SURVEY OF TKE GANG^ES. 5i5 



we may trust to the reports to the natives, the tree, if stript of these 

 integuments, renews them in the course of one or two seasons. The tree 

 'grows to the height of thirty or forty feet, and the branches are thrown 

 -out about mid-way up the stem. The largest we saw measured about 

 four feet in circumference. In the vicinity of these trees were several 

 currant bushes, just passing from the blossom into a state of .fructification. 

 The natives say it is of the red species, and the name they give to it is 

 Cacalia^ A large colony of baboons, called Langurs, have taken up 

 their residence in the centre of the forest. They appeared very at- 

 tentive to ail our motions, and some of them had the temerity to 

 advance within a few paces of us. Among the flowery productions, 

 we met with a very handsome shrub, called by the hill people Chi- 

 mala. It produces a head or cluster of bell flowers, similar in size 

 and shape to the Burdns. The leaves are lance-oval, Arm, of a dark'- 

 green above, and of a deep yellow ochrous colour. The stem quite 

 naked, running along the ground, like a creeper, for the distance 

 of ten or fifteen feet; when, taking abend upwards, it rises to the 

 height of eight or ten feet, and throws out branches. The flowers were 

 of different colours, varying, from pure white, with all the intermediate 

 shades, to a dark purple. The examination of these novelties served to 

 beguile the toilsome road ; and we were led on from point to point, 

 with the pleysing hope of having our labour and fatigues rewarded by 

 some new or beautiful production of vegetative nature. 



After quitting these forests, we ascended, over beds of snow, to the 

 •summit of the Cwdri G'hdt, which is a regular steep ascent, of not less 

 than four and an half or iive miles ; whence we may estimate that its 

 height above our last encampment ( wliich was itself a considerable eleva- 



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