# Memoirs of Travel, Sport and Natural History/Chapter 9

Memoirs of Travel, Sport and Natural History by Henry John Elwes was first published in London in 1930, and edited by Edward G. Hawke
CHAPTER IX
THE KHASIA HILLS, 1886
I had a rather trying journey from Darjeeling to Gowhatty in Assam, partly by steamer, partly by rail, and partly on horseback. On arriving there I found that I could go by tonga to Shillong sixty miles off, and by starting at daybreak do the journey in the day. The tonga appeared with a pair of weak half-starved ponies and my baggage went in a bullock cart. Though these ponies were changed at very short stages, and I think there were as many as ten relays in the sixty miles, they were quite incapable of going out of a walk. When the ascent was at all steep, they could only be kept going at all by continual thrashing. A Bengali is generally a brute to animals which are not his own property, but these wretches were themselves suffering from malaria and treated their miserable beasts so badly that one died on the road. I had to walk at least a quarter of the way, and only reached Shillong after a most tiring day of fourteen hours through a very hot, malarious and unpleasant country. Shortly afterwards, when I was dining with the Commissioner of Assam, his wife asked me what I thought of the tonga service, which had only recently been started. I said that I thought it was the worst I had ever seen in any country and that the state of the ponies was disgraceful. This did not please my host at all, but it appeared that during the rainy season the road was so unhealthy that only very low-class natives would do the work and the difficulty of getting fodder for the horses was very great.
I soon found Shillong to be very unlike any place I had previously seen in India. The bungalows were scattered about a tract of open undulating country at the foot of a range of hills which rise to about 6,400 feet on the north side of the station. There is nothing whatever in the vegetation or scenery to remind one of the tropics. Scattered pine-trees and grass or brushwood-covered slopes reminded one far more of some parts of the upper Engadine near St. Moritz, whilst the aspect of the little marshy spots among the hills, and the vegetation which clothes the sides of the little streams, recall the Highlands of Scotland. But this resemblance is only superficial, for when one examines the plants one sees that, though a number of genera and species which are characteristic of much higher elevation in the Himalayas occur, yet there is a variety and a wealth of vegetation which one would not expect from a hasty glance over the country. The station of Shillong did not exist when Sir Joseph Hooker visited these hills in 1850. Cherrapunji was then the only European station in the hills, but was deserted about twenty years ago in consequence of the excessively heavy rainfall. At Shillong, which is only twenty-five miles distant, the rainfall is comparatively light, only about ninety inches, and the climate seemed to me to be drier, cooler and less muggy at this season than at Darjeeling. Though rain or mist occurred on most days during the fortnight I remained in the neighbourhood, yet there was also a good deal of sunshine, and ground leeches are unknown ​here on the plateau. The geology and vegetation of the Khasia hills have been so well described by Sir Joseph Hooker in his Himalayan Journals that I need not go into details. But though he botanised in these hills with a large staff of collectors for several months, he did not exhaust the wonderful riches of the vegetation. Mr. Clarke, who was then the best botanist in India, had resided there for some time and collected diligently during the whole of his numerous excursions into the hills, but he found new plants on several occasions during our rambles.
As regards butterflies, my first impression was that the locality was a poor one, and though this impression was somewhat modified later, I must say that at this season, which is perhaps not so favourable as a month or two later, the number of species of butterflies which I found abundant was very small. During my ramble round the station the most remarkable species I took was Argynnis rudra, which, though distinguished by slight differences from the European A. laodice, is found nowhere else in India, and represents a group whose range is from East Prussia through Siberia to Japan. Other species which I took were characteristic of the North-Western rather than of the Eastern Himalaya; whilst only one or two of the insects common here are found in abundance in Sikkim. With regard to birds, they were so few in numbers and variety that they might almost be said to have no characteristic facies. I never was in any locality in India, and in very few in Europe, where birds were so scarce as in the hills round Shillong at this season. You might walk for six or seven miles without seeing as many species of birds, and these were merely common species such as Mynahs, Bulbuls, Pipits and Crows. I made enquiries for natives who might be useful in my collecting, but, though two or three were brought to me, it was evident that they had little or no knowledge of the subject, and being unable to speak Hindustani they were useless. A certain Royan Sing from the village of Maoflong, who turned up on the next day, was, according to his own account, an accomplished collector of plants, birds and insects. But I soon found that he valued himself and his accomplishments so highly that I could do nothing with him; though I got from him a few butterflies of sorts which I did not see myself. In the afternoon Clarke returned from Jowai and kindly asked me to take up my quarters in his house. Among other visits, we paid one to Mr. Mann, who was the chief officer of the Forest Department in Assam, and lived there during the rainy season in a charming bungalow a mile from Shillong. His garden was one of the best kept and richest that I saw in India, and contained numerous native and exotic trees, shrubs, orchids and herbaceous plants. A fine red Salvia was very showy, and many interesting species of Balsams, Begonias and Hedychium were flowering, but, except for a new species of Balsam from Upper Assam, Impatiens Manni, which has variegated leaves and the habit of a Sonerila, I saw nothing in flower that was very striking from a horticultural point of view. Mr. Mann, a Hanoverian by birth, was a distinguished forest officer and botanist and had 2,500 square miles of forest under his direction in various parts of Assam. He showed us a beautiful album of coloured drawings of the Khasia orchids which are extremely numerous. Sir Joseph Hooker says that fully 250 species occur in the ​Khasia hills, where they form perhaps the largest natural order of plants, and he doubts whether in any other part of the globe the species of orchids outnumber those of any other natural order or form so large a proportion of the flora. Balsams are next in relative abundance; over twenty-five species occur, of which many are of great beauty, and two of them, Impatiens salicifolia and I. Chinensis, were then very showy and abundant about Shillong.
In the evening Clarke showed me some of the very numerous plants which he had collected during the last twenty years in Assam, and which already nearly filled a good-sized room. He had, during his sendee in the Education Department of Bengal, been one of the most hard-working and distinguished botanists who ever came to India, and being blessed with an extraordinary constitution and wonderful activity for a man of his age, had botanised over a great extent of country. The number of sheets of plants collected by him amounted to over 50,000, many of them found in the most remote parts of Chota Nagpur, Sikkim, Kashmir, the Naga hills and Manipur. And as during the whole of his career he had been in the habit of laying in and ticketing all his plants when fresh with his own hands, adding sketches and dissections of the most important species before drying them, it may be supposed that his herbarium, which has since been most generously presented to Kew, is of immense value.
On September 14th it rained all the morning, but in the afternoon we walked out to a place called the Farm, four miles from Shillong and 800 feet above it. The road lay through open pine-woods and over uncultivated down-like hills. There was nothing tropical or even Indian in the scenery or vegetation, and though perhaps the species of plants observed belong to tropical genera, the most conspicuous features were not tropical, and many European genera and even species, such as Spiræa Lamium and Agrimonia, were noticed. Among the coarse grass numerous plants of Osbeckia crinita and a pretty pink Melastoma, were flowering, together with a blue Cyanotis, a small Arisæma, A. Leschenaulti, and some terrestrial orchids.
At the Farm there was a nice little bungalow formerly occupied by a gardener, who attempted to form a Government nursery and vegetable garden. Owing to bad management, unsuitable soil and other difficulties, which so often mar the success of well-intentioned but badly organised Government schemes in India, the garden was abandoned, and the bungalow used as a dak bungalow.
Next morning about eight we went along a path leading up to Shillong Peak, as it was then called—a rounded knoll clothed on one side by a small but very dense patch of primæval forest, at a higher elevation than any other in the Khasia hills. It is about 5,000 feet above the sea and commands a wide view over rolling downs and rounded hills which fall somewhat steeply to the north and stretch away in the far distance towards the Jaintia hills on the east and the southern edge of the plateau on the south. I was not fortunate on this or any other occasion in seeing the wonderful view of the Himalayan range which is described with so much detail by Sir Joseph Hooker. Mist or cloud always obstructed the distant ​view, but I could see the North Cachar hills at a distance of seventy miles or more. According to Sir J. Hooker, the visible horizon of the observer from this point encloses an area of fully 30,000 square miles, which is as great as that of Ireland. It extends from the Tippera hills on the south, 100 miles distant, and the delta of the Ganges 120 miles away on the southwest, over the Garo hills and the Assam valley to the Himalayas on the north and north-east. Some of the peaks in this range, which occupy 60 degrees of the horizon and extend over 250 miles, are visible at a distance of 220 miles from Shillong. But though the view is such an extraordinarily wide one, I do not think it could compare in grandeur or interest with many much more restricted views which are constantly before one in Sikkim.
The vegetation of these elevated downs is very peculiar and unlike anything I have seen in the Himalayas; it is composed of coarse wiry grasses, which do not form a turf, but are mingled with numerous showy herbaceous plants and shrubs in the hollows. A Primula, which in Sikkim is only found at 10,000 to 12,000 feet, occurs in wet places. Numerous terrestrial orchids, of which Habenaria pectinata, Platanthera Manni, Satyrium Nepalense and Aceras angustifolia are the commonest, three or four showy Balsams, an Anthericum, a dwarf Roscœa like R. purpurea, a splendid yellow-flowered plant allied to Pedicularis (Centranthera grandiflora), and many others were gathered. Numerous small butterflies, Terias, Cœla, T. Verrata, Lycilna maka, L. dipora and L. chenelli, with small Satyridæ such as Yphthima nareda and Y. sakra, were flying about the downs. Three large species of fritillaries, Argynnis Childrens, A. rudra and A. niphe, were constantly seen driving along before the wind which generally blows up there; but birds, with the exception of a few pipits, grass warblers and green pigeons which came in flocks to feed in the adjacent patch of forest, were wonderfully scarce,
I soon discovered, however, that in the little wood on the Peak and in the wooded glens which descend from the ridge towards Shillong, there were very many rare and interesting forest-loving species of birds, insects and plants; and though it was very difficult to penetrate on account of the want of paths, I stuck to this ground as the best place for collecting during my stay at Shillong. The trees in these little woods and glens are not, as a rule, large, and consist mainly of evergreen species of oak, laurel, magnolia, Aralia, wild cinnamon and others, many of which are densely covered with Cœlogyne, Pleione and other orchids and climbing plants. The undergrowth is a dense thicket of Bœhmeria and other nettles. I noticed a dwarf bamboo which had recently seeded and died down, a climbing yellow-flowered Dicentra Thalictrifolia, and on the skirts of the woods were numerous trees of rhododendron and of Daphne Wallichii whose sweet-scented white flowers were now in perfection. Many curioua herbaceous plants also occur on the skirt of the woods, such as Lilium giganteum, the tall blue-flowered Delphinium altissimum, the curious red-berried Pentapanax Pseudo-ginseng, and a graceful rue, Thalictrum Javanicum.
In the depths of the shady ravines numerous rare ferns were found with species of Polygonatum, Paris polyphylla, and other Liliaceæ, whilst ​growing among the rotten debris of decayed wood we found a leafless Monotrope, and a single plant, new to science, of one of those beautiful-leaved terrestrial orchids (Anæctochilns Elwesi C.B. Clarke) which are the admiration and despair of English gardeners on account of the difficulty of growing them.
I have been somewhat particular in describing the vegetation of this peak, because it was not visited till later in the season by Sir Joseph Hooker, who does not seem to have botanised in these deep glens as carefully as in some parts of the hills, and also because the vegetation of the highest and most undisturbed spots in the whole of the range is always of particular interest and importance from a naturalist's point of view. The companionship of such an accomplished botanist as Mr. Clarke, whose knowledge of the local flora was so accurate that I could always learn the name of every plant of interest at once, naturally inclined me to pay more attention to the plants than I had lately done since I became specially interested in the butterflies. Though it is difficult, not to say impossible, to collect everything, yet even a superficial knowledge of several branches of natural history often leads to the correct appreciation of difficult points in each of them, and here it was highly interesting to see that the presence of butterflies, found at higher elevations in Sikkim and elsewhere only found in the North-West Himalaya, was accompanied by the appearance of some plants having the same distribution.
I am quite unable to account for the fact, of which several cases are also quoted by Sir J. Hooker, by any difference between the climate of the Khasia hills and that of Sikkim. The situation of the Khasias, which are surrounded on both sides by the hot tropical valleys of Assam and Sylhet, and which are not exposed to the influence of the high snowy range of the Himalaya as Sikkim is, would lead one to expect more tropical rather than more temperate forms of animal and vegetable life at similar elevations, but all that I observed on the plateau of the Khasias is distinctly to the contrary. I am unable to compare exactly the mean temperature of Shillong peak with that of a similar elevation in the outer hills of Sikkim, but I certainly found the climate more bracing, less muggy and much more windy. Probably the absence of the dense forest which covers the Sikkim hills up to 11,000 or 12,000 feet, and the comparative absence of radiation, cause the climate to be more favourable to the upward extension of tropical forms, which is more marked in the outer than in the inner ranges nearer the snow; for in the neighbourhood of Kohima, a station m the Naga hills about 180 miles north-east of Shillong, where the forest is much heavier than on the Khasia plateau, the vegetation more closely resembles that of Sikkim. A letter on this subject from Clarke to Sir J. Hooker published in the Journal of the Linnean Society for 1886, p. 128, is so interesting in its bearing on this subject that I shall quote some passages from it here. Writing from Kohima on October 10th, 1885, Mr. Clarke says:
After describing some points in the botany which I need not quote, Mr. Clarke goes on to say:
This description of Kohima shows that the soil and the presence of forest have a much greater influence on the vegetation than the mere elevation or distance.
​Besides the butterflies which I have mentioned as frequenting the open downs, I found on this and subsequent occasions some forest-loving species of great interest on the skirts of the wood at the peak. The one which gave me most pleasure was a large dark grey species of Delias with yellow blotches on the underside, Delias ithiela Butler. This insect was originally described by mistake as occurring at Penang, and is a dark form of a common Himalayan butterfly, Delias horsfieldii, which occurs from Kulu in the north-west as far as Sikkim. It may probably be the same as D. belladonna, a species which occurs in China and East Tibet, but is so variable that until now I had been unable to separate the different forms of it which occur at various elevations in Sikkim, most abundantly by the side of streams in deep tropical gorges where it sits on wet sand or stone, but sometimes in the forest from 6,000 to 8,000 feet. The female, which is so rare that it was unknown to the describer, I had never been able to find in Sikkim, but here on the skirts of this little wood I found both sexes fairly abundant, though very different in their habits, as in their habitat, from the Sikkim insect. Here they emerge from the dense foliage of the tree-tops and sail about with a gentle soaring motion in the sun, continuing their flight even when mist and rain come on, and frequently settling on the blossoms of a Dipsacus and of a white-flowered shrub, Viburnum coriaceum, which attracted them. Though they are somewhat shy, I was enabled by patiently watching these flowers to catch a good series of this beautiful insect. I saw them also' in and near similar patches of forest in other parts of the hills above 4,000 feet.
Another insect which I was quite unprepared to find there was more rare. It is the same as, or almost identical with, Lethe maitrya, a glossy dark brown Satyrid which was first discovered in the North-West Himalayas at over 9,000 feet elevation, and afterwards found abundantly by me on the Tonglo range in Sikkim at 9,000 to 12,000 feet. Here it occurred as low as 5,000 feet but must be rare, as I only took four or five specimens and no one else has recorded its existence on the Khasias. A few large and beautiful Papilios were occasionally seen hovering over the tree-tops in this wood, and flying before the wind over the ridge, whilst Danais tytia, a species which occurs in the North-West Himalayas and Japan, was also not uncommon. On a piece of marshy ground between the station and the farm I also took one or two specimens of a Clouded Yellow, Colias Fieldii, which, though peculiar to the Himalayas, and even common there both in the north-west and in Sikkim, frequents much higher elevations than it does at Shillong, and is typical of one of the most Arctic forms of insect life, of which some species occur in the highest latitudes. A similar straggler is found in the form of Colias nilghiriensis, a near ally of our English Pale Clouded Yellow, on the tops of the hills of Southern India, but nowhere in the country between there and the North-West Himalayas. Though the species varies extremely over the greater part of its wide range from England to Japan, and has been divided into many supposed species, yet none of its forms seems to be so well ​marked as this isolated race in the mountains of Southern India, whilst on the other hand the C. Fieldii of Khasia is absolutely indistinguishable from the Himalayan insect.
Another walk in the neighbourhood of the farm was to the so-called Elephant Falls, in a pretty gorge about a mile from the bungalow where a stream, which after heavy rains is of fair size, falls over rocks into a deep dark pool, overhung by steep banks covered with pines and a common form of evergreen oak (Quercus Griffithi). In some marshy ground below these falls there grew in abundance two species of Grass of Parnassus, a genus which reminds one of similar spots in the Highlands. One of them, Parnassia Wightiana, is a lovely plant with large white fringed petals. I gathered the seeds and sent them to Kew, for the cool orchid house there. In this neighbourhood, as everywhere on the plateau of the Khasias, one remarks groups of upright stones, sometimes of very large size, arranged in a line of five or seven or more, with the tallest in the centre, and smaller ones on each side, and having one or two large altarlike stone tables in front of them. These monuments, which have been described at length by Mr. Clarke, were not, according to his views, for sacrificial purposes, bur simply family monuments erected to the memory of deceased persons. Some of them are of great size, as much as thirty feet in height, but the majority of them are from six to ten feet, and they are found scattered about the country, remote from habitations, as well as in the vicinity of villages. At Nurtiung in the Jaintia hills there is a remarkable collection of them, forming a veritable Stonehenge, but as far as I have seen, they bear no inscriptions and therefore give no clue to the history of their erection.
I spent three or four days in collecting near the Shillong Peak, and constantly discovered plants new to me, some of which were very striking, but my collection of butterflies increased but slowly, and not having received my gun and baggage from Gowhatty, I had no means of identifying the few birds I saw. On September 7th, I returned with Clarke to Shillong, and the next day visited what are called the Bishops' Falls, which are in a deep gorge about three miles from the station. They consist of one fall of about 200 feet, which, though the body of water is not large, is very pretty, and of a lesser fall below it. Below the junction of the two streams which unite here and form the Umiang river, there seems to be a larger and finer fall, but owing to the precipitous nature of the rocks and the dense jungle which grows on the bottom of the gorge, this part of it seems inaccessible. The heat when the sun came out was considerable, and the vegetation much more tropical than on the plateau 1,000 feet above. The ravine was full of immense, smooth and apparently water-worn blocks of conglomerate, piled together and overgrown with long coarse grass and bushes. Of butterflies I saw several species of Hesperidæ and a few large day-flying moths of the genus Euschema, and a fine large blue and black Adolias which I could not catch. The most striking plant was an immense red-flowered Hedychium, which does not seem to have been described, and a species of Codonopsis, a blue-flowered ​trailing plant. In the dry sandy pasture at the top of the rocks were numbers of a beautiful herbaceous plant with large blue gentian-like flowers, Exacum tetragonum. The only birds I saw here were a few shrikes, bulbuls, swallows and mynahs, with a vulture or two soaring overhead. On the next day I rode for about ten miles on the Gowhatty road as far as the bridge over the Khiri river, which is about 2,000 feet below Shillong. The first four or five miles lay over the plateau which is there better wooded than in most parts, but the woods consist of pines and bushes rather than of true forest trees. Then the road turns round the shoulder of the hill into the Umiang valley and winds down the side of this for five or six miles. The day being fine and hot, I saw more butterflies there than anywhere else near Shillong, many of a decidedly tropical character, including several Papilios, Euplœas and Lycœnidæ, but nowhere in anything like the abundance or variety that one would expect. Towards the lower part of the descent the vegetation in shady gullies was of an almost tropical character with figs, tree-ferns and large climbing Mucunas; but at the bottom the road comes out into the great stretch of bare, grasscovered downs which I described on the journey up from Gowhatty. There, by the side of little ravines, I found two pretty blues, Thecla nissa and Hypolycœna Grotei, both of which occur in Sikkim, but less commonly.
The valley of the Umiang looked like good collecting ground, but owing to the want of paths I could not explore it far, and found the long coarse grass very difficult to get through. The scarcity of paths in all parts of the Khasia hills is very annoying to the naturalist. It seems to be caused by the scarcity of cattle, for though the country appears to be better adapted for them than some parts of the Himalayas, they are kept in small numbers and seemingly are of very little use. The breed is small and not badly shaped, some hornless and of a red colour like small polled Norfolk cattle. They seem to be more beefy and better adapted for slaughter than the ordinary Bengal breed, but give very little milk, which is not, however, used by the Khasia people. The cattle are also but little employed for draught, most of the cultivation being done by hand. It is said that the long period of dry cold weather makes the grass very coarse, but I noticed that it was much shorter and of better quality where it had been regularly fed down, and I think that with some care and judgment both cattle and horses might be bred with success in these hills. The few ponies that are kept all come from Bhutan, Manipur, or the plains, and the natives apparently have no idea of breeding them, though the demand among planters and others in Assam is considerable. Sheep have been tried near Shillong but were said to have thriven badly on account of the innumerable caterpillars which cover the grass at certain seasons, but I could not learn that any serious attempt had been made in the way of pastoral farming by anyone with adequate experience. An enormous quantity of grass goes to waste annually, which, if converted into silage when young, would make very fair winter fodder; as this system has been proved highly successful in the plains of India, it might well be tried.
On September 11th my baggage was still on the road from Gowhatty, but we determined to wait no longer and started for a week's excursion to Nunklow, which is about thirty-six miles from Shillong on the old road ​from Gowhatty to Cherra. Clarke had ordered coolies who are not always easy to procure at this season and who receive high pay, eight annas a day, for carrying much lighter loads than in Sikkim. They did not get off till past ten o'clock, and as the first day's march to Syeng is about sixteen miles, they were rather late in arriving. The first ten miles of the road is rather uninteresting, over open grassy country with many small ravines but no high hills, and only scattered fir trees here and three. The villages are few and far between and only small patches are cultivated with potatoes, Indian corn and Coix (Job's tears), a poor hard grain which grows in a thin crop at 4,000 to 6,000 feet and is eaten by the poorer Khasia people. Turning off the main road to Cherra about ten miles from Shillong, we crossed a rocky hill and descended into a wide marshy flat, two or three miles across, where the path is in some places wet and bad, but always passable for ponies. On the other side of this there is an ascent of about 500 feet to the village of Syeng, at the entrance to which the road passes along the upper side of one of the so-called sacred groves, which are preserved in a state of nature near most of the villages on the plateau; these are almost the only bits of real primaeval forest left in the country. Then passing through one of the square stone-built enclosures with seats all round it, which are found at the entrance to many Khasia villages and used as resting-places by loaded coolies, we entered the scattered and very picturesque but dirty village of Syeng, below which a small and rather dilapidated bungalow afforded us shelter for the night.
The wood at Syeng seemed richer in birds than any I had yet seen; it was mostly composed of oaks, laurels and Castanopsis, and many of the trees were laden with ferns and orchids, Hedychiums and other epiphytes. Ivy was also growing on some of them, which, though botanically identical with the European ivy, H. helix, was of different habit. The people at Syeng, who were idling about their dirty hovels, most of which had a large cesspool at the very door, did not seem to be much used to the presence of Europeans; but they supplied us with firewood, and, after making a large fire and getting the bungalow swept out, we made ourselves comfortable for the night. A few moths came to the lamp in the evening, but I did not find any place where I stayed in the Khasia at all comparable to Darjeeling for moth collecting at night, and I only procured about a hundred species by day and night during the month I spent in these hills. In the morning I went to the wood before breakfast and collected a few butterflies, but it was too early and too wet to do much. I found the lovely green Ilerda androcles, which is so common in Sikkim, and a Large Blue of the Argiolus group which was new to me, abundant along the hedges of Prinsepia, which, according to Sir J. Hooker, is only found at 8,000 feet in Sikkim. Mr. Clarke's habit of breakfasting before starting, which I believe was also adopted by Sir Joseph Hooker, is perhaps better adapted for botanical collecting than my own plan, which was, whenever possible, to halt for breakfast on the march. It is not every man who, after a long residence in India, can eat a hearty breakfast early in the morning, and by doing so one misses the two or three morning hours which of all others are the best for collecting birds. But Clarke in many respects was one of the most remarkable men in India, and at fifty-five ​years of age was able to walk through the longest and hottest marches and to climb over the most difficult ground from morning till night without apparently feeling hunger, thirst or fatigue. And this he did in the most unhealthy climates and in the same clothes as he would wear in Europe; even scorning to wear a solar topee or to use an umbrella for protection against the sun. A really fever-proof constitution like his is a blessing given to few, and it enabled him to get through an amount of work that would have killed many other people.
From Syeng to Myrung was a short march of about nine miles over an undulating country of grass or rocky hills and winding shallow valleys with very little cultivation and few inhabitants. I saw but little in the way of birds, insects or plants, which I had not seen before, and a wood which I explored on the way, though it seemed likely ground, was equally barren of novelty. The character of the streams in these hills is peculiar. They generally flow in a deep narrow stony bed overgrown on both sides by a dense bush of shrubs and coarse herbaceous plants, with occasional peaty marshes full of a peculiar vegetation in which Eriocaulon, Parnassias and many curious grasses are found. The water is rather peaty in places, but clear and sweet; but I observed hardly any fish, frogs or newts in it. Mammalia also seemed extremely scarce in these hills at this elevation, and, excepting squirrels, I hardly saw an animal during the whole of my stay; though in the low valleys and along the foot of the hills wild elephants, tigers and monkeys are found, they do not seem to ascend the plateau.
FIG. 6.—A CANE BRIDGE IN THE KHASIA HILLS, IN THE DRY SEASON.
On September 13th we left Myrung about nine and went on quickly to Nurmai, about six miles, over a country much like that of the previous day. Shortly before reaching the village there was another church and a small wood in which I found some fine orchids and that curious root parasite, Balanophora, which grows like a round, pinkish hard fungus in little clusters under the dense shade, and has neither leaves, stem, nor flowers which could be recognised as such except by a botanist, A large plant of Dendrobium chrysanthum was in flower, and a Hedychium with green and white flowers which I had found in Bhutan (H. albovirens C.B. Clarke). In this wood was a large horned owl which was persistently mobbed by bulbuls and other small birds; I also saw a small tailless wren-like bird, probably Pnœpyga pusilla, creeping amongst the roots. Beyond Nurmai the road gradually descends, and the character of the country changes, rice fields become more numerous, but the cultivation is confined to the narrow swampy valleys between the hills. I also saw a small patch or two of Caladium escalentum, which is grown for the food afforded by its large fleshy roots. In the same swamps Arundina bambusifolia and Hedychium coronarium were abundant at 4,000 to 5,000 feet. On the road we passed a collection of three or four hundred natives who were holding a market on a bare knoll away from any village, but the products for sale were few and of inferior quality, consisting principally of betel, salt, stinking dry fish from the plains, coarse plantains, potatoes too small for export, maize and caladium roots. The majority of the people were dirty and ill-dressed and the women extremely plain. There seemed to be some considerable variation in their type of countenance, for which I did not know them well enough to account, as it takes some time to appreciate the distinctive facial characteristics of a new race; for this reason travellers should never select individuals for photographing or drawing until they know them pretty well. Three or four miles further on we came to the bungalow at Nunklow, which like others on that road was but little used, and much out of repair. It was infested with fleas and mosquitoes, which we had not found elsewhere. The water in the tank close by was very bad and unwholesome, and many people had been ill from drinking it, so it was necessary to send a mile away to get good ​water, The situation is hotter and more unhealthy than that of other villages on the plateau, and though it lies close to the edge of the forest on the north slope of the hills, and is a good place for collecting, it is not at all a pleasant residence.
As it was still early I walked two or three miles down the old Gowhatty road which descends steeply just beyond the bungalow, and soon came into a wooded glen which has a thoroughly tropical vegetation. A fine tree fern, Cyathea spinulosa Hook, Pandanus, Areca triandra and other plants which are not found anywhere above Nunklow, here formed a conspicuous part of the vegetation, but pines on all the moie open knolls and ridges were also numerous, and became larger as one descended, giving a very peculiar aspect to this otherwise tropical jungle. There I also saw that splendid butterfly, Thaumantis diores, a large blue and black insect which haunts the densest undergrowth and flits along amongst the bushes in a way which makes it rather difficult to catch. Besides this and a species of Neptis new to me, I saw little, and I returned to the top of the hill before dark, getting on the way some fine plants which I thought might interest Clarke, who had not been there at that season before. Chirita pumila, C. acuminata, a huge white Hedychium with flower-spikes two feet long, and a fine mass of Dendrobium were amongst them.
Nunklow was one of the first posts occupied by our troops in the Khasia hills, and was the scene of a bloody massacre in 1829, when Lieutenants Burlton and Bedingfield with about fifty sepoys were surprised and murdered by a treacherous band of Khasias who had previously been on good terms with them. This led to the whole of the hills being annexed, and the power of the native chiefs broken by degrees, but a long period of harassing war was required before the country was thoroughly pacified. Though it is now many years since there has been any trouble in these hills, there was a serious outbreak in the Jaintra hills which join them on the east as recently as 1862.
On September 14th we breakfasted early, and set off for the bridge over the Khiri river (erroneously called Borpani in Hooker's Himalayan Journals). This lies about six miles down the old Assam road, and is at least 2,000 feet below Nunklow. The morning was hot but soon became cloudy, and about noon turned out very wet. Clarke had always had bad weather during his visits here, and thought the place must be as much wetter as it certainly was hotter and more unhealthy than Shillong. The look and smell of the jungle towards the bottom of the descent gave one the impression of a most feverish place, and it is considered most dangerous to sleep down there at any time between March and November. Partly on this account and partly because of the new road being open, this route to Gowhatty was then little used, and the country for some distance seemed very nearly deserted, though a few jhooms were seen in the forest; it is said that villages formerly existed on the low grass-covered hills on the other side of the Khiri which have to be crossed before the final descent into Assam. Near the bottom of the descent I heard the curious cry of the great howling monkeys, a large flock of which were feeding in the trees; they rushed off in a great fright when I surprised them, though they managed to keep very much out of sight in the dense ​foliage as they swung from tree to tree. The path, though still good and paved with stones on the steeper parts, was much overgrown with high grass and covered with moss and weeds. A most beautiful species of Æschynanthus with large crimson and black spotted flowers was common on the trees, and Clarke found so much to collect that we soon parted company. Near the bottom of the hill I found a beautiful pink and white orchid-like flower which is developed at the root of a ginger-like plant, Kæmpferia sp., but the flowers of this family are mostly fugacious and difflcult to preserve, and are not much in favour with gardeners at home.
A well-built iron suspension-bridge crossed the river, which is large and very rapid, boiling down over immense boulders between rocky banks covered with vegetation. Here in a rather inaccessible spot under the bridge I found a beautiful little orchid with fibrous roots and large white flower, which was unknown to Clarke but turned out to be Thunia Bensonia. That and Dendrobium densiflonim, two of the most favourite plants of our orchid houses, were in full beauty, but I was much disappointed with the number and variety of butterflies which I caught. With the exception of a few common Papilios such as P. philoxenus and P. Paris, a single Neope bhadra, a few small Lycœnidæ and Hesperidæ, I got nothing worth speaking of that day, and the heavy rain which came on prevented me from remaining long in this beautiful though unhealthy spot. Birds also were scarce and, strange as it may seem in a country which seems so favourable, I did not see a single species of woodpecker in the Khasias, whilst in Sikkim a day never passed without my seeing four or five kinds. Bulbuls, small wax-bills, king crows and barbets, all of common species, were the most abundant, but having no gun I did not pay much attention to them. Clarke came in late very wet and heavily laden with plants, which it took him some hours to lay in and ticket, a duty which he religiously performed every night. As it was again very wet in the morning, and we did not see much prospect of good weather, we started back to Myrung. On arriving there it was windy and cloudy but seemed to be clear again on the north side of the hills. The rainfall is evidently very partial and local in this district. It is often raining in torrents at Cherra, and all along the south side of the hills, when it is fine and bright at Shillong; and sometimes, though not often, the reverse is the case.
I went out again in the Myrung wood and found some curious ground orchids, among them the great yellow Cyrtopodium of Darjeeling in fruit, and a couple of green and yellow veined Anæctochilas, which here, as is usually the case, grow very sparsely and singly among decayed wood. This wood must be very rich in plants, but is difficult to get about in owing to its steepness and the want of paths. I saw some large buzzardlike hawks with white breasts, which were apparently breeding, and the big purple fruit pigeon, Carpophaga insignis, also a whinchat-like bird with white throat and black tail which frequents the grass and was new to me; but still not half the birds one would expect in such a fine country, Our coolies being lightly loaded, marched well and halted but little, getting over about two and a half miles an hour with ease on these good paths; they are used to much harder work in carrying potatoes down to Cherra. ​We passed numerous parties all loaded in this way, and carrying sacks of sixty to a hundred pounds weight by a plaited cane strap which rests on the forehead. I collected a few roots and bulbs of all the best plants I saw on the return march to Shillong; they were not yet dry enough to send to England, and had to be put in a garden till after the rains, as packing green and growing plants almost always results in their death.
On September 15th we went from Myrung to Maoflong, which is a large village on the other side of Syeng, but we did not stop, and though the day was fine I saw but little on the road to detain me in the way of insects or plants. A pair of lazy white-headed and white-tailed eagles, apparently Haliætus leucomphus, which breeds in Assam, were flying round, and when I got to a small marsh a couple of miles from Maoflong, Clarke's boy showed me the place where that rare and beautiful plant, Primula Smithiana, in which I was much interested, was found. This splendid plant grows as much as three feet high with whorls of flowers like those of P. japonica, but yellow in colour instead of crimson. All the early attempts to introduce it to Europe by means of seed failed, but in 1881 Gammie's native collector brought a packet with many other seeds from the mountains of Western Bhutan. These I distributed among some of the best gardens in Europe, but only one plant was raised by the late Mr. Anderson Henry of Edinburgh, who sent it when in flower to Sir J. Hooker at Kew. It produced a numerous progeny of seedlings for which, I believe, a large sum was paid. It did not, however, prove very easy to grow in Europe, and I now saw that the plant was semi-aquatic, at least during some part of the year, as the marsh in which it was growing, though dry during the winter, was then very wet, and the long fleshy roots were growing in black mud and sometimes quite under water. The flowering season is in April and May.
Now here is a good illustration of the difficulty of agreement between botanists of the highest repute and experience in dealing with the nomenclature of allied plants having a wide geographical distribution. For the histopr' of this Primula is as follows. Wallich had described Primula prolifera from the Khasia hills. Then Junghuhn had described Primula imperialis from Java, where it was found growing on volcanoes at 9,000 to 10,000 feet. In 1882 Hooker in the Flora of British India united the Khasia and Java plants as one species, P. prolifera. Two years later, m the Botanical Magazine, plate 6732, Hooker figured the plant raised by Anderson Henry from my seed as P. prolifera. He himself had gathered it years before m Sikkim, though he had not recognised it by that name, twenty years after, Craib described a plant which he had collected as Primula Smithiana. He noted that it differed conspicuously from P. prolifera in having a dense coating of yellow meal over the inflorescence and the flowers. Finally in 1914, Professor Bayley Balfour found that my Primula was, after all, identical with Craib's and not with P. prolifera. "It should be, I think," he wrote, "a good garden plant of the Candelabra section and, if Hooker had only recognised it, might have borne your name instead of the perhaps more beautiful but certainly more difficult Primula associated with it."However, so far as I know, the plant soon died out in cultivation here, as many of these Asiatic Alpine plants do. When Trinominalism comes to be a practice accepted by botanists as it has been by ornithologists—as I think it must be eventually—here is a case in point.
* ↑ I published an account of this butterfly and its varieties in the Annals and Magazine of Natural History for February, 1886.
* ↑ This was described by Elwes as H. Elwesi and was introduced later. It is closely allied to, not identical with, H. Greeni (Botanical Magazine).
* ↑ Twenty years afterwards he died at Kew, regretted by all who knew him, from the effect of a long bicycle ride on a very hot day.