on the banks of the Jumna, the mountains here have lost all vestiges of cultivation, as well as of animal life. They are far more rude and impracticable. The rocks tower more suddenly to their height. There is less wood and fewer ledges and clefts where cultivation could be performed.

"The glen above described is by far the most gloomy savage scene we have yet met with." p. 410, 411.

After ascending the river for some time, they obtained a view of Bunderpouch, which is described as follows:

"From this station we had a far nobler and more satisfactory view of Bunderpouch than we had hitherto enjoyed, or would probably have again. It is a prodigious mountain; though, from our close vicinity; and comparatively low situation, we could not conceive its full height. Two lofty and massy peaks rise high above the rest, deep in snow, from which all the other inferior ridges seem to have their origin. These peaks are connected by a sharp neck, considerably lower than themselves.

"The south and south-east exposure is the least steep, and bears a great depth of pure unbroken snow. Little or no rock is seen, except a few points at the ridge of the connecting neck, where it is too sharp and steep for snow to lie; and there it appears of a red colour. Here and there lofty precipices are seen in the snow itself, where the lower parts have melted, and masses have given way and slidden down to the ravines below, leaving a face several hundred feet high, that shows the depth of snow which has accumulated for ages.

"The name of Bunderpouch properly applies only to the highest peaks of this mountain all the subordinate peaks and ridges have their own peculiar names. Jumnotree has reference only to the sacred spot, where worship is paid to the goddess, and ablution is performed. There are said to be four peaks which form the top of Bunderpouch, only two of which are seen from hence; and in the cavity or hollow contained between them, tradition places a lake or tank, of very peculiar sanctity. No one has ever seen this pool, for no one has ever even attempted to ascend any of these prodigious peaks. Besides the physical difficulties, there is one to be encountered far more conclusive than any other, that could be opposed to the superstitious and blindly obedient Hindoo. The goddess has especially prohibited any mortal from passing that spot appointed for her worship. A fuqeer once lost his way in attempting to reach Jumnotree, and was ascending the mountain, till he reached the snow, where he heard a voice inquiring what he wanted; and, on his answering, a mass of snow detached itself from the side of the hill, and

the voice desired him to worship where this snow stopped; that Jumna was not to be too closely approached or intruded on in her recesses; that he should publish this, and return no more, under penalty of death. Indeed, I suspect this prohibition to be unnecessary, to prevent an ascent to or near the top of any of these snowy peaks: even the extreme steepness, the rugged nature of the rock, where it is bare, and the hard slippery smoothness of the snow, are, independent of the immense height and consequent fatigue to be borne, sufficient obstacles to such an attempt. The existence of such a lake, therefore, rests entirely on tra gend from the Shasters; for it would ap dition, and probably on some obscure lepear that all these mountains, with their various cliffs and valleys, are frequently referred to as the scenes of mythological story; and to one of these the mountain owes its name." pp. 418-420.

A festival celebrated on the banks of the Jumna gave them opportunities of making observations on the na tives, which do not seem to have been more favourable than formerly.

These, and

"The annual ceremony of carrying the images of their gods to wash in the sacred stream of the Jumna is (it appears) one of much solemnity among the inhabitants of the neighbourhood; and the concourse of people here assembled has been busily en gaged, and continues to be fully occupied in doing honour to it. They dance to the sound of strange music, and intoxicate themselves with a sort of vile spirit, brewed here from grain and particular roots, sometimes, it is said, sharpened by pepper. The dance is most grotesque and savage; a multitude of men taking hands, sometimes in a circle, sometimes in line, beating time with their feet, bend with one accord, first nearly to the earth with their faces, then backwards, and then sidewise, with various wild contortions. their uncouth dress of black and grey blankets, give a peculiar air of brutal ferocity to the assemblage. The men dance all day, and in the evening they are joined by the women, who mix indiscriminately with them, and keep up dancing and intoxication till the night is far advanced. They continue this frantic kind of worship for several days; and, in truth, it is much in unison with their general manners and habits-savage and inconsistent. At a place so sacred, the residence of so many holy Brahmins, and the resort of so many pious pilgrims, we might expect to find a strict attention to the forms of religion, and a scrupulous observance of the privations and austerities enjoined by it. So far, how. ever, is this from the truth, that much is met with, shocking even to those Hindoos who are least bigoted." p. 422.

"I had no idea that height of situation could have so severely affected the strength and chest, and yet it must have been this alone, for severe as was the ascent, and bad as the road was, we had met with fully as bad days' journeys before; and though the people asserted that the air was poisoned by the scent of flowers, and though there really was a profusion of them through the whole of the first part of the march, yet the principal part of them had no smell, nor could I perceive any thing in the air except a cold and somewhat raw wind. Besides which, the chief distress was experienced after we reached the lofty gorge of Bamsooroo, which was beyond the region of vegetation, and consequently could not be easily affected by the perfume of flowers. After reaching that place no one was proof against this influence. It was ludicrous to see those who had laughed at others yielding, some to lassitude, and others to sickness, yet endeavouring to conceal it from the rest. I believe I held out longer than any one; yet after passing this gorge every few paces of ascent seemed an insuperable labour, and even in passing along the most level places my knees trembled under me, and at times even sickness at stomach was experienced. The symptoms it produced were various: some were affected with violent headache; others had severe pains in the chest, with oppression; others sickness at the stomach and vomiting; many were overcome with heaviness, and fell asleep even while walking along. But what proved the fact that all this was the effect of our great elevation, was, that as we lowered our situation, and reached the region of vegetation and wood, all these vio lent symptoms and pains gradually lessened and vanished. The appearance of the higher cliffs, however, both snowy and rocky, and the sensations of this day, proved most satisfactorily, that it would be a very arduous undertaking, if not an impracticable one, to ascend even nearly to the tops of these loftiest hills. We could not have been within several thousand feet of even those peaks of snow which were tolerably near us." p. 449.

Three days' travelling from Jumnotree brought Mr Fraser to the banks of the Bhagiruttee. He found it already a broad stream, nearly of the same magnitude with the Sutlej. His picture of the scenery, and parallel view of that on the streams formerly visited, seems well to deserve being

extracted.

"From the description given of the nature and appearance of the banks of the Jumna, it may be conceived that nothing wilder or more impracticable could well

present itself to the traveller's view than the scenes there witnessed; and I confess that this was my own idea. Nevertheless, it is certain that the character of the moun tains that form the banks of the Bhagiruttee, in the quarter we have passed to-day, is not only different from that of any yet seen, but marked by features unspeakably more lofty, rugged, and inaccessible. There is even less of beauty, and more of horror; more to inspire dread, less to captivate. The variety of character to be met with in these mountains, particularly after reach. ing their more remote and difficult regions, is remarkable; and to a person who has only travelled in the lower parts, and seen the better cultivated and more inhabited tracts of the country, scarcely credible. Perhaps a more complete and better marked example of this cannot be produced in any purely mountainous country, certainly not in that under consideration, than is exhibited in the features we see, marking the beds of the Sutlej, the Pabur, the Jumna, and the Bhagiruttee.

"The mountains which form the valley of the Sutlej, particularly on the northwest side, are brown, barren, steep, and rocky; but they have these characters without the grandeur produced by lofty precipices or fringing wood. The nullahs that furrow them are dark uninteresting chasms, and their breasts in general are unenlivened by cultivation; and, though their heights are thickly crowned with forts, there are no neat villages surrounded with trees, on which the eye may turn and rest from the dark desert around. Such are the Cooloo hills, which met our view from below Comharsein, even to beyond Seran. And on the Bischur side, though there may be somewhat more cultivation above, and wood yields its verdure here and there to embellish the valleys, still the lower parts of the hills, for a descent of full three miles, to the narrow, rocky, and arid bed of the river, exhibit little except black rock peeping irregularly through brown burnt grass.

"The smiling vale of the Pabur offers a delightful contrast to the black chasm through which the Sutlej rolls. We cannot speak of this river very near its source; but, from a long way beyond the village of Pooroo, which is seven miles above Raeengudh, it flows meandering through a valley of moderate breadth, in which pasture and crops are checkered with its different streams; and on the banks and roots of the hills, rich cultivation, villages, and wood, form a lovely picture, which extends up the stream as far as the eye can distinguish, and till brown hills, topped with snow and rocks, close the prospect.

"If any success has attended the perhaps too detailed descriptions of the banks and bed of the Jumna, the reader will already have formed an idea of them:

though rocky, precipitous, and wild, they are woody, green, and varied with sloping faces, which are rich with cultivation and verdure. Here and there the river runs through a level though narrow bottom, and many well cultivated and beautiful valleys lead into it: even at its source, though a wilder collection of requisites for a romantic and imposing landscape, as rock, wood, precipice, and snow, could not well be drawn together, they did not form so truly desert and stern a scene as is exhibited in the bed of the Bhagiruttee.

"I have said that these mountains are more lofty and bare; in fact, we had now penetrated farther into their higher and more inclement regions; and the Bhagiruttee, a far larger river than the Jumna, has worn a deeper bed, even in the stubborn materials of their bowels.

"It is not easy to describe the change of scene effected by this change of situation: not only is luxuriant foliage more rare, all rich and lively greens giving way to the dark brown of the fir, which spots the face of the rock, but even that rock is evidently more continually acted on by the severity of the storms. Instead of being covered with rich and varied hues, the effect of lichens and the smaller herbage, that usually clothe and variegate even a precipice, the rocks here are white, grey, red, or brown, the colour of their fracture, as if a constant violence was crumbling them to pieces. Their sharp and splintered pinnacles spire up above the general mass: their middle region and feet are scantily sprinkled with the sombre unvarying fir-tree; while the higher parts, retiring from the view, present little more than brown rock, except where a lofty mass of snow overtops them, and calls to our recollection how nearly and completely we are surrounded by it. No green smiling valleys yield their waters to the river: the white and foul torrents which swell its stream pour their troubled tribute through chasms cleft in the solid rock, or are seen tumbling down its face, from the snow that gives them birth.

"The whole scene casts a damp on the mind: an indefinite idea of desert solitude and helplessness steals over it: we are, as it were, shut out from the world, and feel our nothingness." pp. 456–458.

Here, however, they found a village, where they obtained comfortable repose during the night, and next morning set out for Gungotree. After travelling six cos, they came to a spot called Bhyram Ghauttee.

"This is a very singular and terrible place. The course of the river has continued foaming through its narrow rocky bed, and the hills approach their heads, as

though they would meet at a prodigious height above. At this point the Bhagiruttee is divided into two branches: that which preserves the name descends from the eastward, and the other, of a size fully equal, called the J,hannevie, joins it from the north-east. Both these rivers run in chasms, the depth, narrowness, and rugged wildness of which it is impossible to describe: between them is thrust a lofty crag, like a wedge, equal in height and savage aspect to those that on either side tower above the torrents. The extreme precipitousness of all these, and the roughness of their faces, with wood which grows near the river side, obstructs the view, and prevents the eye from comprehending the whole at a glance; but still the distant black cliffs, topped with lofty peaks of snow, are discerned, shutting up the view in either of the three ravines, when the clouds for a moment permit them to appear.

"Just at the bottom of the deep and dangerous descent, and immediately above the junction of these two torrents, an old and crazy wooden bridge is thrown across the Bhagiruttee, from one rock to the other, many feet above the stream; and it is not till we reach this point that the extraordinary nature of the place, and particularly of the bed of the river, is fully comprehended; and there we see the stream in a state of dirty foam, twisting violently, and with mighty noise, through the curi ously hollowed trough of solid granite, cutting it into the strangest shapes, and leaping in fearful waves over every obstacle. From hence the gigantic features of the mountains may frequently be seen, overhanging the deep black glen; their brown splintered crags hardly differing in colour from the blasted pines which start from their fissures and crevices, or even from the dark foliage of those which yet live."

pp. 463, 464.

The J,hannevie, a stream, the existence of which had not been noticed by any preceding traveller, appears to have already run a pretty long course, having risen from a lofty mountain about fifteen days' journey to the north-east, and within the territories of China. After a most laborious journey along the side of precipices, and over immense heaps of loose stones, they reached Gungotree.

"The hills which form between them

the bed of the river, and which are exceedingly precipitous and close the whole way from Bhyramghattee, here recede a little, and without losing any thing of their savage grandeur, admit somewhat of a less confined view, and more of the light of day. Below Goureecounda, the river falls over a rock of considerable height in its