from its extremities determined the distances of the two peaks, and their heights above the east end of the base, as follows:

First peak called Sewmarcha Chauntal, distance 16440 feet, bearing due south. Its angle of elevation 26° 43′ 42′′, and height above the river 8278 feet. Second peak no name, but it is mountain. Distance 15374 feet. Angle of elevation 25° 55′ 30′′. river. Barometer 22-249 inches; detached 78°.

a lower part of the Srīcānta Magnetic bearing 170° 43′. Height 7473 feet above the thermometers attached 79°;

N. B. On our return, we found gooseberries at this place; they were of the large hairy kind, and, though not ripe, made good dumplings.

Gradual descent, and cross the Kheir Gadh large rivulet by a sangha at Derāli, a village of six houses, but now deserted on account of the failure of the crops and incursions of banditti.

The road to day, considered as a mountain path, was excellent, two or three places excepted. The north bases of the mountains which we passed along are moderately steep, and are clothed with noble cedars, and various sorts of large pines, of which the cshir and khai, or kher, are the largest. Cshir is a name indiscriminately given to several of the large leaved pines, but the tree so called here is the true deal; it grows to a great height, and bears a resemblance to the common cshir or turpentine fir, which abounds in the lower hills, but which is never seen in company with the cedar (deodar). I took some specimens of this deal; it is light, and has a fine grain: the rhai is a lofty pine; it has a graceful appearance; the leaves are pendent. The wood of it is not esteemed for building, being heavy and knotty: the cedar is always preferred for that purpose. From the sangha to Derāli the Ganges flows in an expanded bed with a swift current over stones. Yesterday it was a succession of falls from rock to rock, and bounded by frightful precipices. To day the scenery was very interesting, the river being bounded immediately to the north by the cedar forests; above which towered the sharp snowy peaks, and many torrents and cascades fell from them. I never made a more delightful march; the climate is pleasant, and the weather bright to day. The village of Derāli is situated in a rocky recess, and commands a fine view of the river, and of the north sides of the snowy peaks behind Jamnautri. There are three small temples of stone by the river side; they are of good workmanship. Derāli was plundered last year by banditti from the westward.

Pole star hid by the mountains as usual. Crest of nearly perpendicular and difficult short ascent: crags overhanging and threatening to fall. The river bed the whole way broad, and strong current at Derāli; lofty peaks on every side rising immediately from the river. This place is 1000 feet above it. Cedars of great size here.

Road generally level on bank of the river: cross an avalanche of great magnitude, being a fall of lumps of snow like large rocks, it has brought down, and broke to pieces, all the cedar trees in its path: perpendicular rocky precipices rise immediately from the river bed to the height of 1500 and 2000 feet; high snow peaks on all sides; large cedars at their feet.

An exceedingly steep ascent; river not visible, but close below mountains with bare peaks; not a blade of herbage on their rocky sides. In front, Decani snowy peak; to our left a mountain called T'hui. The south side of Decani is washed by the Bhagirat'hi, and the north side by the Jahni Ganga or Jahnevī, their confluence being at Bhairog'hāti. This place is called Ratenta.

Another steep and toilsome ascent.

Descent over broken fragments of peak. A rocky precipice nearly mural, of 1000 feet, overhangs the right bank of the Ganges, which here, as usual, rushes over rocks with an impetuous and foaming current. In front is the gigantic peak Decani rising immediately from the bed of the river, on the left, almost equally high, one of T'hui; below immense masses of granite overhang the river. The scenery is very grand. Very large cedars here.

A sweep from S. to E. brings us to that most terrific and really awful looking place called Bhairog'hāti.

The descent to the sangha is of the steepest kind, and partly by a ladder. The sangha is inclined far from the level, and, as seen from the height above it, cannot fail to inspire the beholder with anxiety as to his safe passage over it. It is indeed by far the most formidable sangha I have seen; the height of the platform above the river, we measured by dropping the chain; it was 60 feet. One is apt at first sight to estimate it at much more; however, this height added to the circumstances of the narrowness of the sangha (about 24 feet wide), its elasticity, and its inclined position, is sufficient to render its passage disagreeble, it being (like all the rest) quite open at the sides. It is laid from one side of the precipice to the other; the end on the left bank is the highest; the precipices in some places are quite perpendicular, in most, nearly so, rising to the height of 3000 feet above the stream; they are of compact granite. On some ledges there is a little soil where the cedars fix their roots. The river below the sanghais closely confined by the wall-like rocks, which are perfectly perpendicular, and its course is thus bounded nearly to Gangautri. The breadth of the stream is about 45 feet, and it is deep under the bridge.

Turn to the left by a rocky path to our tent, which is in a very strange place for a tent to be in; and one of the most curious sights among many here, is to see a little tent pitched under vast overhanging masses of rock at the confluence of these two rivers, the Bhāgīrat'hī, and its foaming rival the Jāhni Gangā, or

as more properly called, the Jahnevī. The strange and terrific appearance of this place (Bhairog'hātī) exceeds the idea I had formed of it. No where in my travels in these rude mountains have I seen any thing to be compared with this, in horror and extravagance. Precipices composed of the most solid granite confine both rivers in narrow channels, and these seem to have been scooped out by the force of the waters. Near the Sanga, the Bhagirat'hi has in some places scolloped out the rock which overhangs it. The base of these peaks is of the most compact sort of granite; it is of a light hue, with small pieces of black sparry substance intermixed. From the smoothness of the rocks which confine the stream, and which appear to be worn so by water, I think the stream must have formerly flowed on a higher level, and that it is gradually scooping its channel deeper; for it does not appear that the walls which confine the rivers are masses fallen from above, but that they are the bases of the peaks themselves. Enormous blocks have indeed fallen, and hang over our heads in threatening confusion; some appear 200 feet in diameter, and here are we sitting among these ruins by the fire side at noon. Thermometer 52°. What are these pinnacles of rock, 2000 or 3000 feet high, which are above us, like? I know not. To compare small with great, I think the aptest idea I can form of any thing that might be like them, would be the appearance that the ruins of a Gothic cathedral might have, to a spectator within them, supposing that thunderbolts or earthquakes had rifted its lofty and massy towers, spires, and buttresses; the parts left standing might then in miniature give an idea of the rocks of Bhairog'hātī.

The great cedar pines, those gigantic sons of the snow, fringe these bare rocks, and fix their roots where there appears to be very little soil; a few also of the larger deal pine are seen, but inferior trees do not aspire to grow here. The day is dull and rainy, and I cast my eyes up at the precipice overhead, not without awe; a single fragment might dash us to pieces.

Avalanches of snow and rock such as we have passed to day, and indeed for these three last days, show by their effects their vast powers of destruction; for they bring down forests in their overwhelming course, and dash the cedars into splinters. These avalanches have all fallen this season; they have in some places filled up the dells and water courses to a great depth with snow, and extend from the peaks to the margin of the river.

A painter wishing to represent a scene of the harshest features of nature, should take his station under the sanga of Bhairog'hātī, or at the confluence of the Bhagirat'hi and Jahnevī rivers: here it is proper to take some notice of this latter river hitherto little known. Though the Bhagirat'hi is esteemed the holy and celebrated Ganges, yet the Jahnevī is accounted to be, and I think is, the larger stream. From a Brāhman who officiates at Gangotrī, and who has been up it, I collected some particulars, which,

though, perhaps, far from correct, may serve to give an idea of it. By the course of the river is a pass to Bhoat or Thibet, by which the people from Reital and the upper villages of Rowaien go to get salt, blanket cloth, and wool, in exchange for grain. The trade is trifling, and not more than 100 people go yearly; in the latter end of the rains the road is open. They carry their goods on sheep and goats. The Brahman has been at the frontier village called Neitang; it is four long and very difficult days' journey. The first three days are up the course of the river, high above its bed for the most part, but occasionally descending to it. It is exceedingly steep and difficult.

First day. They go along the high precipice on the right bank of the river: a sangha at the end of a long march. Very bad path. No village.

Second day. Having crossed, very bad path to Cartcha, a halting place. No village. Cedar pines here.

Third day.-On same bank of the river to Handouly, a halting place; but no village. Not very long march.

Fourth day. The frontier or (do-phāshiās) village called Neitang, in the district of Tangsah; at this village, the river seems (they say) but little diminished in size, and there is a sangha over it. The Brahman can give no account of its origin, except that he believes it comes from some hills in Bhoat. The first part of the course of the river upwards, so far as can be seen from Bhairog'hātī, is 72° NE.; and from what I can understand, it appears that this river has its source to the north of that ridge of the Himalaya which bounds the Bhagirat'hi to the NE. or on its right bank, and that between Bhairog'hātī, and, perhaps, the third day's march above-mentioned, it forces itself through the range. The Brahman says that at the village, and for the last day's march to it, the mountains are bare of trees, and that they are not the Cylās mountains (i. e. not what we call snowy mountains) but that the Cylas peaks towards Gangotri are seen to the right, and so they would be, if we suppose the course of the Jahnevī up, to be about N. 70 E.; and the course of the Ganges is, we know from hence, considerably to the S. of E. By the way I may mention here, that cylas is a general appellation for high ranges always covered with snow, in the same way as we say Himalaya or Himachal (which last indeed literally means snowy peaks).

At Neitang, the houses are built very low on account of the high winds. Travellers suffer much from difficulty in breathing, caused, as they say, by the bic'h or bis'h; i. e. exhalations from poisonous herbs which grow on the high bare knolls. This frontier district of Tungsah appears to be considered to belong to what they call here Bhoat or Thibet, and they pay their land tribute to a collector who comes from Chaprang. Of the distance, or size, or direction, of Chaprang, I could not get any satisfactory account, but it appears to be a Chinese dependency. The

district also gives to the Rājā at Bassahir a blanket per man every third year, and a small complimentary tribute of dac'h (raisins) to the G'harwal Rājā. The inhabitants are called dophāshias from their speaking the languages of both G'harwal and Bhoat, and they act as interpreters and brokers.

The exports from Rawaien are rice, mandwā and pāprā (coarse grains), tobacco, and tamashas. Imports, salt, and thick woollen cloth and wool.

The Rawaien people go in the month of Cartic, because the wool is then ready, but in the month of Sawan, the road may be passed, and that would be the best time to go.

Had the season been more advanced, and if I had had grain, I should have been tempted to go up this river; it is an interesting object of future research, but there are many others, and one does not know which to attend to first; but it is my intention to explore this river next season.

Latitude observed. Confluence of the rivers at Bhairog'hātī. Water boiled at 198°, the air being 44°.

On our return, June 3, we encamped in a much better place, a small piece of flat at the summit of the cliff which bounds the Ganges on its left side. It was a pleasant and secure situation, and under the shade of the cedars. At this place, about 700 feet above the river, the barometer (unboiled mercury) stood at 21 inches, temperature of air 70°.

Latitude of this camp 30° 01′ 22.5′′ good observations; junction of Bhagirat❜hī and Jāhnevī rivers 72° distant 1 furlong.

A very steep and difficult ascent, we pass along the perpendicular face of the precipice by means of a scaffolding of two narrow planks, which appear very rotten, and ill supported at the ends; under the scaffold is a chasm of 300 feet deep. Immediately afterwards, ascend by ladders, the precipices bounding the river, being here like walls, and these scaffolds and ladders are laid from projecting points to enable one to pass.

Three other passages along the precipices and over chasms by means of rotten planks; then an exceedingly steep ascent by short zigzags to a flat at the foot of Decanī peak; here is a small temple of Bhairo Lal who is esteemed the janitor of Gangotrē'; at this place, pious Hindūs leave their shoes.

Road tolerably level; winds round the SW. side of Decanī peak; the river is about 800 feet below to the right, and rising from its bed is a wall of mountains of a height I find it difficult to estimate; below to the river steep precipices.

Path very difficult; a few paces further on cross another frightful chasm by a platform of a foot or 18 inches wide. Road over masses of granite piled in confusion; they are fragments of a fallen peak. Looking up, we see the tower-like summits of Decanī almost overhanging us. The whole way strewed with falls of rock from them. Many traces of bears.

Wind round the brow of the hill, and come upon an opening