1895.] H. G. Raverty —Tibbat three hundred aud sixty-five years ago. 95 
but where there are forts and villages there it prevails to a less degree. 
In all cases the symptoms are the same: the respiration is always 
affected or stopped, and a person’s head burns in the same manner as if 
he had taken a heavy load upon it aud had ran up a very high ascent 
with it; and on account of this burning sensation he cannot speak 
without much effort. Then sleep overpowers him, but as yet the eyes 
are scarcely closed in sleep —what from the difficulty of respiration and 
the burning sensation in the head, and pain in the lungs and chest—than 
he awakes again in great anguish and agitation; and this is the state 
into which people always fall when attacked with this malady. When 
it increases, delirium ensues, and the person begins to talk incoherent^, 
and sometimes has not the power to utter a word. The face, hands, and 
feet swell; and when this change has come, the person dies between the 
morning and the early forenoon. It sometimes happens that a person 
attacked lingers in this state for some days ; and if, during this time, 
death does not supervene, and the invalid reaches a fort or village, or 
other inhabited place, there is a chance of his life being saved, but if 
not, death is certain to happen. 
“ Strange to say, this malady does not attack the people of Tibbat, 
In another place (Notes, page 309), on crossing the Qara-Quram range from 
Kahaplu Aghza, he says, that “on the way thither, yon meet with a vast deal of 
snow, and much water, grass, and herbage. As the smell emanating from these 
grasses produces faintness and stupefaction, ti’avellers take care to provide them¬ 
selves with onions when they travel by this route. When a person becomes affected 
from the smell, and feels faintness coming over him, his companions give him an 
onion to eat, and also one to smell at, and this is said to be an effectual antidote.” 
It is doubtful, however, whether it would have the same effect if the person 
continued in that part; for, of course, only the first symptoms of dam-giri, are here 
referred to. 
The Buddhist pilgrims, Hwui Seng and Sung Yun, which latter is said to havo 
been a native of Tibbat, who visited these parts in 518 A.D., in the translation of 
their travels by Beal from the Chinese (page 183), say: “After entering the Th’snng 
Ling for Onion Mountains), step by step we crept up for four days, and then reached 
the highest point of the range. # * * # To the west of the Th’sung Ling 
mountains all the rivers flow to the westward. # # # * To the eastward of the 
capital of this couutry [Han-pan-to, Pan-to, or Khartchou], there is a rapid river (or 
a river, Mang-tsin, or a wide ford river) flowing to the north-east towards Sha-leh 
(Sand-curb, see note 2 page 88).” Here, of course, the Zar-Afshan, described by 
MIrza Haidar, is referred to, which is styled by the name of Mangshln [Mang-tsin] 
up to the present time. 
What I particularly wish to draw attention to here is the coincidence of the 
range being called the “Onion Mountains” in 518 A.D., from which it is evident that 
onions have been used for at least some fourteen centuries as an antidote against an 
attack of dam-giri (see also page 84), and that the probability is, that the range 
got the name of Th’sung Ling, or Onion Mountains, fx’om this use of onions. 
