SIKHIM AND BHUTAN
records remain in the manuscripts I found dealing with the reign of the Sindhu Raja of Pumthang, and have mentioned elsewhere. This march throughout was a great contrast to the last, as it was entirely through cultivated land, with small collections of houses, two or three together, not large enough to form villages. All the crops looked excellent, especially the wheat and barley; the country was thickly populated, and the inhabitants flourishing and well fed. I saw one iron-impregnated stream.
There is an easy and good trade route which runs from Tashi-yangtsi over the Ging-la to Donkhar, where it joins the route from Tashigong and Tawang and Tshona, and this is a good deal used by traders in the cold months. My shortest route was by a road branching off one day’s march up the valley, and running over the hills to Singhi-jong, but I was told it was very difficult and neither ponies nor mules could be taken over it, and also that snow was lying on the pass. In consequence of this report, I decided to proceed viâ the Dongo-la, and to branch off near Lhuntsi-jong and follow the valley leading from there to Singhi-jong, if I could not get up the valley of the Kuru-chhu. While at Tashi-yangtsi I visited Chorten Kara. It is a fine specimen, and is built partly on the lines of the big chorten at Khatmandu, but, like everything else, has its origin in an unknown past. Near the chorten there were some terraced paddy- and rice-fields of a fair size, on which ploughing and sowing were in full swing, and some large villages, and in spite of the clouds snow-capped hills appeared every now and then up the valley to the right.
The road on to Lhuntsi took me up a side valley through jungle the whole way, and I camped the first night at Wangtung (10,000 feet), at the level of silver pine, on a ground so cramped that I was obliged to cut several trees down to admit some light and air; and as it was also pouring with rain and very cold it was altogether miserable and uncomfortable. The morning broke very wet, but it
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