Twenty Years in the Himalaya/Nepal and Sikhim (continued)
The studied isolation of Nepal, which allows no European to travel in the country except by special leave by the one main route to the capital itself, is a political move, and from whatever cause arising, which need not be discussed here, is, I go so far as to say, of distinct advantage to us, since it keeps a simple people removed from modern influences. Whatever effect it may have in the modernising of the country, still, I believe, it is a distinct factor in the general happiness of the people. The privileged visitor to Nepal is allowed a certain amount of freedom of movement within prescribed limits, and although these limits contain all there is of interest in Nepal proper, a tour that I made round the edge of these limits filled me with a hungry desire to explore further.
An easy afternoon's ride north from the Residency brings one to the Hills of Kakani, in which is situated the Resident's hot weather retreat, from which a most gorgeous view of the whole main Himalaya range is obtained. This house is on a ridge about 7400 feet above the sea, and looks down on distant Nawakote and the valley of the Trisuli, both of which names I had been well acquainted with for years. I was very much struck with the hill agriculture, as far as I could see it, on the surrounding hills, the terracing being excellent and the fields evidently kept in excellent order. The most remarkable fact seemed to me the general want of animals, either for ploughing or for transport purposes. Even in the valley, which is, so to speak, cultivated to within an inch of its life, mostly by Newar villagers, I saw nothing but manual labour. Of course, owing to the want of good roads leading to India, wheeled carriages are, except on the main road, unknown, but baggage animals are also few and very far between, nearly the whole of the trade exports and imports from all directions being carried on men's backs; in fact, every one seems to carry — men, women, and children. The amounts they take when they are conveying the produce of their fields to market or to the towns of Nepal proper are prodigious. 100 to 140 lbs. is quite an ordinary load, and I once attempted to measure the weight of loads that I put down as nearer 400 lbs. than 800 lbs.
My route took me east from Kakani, crossing the very distinguishable point which lies due north of Nepal about 8500 feet above the sea, from whence an excellent view should have been obtained of the great range if it had not been for the thickness of the jungle. We marched through pleasant jungle paths, till we arrived at night at a Government shooting-box. These Government shooting-boxes are not very often used, it appeared to me, though this one was very well situated in a wooded valley about a mile above the Government water- works for the supply of the valley, for the whole valley has an excellent water-supply with pipes laid on everywhere, the work of local Nepalese engineers.
The following day's march took me through the eastern end of the valley of Nepal to the Maharajah's summer residence at Nagarkote, situated on a hill about 6800 feet above the sea, with a great view of the eastern ranges. It is an excellent little station with very well built and comfortable houses, but rather of the stucco villa style of architecture. From here we were able to make out the point of Everest appearing between the shoulders of two other mountains, whose names I was unable to discover; and we also had a very fine view of the Gauri Sankar group more to the north.
The continual confusion and uncertainty that have existed for so long concerning the real local name of Everest have, I think, been finally set at rest by Surveyor Nathu Sing, who was allowed to make a journey in 1907 for surveying purposes to the head-waters of the Dudh Kosi river. He says that Everest is known in the Dudh Kosi Valley as Chomo Lungmo; this name was also given me by some Sherpa Bhottias whom I employed in April and May 1909, and whose home was at Dhimbuje village, one of the highest villages on the Dudh Kosi river. They further gave me the name Kamalung for Makalu, not recognising the latter name at all; the mistake seems natural, as the two names seem to be the same word with the letters differently placed, and may be easily made by a man not acquainted with any Thibetan language, as the sound is very much the same. It is possible that the name obtained by Colonel Waddell, I.M.S., for Everest is also used by Thibetans, but I failed to find any one who had heard of it.
Since the report of Captain Woods, R.E., on the Nepal Himalaya, the question of the identity of the Gauri Sankar group has been finally settled. The Gauri Sankar group is very striking as seen from Nagarkote, but is inferior in every way to the Everest group; the massif of Gauri Sankar culminates in a point of only 28,000 odd feet.
Here, or rather on the way, I joined Major Manners Smith, and through the kindness of the Maharajah we were allowed next day to descend into the Banepa Valley, stopping at the village of that name, a most interesting walk into another cultivated valley. On our descent into the valley we joined the main road which goes to Eastern Nepal and up to the Sikhim frontier, quite fit for riding or pack transport, but not large enough for wheeled vehicles. Banepa itself is a large Newar village. In it were a great number of wild pigeons, who feed as much in the village as in the fields; we made quite a bag of them, much to the amusement of the villagers, who scrambled for the empty cartridge cases. Our return journey to Nepal led us over a small col down to the most interesting town of Bhatgaon, where, besides getting many photographs of the temples and other buildings, I was lucky enough to find some regiments just waiting to fall in for their morning parade on the very fine parade ground, and had some amusement with the men. From here there is a carriage-road back to the Residency, and Major Manners Smith's phaeton was in waiting.
My tour was short, but of surprising interest. The views I obtained of what is quite untravelled country naturally made me more anxious than ever to continue, but after the set-back that our attempts during the year 1907 had received from the India Office regarding an exploration of the Everest group to be carried out via Upper Sikhim and through a comer of Thibet, I did not fed very sanguine of interesting the Nepalese authorities in this matter. However, I found that Major Manners Smith had already done so to a great extent, and that the Prime Minister was himself quite hopeful that a way would be found to explore Everest from the Nepal side; he even talked of a mixed Anglo -Nepalese exploration. However, he is not an autocrat, and has, I believe, often considerable difficulty in combating the natural jealousy with which the upper classes in Nepal regard the idea of the intrusion of Englishmen and other European foreigners into any part of that kingdom. This being the case, although the Viceroy of India himself actually considered the possibility of Everest being explored from the Nepal side, and although in 1909 the Nepal Durbar suggested a short and rapid dash from the district which lies north of Mozufferpore in Bengal, through an eastern Nepalese city, Hanuman Nagar by name, direct to the foot of Everest, and complete preparations were made for such an expedition, it was at the last moment adjudged to be inexpedient and had to be abandoned.
No more exciting journey could have been taken, nor is there in any part of the great Himalaya range such a promising region as the whole of the Nepal kingdom for the organisation of exploring and mountaineering expeditions. The lower valleys are thickly populated, grain can be easily purchased, and in the upper valleys are everywhere sheep and half-bred yaks. The peasants of the upper valley are mostly Sherpa Thibetans; in fact, a good many of the porters employed by Messrs. Rubenson and Monrad Aas were Sherpas from the actual Dudh Kosi, a branch of the great Kosi river, which rises in the lower slopes of Everest itself, All the higher valleys have excellent porter material, but the clothing of the different districts varies considerably. The Goorkhas of the higher parts are suitably clothed for their own business, but not by any means arrayed with a view to spending many days in the snows. The Bhutias (Thibetans) are generally much better fitted out in this respect, and have besides a great power of resistance to cold.
Nepal itself, for an extremely mountainous country, is very thickly populated. So much is this the case, that at least 40,000 Goorkhas have overflowed from the eastern provinces into our district of Darjeeling and into semi-independent Sikhim, and immigrants continue to come into the latter district. In Sikhim, in the western portion, the Goorkhas completely outnumber the original Lepcha inhabitants as well as the now dominant Thibetans, although they really take little, if any, part in the governing of the country. This means that all the district officials are Thibetans, as is natural when one considers that the semi-independent Raja of Sikhim is a Thibetan himself. Still, nearly the whole of the agriculture of the district is in Nepalese hands.
I cannot congratulate them on the way they have taken up their new lands there, nor on their treatment of the land, still less can I congratulate the authorities who control their actions. If Nepal is well cultivated, and if the hill-sides are well and economically treated, so in contrast is the condition of Sikhim a crying shame. It is situated in a kind of sleeve formed by mountain ridges and headed by the great Kinchenjanga group, it possesses one of the most humid climates in the whole Himalayas, and is fine and wonderful, but generally unpleasant Up to a certain altitude it produces fine crops — but this is how immigrants treat the hill-side; they have one, and only one, idea — burn, burn, burn. I never saw a terraced area; corn is grown on newly burned ground, without labour or difficulty. This waste is awful, not only of timber but of soil, and the results, when this system has continued for some time, is not only a waste of most valuable forest, but that the hill-sides are actually falling down, slipping into the valleys in fact I consider the authorities are themselves responsible for this condition.
Colonists always want quick returns with little labour, but why is a country, from which fine agricultural results might have been expected, allowed to be so ruined? Putting aside this consideration, travelling in Sikhim, when the weather is at all propitious, is delightful. To the mountaineer, no district offers so many chances, not only of really good mountain exploration, but also of obtaining that most irritating and annoying thing, a record. It is an expensive district, and supplies are supposed to be difficult to obtain. During a journey into the snows this year (1909), I found the former true, but the latter much exaggerated. I found among the villagers men who were perfectly ready to contract to supply me with ample grain, butter, and sheep at by no means an exorbitant rate, at the high alp of Jongri, and was able thereby to cut down to a great extent my caravan from Darjeeling.
My journey was, however, an undoubted failure, undertaken with the hopes of finding settled weather for the two months before the monsoon was expected, and also as a solace for my disappointment over the projected expedition to the Everest group. I arrived in Darjeeling at the end of a most extraordinary drought. The tropical forest through which the railway runs was this year (1909) in April an unpicturesque dusty scrub, the hill-sides almost shut out by the smoke from the innumerable forest fires, which bad done immense harm both to Government forest property and to animal life; indeed quite a number of shepherds as well as animals lost their lives in the higher jungle.
I had no sooner arrived in Darjeeling than the weather broke. With the help of Mr. R. de Righi, who is always ready to assist any traveller to the upper ranges, my little caravan took but two days to organise. We journeyed by the usual way to Jongri (see Mr. Freshfield's book[1] on the Himalayas), but I think I got much more fun out of that journey than the ordinary traveller. Sikhim travel is always fascinating, if one does not mind the continual ascents and descents. On the direct road to Jongri the ascents alone amount to 26,000 feet, in what ought to be six not very severe marches. We took nine days over it, as we visited neighbouring Buddhist monasteries — for Buddhism is here the religion of the ruling race— and waited at other places to make arrangements for supplies.
The road leads us past the Monastery of Pamionche, a large building, newly built and unfortunately supplied with a tin roof, most unsightly and out of place. Below Pamionche is a small bazaar, by name Gesing, where we stopped to be present at the weekly market and had a most amusing time. Natives of all kinds arrived, Nepalese, Bhutias, and the aboriginal Lepcha; the latter a gentle, good-looking, and most friendly people, most attractive in manner but without much character. They are rapidly disappearing, I believe, merging into the Thibetan type through intermarriage. Every one seemed most cheerful and friendly, and freely partook of the local good cheer at the local public-house or "Gadi"; towards evening things got very lively, and we were much amused at a quarrel between a Nepalese, a Gurung by tribe, and the local tailor, a Damai, one of the low menial Nepalese castes. Finally the tailor called the Gurung "a pig." There was a prodigious row, every one joined in and urged them on, but prevented them from getting together on purpose; and every one pretended to side with one or the other and to get equally angry, and then retired to laugh. Meanwhile the two principals got perfectly wild. They were not allowed to get close, but were still urged on more and more. Finally a Thibetan, evidently of some standing, jumped into the ring that had been formed and patted the Gurung on the back: "Never you mind," said he, "he does not mean to insult you, he is only calling you after his pet pig that he is so fond of. He wanted to be kind." Every one howled with laughter, and the Gurung was fairly beside himself. Suddenly a wild figure, more tipsy than the rest, sprang into the arena and beat every one all round with a stick violently for some minutes. Every one took this as a huge joke, but finally he too was bustled away. Everything ended in quite a friendly fashion after all, though this is not always the case by any means, as these hill tribes have the "kurki" or carved Nepalese knife always handy, and sometimes the sudden temptation to use it is too great
Yoksun is the last permanent settlement in Sikhim on the Jongri route. Here we lived in the Kazi's house. Things have changed but little since the visit of Sir Joseph Hooker in the late f̓orties of the last century, except, probably, that some more land has been taken up by the invading Nepalese. Thence to Jongri, a tiresome road and a tiresome jungle; a two days' hard march, and unfortunately for us a damp one. The forest fires had extended even so far as these remote hill-sides, and we had very hard work cutting a way through fallen trees. The road in some places can hardly be distinguished at the best of times, at least this is true of the short cut by which we were going, but when covered by trees fallen from above and in places still alight, it added considerably to the trouble of getting through. From the river bridge there is a direct ascent to Jongri of 6000 feet odd, through a jungle, which is, I believe, admired by some; I personally loathed it; still, though it was drenched, there were no leeches, or hardly any. Later on in the year it is alive with these horrid pests.
However interesting botanically a Sikhim forest may be to the scientist, to the ordinary traveller who is acquainted with the grand fir, oak, and chestnut forest of the Central and Western Himalayas, it is anathema. The men caught several of the large edible frog "pāhā," which is supposed to be excellent medicine and very good to eat. Jongri on arrival held out all sorts of hope, the weather had actually partially cleared, that is, we could see where we were going; the surroundings of Jongri under such conditions looked like a Scotch moor, or perhaps more like the rough country round the Rhinog group in Mid-Wales. Our road was very steep, and led us through drenching forest of Mālinga bamboo, some chestnut, and finally rhododendrons of all shapes and sizes, emerging through scrub rhododendrons on to the Upper Jongri moorland. The great mountains, though close at hand, remained invisible.
No sooner had we arrived there than the clouds descended, the wind blew, and the snow and sleet — chiefly sleet — drifted. The storm never stopped for four days and nights, with the exception of one morning just enough to tempt myself and Pahal Sing, one of my orderlies, to start out and see if we could learn something of our surroundings. After a lot of scrambling, we arrived at a height of 15,400 feet approximately, the weather having again descended, and then had to return drenched. After the fourth day we turned back, as it was impossible to get anything dry.
The two huts at Jongri I had given up to the porters, my own servants, and orderlies. My own Whymper tent, usually a good protection, was not good enough to keep the snow out, sleet being blown from every direction; nor were the huts any better; these are roughly built, and the sleet searched them through and through. So on the fourth day we beat a hasty retreat. We were obliged to dry our bedding, but this we did not accomplish, owing to the appalling weather, till our arrival in Yoksun, a day and a half later. However, the trip was quite enjoyable, made so chiefly by the cheerfulness both of the porters, Thibetans and Nepalese, and of the Goorkha orderlies. It seems to me that all the people of Mongolian descent make excellent weather during discomforts. We had no trouble with any one. Baltis, Kashmiris, and most others would have wanted to die. We had dances and other revels, and were generally uproarious.
Among Nepalese especially, this sense of fun is almost universal; amongst them real wit is occasionally found: humour is almost universal, and the people who fail in their dealings with them most are usually those much-to-be-pitied individuals who have not this sense. It goes through all ranks, from the Maharajah, the Prime Minister, down; and, I believe, the want of the recognition of this fact and of how it separates the Nepalese of Mongolian descent from the different races of the Indian Continent, of Aryan and Semitic descent, has caused a good deal of — what shall we say? — the want of cordial appreciation, or perhaps want of understanding between the two Governments.
But what glories are contained in this Himalayan region from the border of Kumaon to Bhootan; the last great piece of true exploration left in India proper. Think of Nepal and its great rivers, the Karnali, the Kali, the Tirsuli, the Tamba, Dudh, Sun Kosi, and the Arun Kosis. All unknown as far as Europeans are concerned. Think of the passes into Thibet, and the well-used and old-established trade routes; and, all mountaineers, think of 500 miles of absolutely virgin peaks, and a population of probably more sporting instinct than the Swiss had one hundred years ago, and of the possibilities that this suggests! Think how glorious would be two or three years in this glorious country! Well, go on thinking! I have done it for years. We'll none of us get there. What's the good of weeping?
"Dakkiglas is the only word" — which was what a Welsh fishing gillie once said to a sporting parson, explaining that it was the same as "D — n," but not so wicked.
- ↑ Round Kangchenjunga. By D. W. Freshfield. London, Edward Arnold. 18s. net.