights many thousand 

 feet above us, were all leafless, the foliage having been destroyed by 

 the snow. The Eennier is crossed by a large fallen tree thrown 

 from bank to bank, notched to prevent the feet from slipping ; with 

 an apology for a bannister, consisting of a few sticks tied together 

 in the rudest manner with creepers, which frail support a Lepcha 

 was obliged to pull quite tight whilst being used, otherwise it would 

 be of little use to a traveller crossing such a boiling, howling chaul- 

 dron, as raged below us. 



The banks of the stream presented hornstone, and in the bed 

 were blocks of a very beautiful gneiss, the component parts of which 

 were intense black mica and pure white quartz. 



A little below the bridge there was a strong wooden palisade sup- 

 porting a quantity of elongated conical fishing baskets and extending 

 quite across the river, destined for the capture of the edible frogs. 



At 11. 30 A. M. after tediously cutting a path through a regular 

 tropical growth of underwood, we reached a small stone fort prettily 

 perched upon a knoll commanding a complete view both up and 



