shows that the Himálaya culminates in two parallel ranges running through their entire length, which I have called the Southern and Central Himálayan Chains, separated by a series of valleys. This view is in opposition to those very ably stated by Mr. Brian Hodgson, Dr. Thomson, Dr. Hooker, and others, who consider that the Southern Himálaya, with its line of snowy peaks, is not a true chain or cordillera, because it is broken by the defiles through which rivers force their way, whose sources are on what I have called the Central Chain. They consider the Southern Himálaya to be not a chain, but a series of spurs from the Central Chain. It will at once be seen that this is not a question of fact, but of nomenclature, which would scarcely have arisen if the similar facts relating to other great mountain masses, such as the chains or cordilleras of the Andes, had been considered. When this is done it will be seen that a great chain of mountains, with a continuous series of culminating ridges and a continuous slope, is a chain, whether rivers force their way through its gorges or not, and that these phenomena of the Himálaya occur also in the Andes, which are nevertheless properly called cordilleras.[1]
Warren Hastings was the first to notice the striking analogy between the Andes and the Himálaya,[2] after perusing the work
- ↑ Mr. Wilfred Heeley, in an otherwise admirable article on Tibet, in the 'Calcutta Review' (July, 1874, p. 139), carries this theory of the broken chain to an extreme. He tells us that the Himálaya "is not one continuous sierra [probably meaning cordillera], but rather a series of short parallel ranges running south from the watershed [presumably meaning water parting'], and each having its highest peak near its southern termination. The ridges may be joined by spurs, and the passes into Tibet cross these, not the main mountain crest." Again, he quotes Dr. Hooker, who says (' E. G. S. J.,' xx. p. 52), "In Sikkim the Himalayas consist of meridional ridges separated by water flowing southward. They are not a continuous snowy chain."
- ↑ All really efficient administrators of the first order are geographers by instinct, and "Warren Hastings was no exception to the rule. Under his auspices surveying operations were carefully fostered and encouraged. Major Rennell, the father of Indian geographers, made his famous survey of Bengal, and constructed his maps of the Ganges and Brahmaputra, in the days of the first Governor-General. Sir John Call, the Surveyor-General, compiled a general map of India, Colonel Pearse, the friend of Hastings, and his second in the duel with Francis, and Colonel Colebrooke, took a series of
