CLIMATE AND VEGETATION OF THE HIMALAYAS. 
iAA/VVVAA/VVVVVVVAA/VVA/'/ 
CLIMATE AND VEGETATION OF THE HIMALAYAS. 
ABRIDGED, FROM THE “JOURNAL OF BOTANY,” BY DR. BUSHNAN; TO WHICH IS APPENDED A LETTER 
FROM DR. HOOKER TO THE BARON A. VON HUMBOLDT, TRANSLATED FROM THE “ GEOGRAPHISCHES 
JAIIRBUCH” OF BERGHAUS, BY A. IIENFREY, ESQ., F.L.S. 
1/J1HE enterprising spirit shown by our indefatigable countryman Dr. J. D. Hooker, the worthy son 
A of a no less worthy father, has excited no small degree of interest among all classes of society, 
and especially among those who devote themselves to the extension and enlargement of the boundaries 
of science. It is, accordingly, with no small degree of pleasure that we testify our esteem by 
joining him, though on a far distant shore, in his botanical mission to the East; and we commence 
our remarks with the record of his steps in his passage down the Ganges. The hanks of that 
stream he describes as generally from ten to fifteen feet above the "level of the waters, sloping 
and sandy on one side, but on the other precipitous, and formed of hard alluvium. Withered 
grass abounds on both hanks. Wheat, Dhal (Cajanus), and gram (Cicer arietinum), Carthamus, 
Vetches, and Rice fields, are the staple products of the country. Though there are few bushes, the 
Argemone mexicana and the Calotropis were universally prevalent. Trees were rare, and these 
usually stunted in them growth. Fici, the Artocarpus, and some Leguminosm were most generally 
noticed. Only two kinds of Palm appeared, the Toddy Palm and a Phoenix, the latter being charac¬ 
teristic of the driest locality. 
The region he explored struck him by its extreme drought, as typified in the absence of Epiphytal 
Orchidem, of Ferns, and of other Cryptogamic plants; of the first, he only met with three spe¬ 
cies. The prevailing genus of Cryptogamia was Riccia, a species of which swarmed everywhere in 
the beds of the river. There were some few water plants, which he terms handsome; a small Vallis- 
neria, very different, however, from the V. spiralis ; two Villarsise; and some Potamogetons. Fungi 
were extremely rare ; only one Agaric was seen, though in spring they are said to be abundant in 
the plains. Of Mosses, only a Fissidens was discovered; Lichens were few, hut no Hepaticse. The 
absence of Cryptogamic plants he considers to be sufficiently explained by the extreme alternations 
of weather; the dry season being followed by the almost complete submersion of the country under 
water for miles, during the three months of the rainy season. Of Rice, he obtained twenty-six 
kinds, some of great beauty, and very different from each other. 
Among the botanical curiosities, he mentions a pair of bellows “ made entirely of the leaves of a 
tree, and used for smelting iron by the Aborigines of these parts. Nothing can prove their poverty 
more strikingly; the article is about the size of a very large cheese; it has a bamboo snout, and 
seems altogether a great curiosity.” 
From Dinapore, Dr. Hooker proceeded by land to Patna. On the road, he observed the reappear¬ 
ance of the Bengal forms of vegetation, to which, for three months, he had been a stranger; also groves 
of Fan and Toddy Palms (rare higher up the river) ; clumps of the large Bamboo, Orange, Acacia 
Sissoo, Melia, Uvaria longifolia, Spondias mangifera, Odina, and Euphorbia antiquorum and neriifolia ? 
trigona ? and indica, all of which were common road-side plants. In the gardens, Papaw, Croton 
Jatropha, Buddlea, Cookia, Loquat, Litchi, Tongan, all kinds of Aurantiacese, Tabermemontana, Plu- 
miera, and the Cocoa-nut, indicated a change of climate, and an approach to the damper regions of the 
many-mouthed Ganges. 
Dr. Hooker’s great object in visiting Patna was to observe the Opium godowns or stores; the plant 
not being cultivated in India without a license. Premiums, however, are given for the best samples. 
“ The Poppy,” observes Dr. Hooker, “ flowers in the end of January and beginning of February, and 
the capsules are sliced in February and March, with a little instrument like a saw, made of three 
serrated plates tied together. The produce is collected in jars, and all the arrangements are con¬ 
ducted with great care. During the north-west or dry winds, the best Opium is procured—the 
worst during the moist or east and north-east. The men employed work ten hours a-day, becoming 
sleepy in the afternoon ; but this is only natural in the hot season, with or without Opium. They are 
rather liable to eruptive diseases, possibly engendered by the nature of then 1 occupation. Even the 
best Indian Opium is inferior to the Turkish, and, owing to peculiarities of climate, will probably 
always be so. It never yields more than five per cent, of Morphia, whence its inferiority; but it is 
good in other respects, and even richer in Narcotine. 
The highly cultivated state of the flat country in the vicinity of Patna does not allow of natural vege¬ 
tation. Some few wild plants were gathered there, and the Mudar plant, (Calotropis), is abundant. 
