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Top of Kongra Lama Tibet frontier Elevation View Vegetation Descent to Tungu Tungu-choo Ponies Kinchinjhow and Changokhang mountains Palung plains Tibetans Dogs Dingcbam province of Tibet Inhabitants Dresses Women's ornaments Blackening faces Coral Tents Elevation of Palung Lama Shawl-wool goats Shearing Siberian plants Height of glaciers, and perpetual snow Geology Plants, and wild animals Marmots Insects Birds Choongtam Lama Religious exercises Tibetan hospitality Delphinium Perpetual snow Temperature at Tungu Return to Tallum Samdong To Lamteng Houses Fall of Barometer Cicadas Lime deposit Landslips Arrival at Choongtam Cobra Rageu Heat of Climate Velocity and volume of rivers measured Leave for Lachoong valley Keadom General features of valley Lachoong village Tunkra mountain Moraines Cultivation Lachoong Phipun Lama ceremonies beside a sick-bed.
When I mounted mine, he took the bit between his teeth, and scampered back to Palung, over rocks and hills, through bogs and streams; and though the snow was so blinding that no object could be distinguished, he brought me to the tents with unerring instinct, as straight as an arrow.
Very few plants grew amongst the stones at the top of the Tunkra pass, and those few were mostly quite different from those of Palung and Kongra Lama. Clouds obscured all distant view. The temperature varied between noon and 1.30 p.m. from 39 degrees to 40.5 degrees, the air being extremely damp.
Turnips are grown at Palung during the short stay of the people, and this is the most alpine cultivation in Sikkim: the seed is sown early in July, and the tubers are fit to be eaten in October, if the season is favourable. They did not come to maturity this year, as I found on again visiting this spot in October; but their tops had afforded the poor Tibetans some good vegetables.
Snuff is little used, and is principally procured from the plains of India. We visited Palung twice, chiefly in hopes that Dr.
The mean temperature of the three summer months at Palung is probably about 40 degrees, an element of comparatively little importance in regulating the growth and ripening of vegetables at great elevations in Tibetan climates; where a warm exposure, the amount of sunshine, and of radiated heat, have a much greater influence.
A few days afterwards, I again visited Palung, with the view of ascertaining the height of perpetual snow on the south face of Kinchinjhow; unfortunately, bad weather came on before I reached the Tibetans, from whom I obtained a guide in consequence.
The already scanty vegetation diminished rapidly: it consisted chiefly of scattered bushes of a dwarf scrubby honeysuckle and tufts of nettle, both so brittle as to be trodden into powder, and the short leafless twiggy Ephedra, a few inches higher. A more dismally barren country cannot well be conceived, nor one more strongly contrasting with the pastures of Palung at an equal elevation.
The mean height of Palung plains is 16,000 feet: they are covered with transported blocks, and I have no doubt their surface has been much modified by glacial action. I was forcibly reminded of them by the slopes of the Wengern Alp, but those of Palung are far more level. Kinchinjhow rises before the spectator, just as the Jungfrau, Monch, and Eigher Alps do from that magnificent point of view.
Having sent the coolies forward, with instructions to halt and camp on this side of the Kongra Lama pass, we followed them, taking the route by Palung, and thence over the hills to the Lachen, to the east of which we descended, and further up its valley joined the advanced party in a rocky glen, called Sitong, an advantageous camping ground, from being sheltered by rocks which ward off the keen blasts: its elevation is 15,370 feet above the sea, and the magnificent west cliff of Kinchinjhow towers over it not a mile distant, bearing due east, and subtending an angle of 24.3 degrees.
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