[[1]]
Dorjiling [Darjeeling]
April 25. 1849 *1
My dear Father
The mail leaving this following summer months some days earlier than usual calls me to the desk sooner than I anticipated tomorrow indeed is the last post day from this & I have not a letter written. I had the happyness[sic] of hearing from you only three days ago acknowledging the receipt of my letter from Sikkim on the return of my expedition into Nepal, & am very glad that you are pleased with my doings & sayings. I delivered your message to Hodgson who is pretty well & begs to thank you exceedingly -- We did not like to bother you in the first instance about the "maps" for really I am often ashamed of the trouble you so willingly & kindly take on my account & until I should have seen H[odgson]. personally I could not give any definite information of all the particulars of that you are now informed & I shall write to Berghaus again & to
[[2]] Humboldt by this mail. I addressed Mr Petermannby the last & shall now Sabine too if I possibly can. Since writing last I have been busy arranging my collections & preparing for my forthcoming trip upon which I start in 4 or 5 days. I am getting 12 pairs of snow boots made & some blanket drapes -- My party are all picked & the loads are all but arranged I take as before a blanket tent but a much nicer one of Campbells & a tarpaulin to throw over it, also blanket housing for all the people as I shall be out in the rains & expect some most wretched weather. Still I have always maintained that there must be much less rain near the snowy range & at 14000 ft than here on the outer range & at 8000 & shall be content to bide by in the hope of the truth of my theory. Should nothing inopportune happen I expect a grand harvest of alpines & have made arrangements to the hope intent of camping some weeks at 14 or 15000ft where I shall set up my instruments
[[3]] a rain guage[sic] &c & greatly collect & draw as opportunity offers. The Sikkim Rajah has sent no guide & I hope he will not, as I can find my way with some occasional help from the villagers & my instruments. About 25 men are all I take & 500 lbs of rice. The distance is considerable some 20 days offexcluding detentions, but I quite expect that Campbell can arrange to send food after me. I leave some men behind to dry plants but take most of themLepchas with me
This intended start has hurried me very much with the completion of some of the least retainable results of the last which should be completed: the journal chart & some of the most important geological elements that require sketch illustrations. These are just done. The chart on a scale of 4 miles to the inch has cost me a world of labor embracing as it does a tract of country where you see nothing before you & where ones own observations are all that are to be had -- I have put all
[[4]] the mts & valleys covered with perpetual Snow in blue -- & those above 10000 ft in Sepia so that a glance shews[sic] the position of the great masses. My route in red ink & the places & dates of camping -- Six miles of distance is the average that I could accomplish each day when travelling which is 1 mile an hour of walking & yet our rate of progressionwas fully 3 miles an hour, all the rest is walked in bends & ups & downs. In other words the actual distance travelled is triple the linear on an average of 90 days. As soon as I can get this copied I will send you the original --
I have just got the Caryota & cannot distinguish it from C. urens. I have spadix & 6 pieces of trunk young leaves 12 ft long & a whole young plant. The trunk is covered with a tinder above made by the natives & quite like soft Amadou, but too cottony. My Palms are now 1. Caryota Urens; 2 Phoenix acaulis, 3 Wallichia caryotoides; 3
[[5]] 4 Areca gracilis -- Calami 4 species. These, Pandanus a sp. & Cycas pectinata -- are all the speciesplantsof that habit I have except the 2 Tree ferns. -- I have just got another Pine from the great Rungeet. This appears to be Excelsa but always was very scarce & is now all but extinct. I have seen only young plants where leaves are 2 in a sheath. I think I once asked you whether you had seen Maddens paper on the Himal Coniferae in "Journ[al]: Agri. Hort[icultural]. Soc[iety]. of India vol IV. part IV. - it is most admirably done & well worth copying into your Journal; very amusing to[sic]. Lest I forget it; we had some "first chop" Kemaon Tea at Campbells the other morning & the most excusable stuff I ever tasted as bad as "Senna" -- & yet this an indubitable sample & not a promiscuouspurchase. Do not say however that I said this -- as a few words would ruin the project -- I have tasted very good from Assam -- all Campbells Tea plants are killed by the Snow & hail of this past bad season.
[[6]] The Journal of my late trip is finished but how can I copy it out for you? --
No word has come of the arrival of my collections at Calcutta & I am getting uneasy
If Reeves has 180 subscribers for the Rhod[odendron] book it will no doubt pay him well, as many persons in Indiahere will buy it I believe & it must be very beautiful. I hope you understand that I consider arboreum of 4--7000 ft to be the normal species, in E[ast] Nepal & Sikkim; having leaves silvery underneath & either sharp or obscurely cordate at the base. The R. campbelliae occurs from 8--10000 ft & is probably a variety, color of flower is nothing I cannot distinguish C. Cambelliae but as a variety (or subspecies or any name you like) & it appears the same as Nilagiricumfigured in Bot[anical]. Mag[azine]. as arb[oreum] var Roseum as Sylhet species & others for aught I know [Rhododendron] puniceum Roxb? formosum
[[7]] Wall -- Campanulatum??. I wonder you should confound R. lancifolium with it which has an immense calyx & is more probably a var of barbatum.
A great noise was I think made about a yellow Rhod[odendron]. from Java or Borneo -- we have one if not more fide Royles plates -- the R. anthopogon which is the scented "Palu" of the Bhotheas of this & "Tsallu"R. setosum Don. I sent many dry tufts for the museum as the plant to whose effectsmellthe Bhoteas attribute the headaches &c of great elevations & the smell still reminds me of those indescribably wretched pains & aches though rather pleasant otherwise.
Cathcart has just sent me the last years numbers of Bot[anical]. Mag[azine]. it is the most beautiful work I ever saw on plants, & quite unique. Do you pay J. Smith for his communications on horticulture? -- I have just bought Schleiden ("The plant")who appears to be mad though much of his book is extremely
[[8]] interesting & instructive I have just got you a new kind of hemp out of which they make the broad bands to support the basket on the head. I have the band string & substance but not specimens of the plant which I take to be an apocyn[eous].climber. The India rubber fig wild is used to make those bamboo baskets waterproof of which I sent you a specimen. Lyellea grew about 3000ft or 4000 at the outside on mossy shaded clay banks -- below Rice cultivation on banks of Tambur river -- is vegetation of tropical Bamboo,Acacia, Coix, groves of Erythrina, Saccharum &c still it was on the upper part of the tropical zones though buffalos were not as yet replaced by cows. I suppose you know that Buffalos are tropical, -- bulls & cows temperates & the yak (which is tame "Bison") Arctic. The Thibetans [Tibetans] tell me of the wild Bisonof Thibet a huge animal much larger than the American & indeterminably fierce. Hodgson is a splendid fellow at geography[ic]
[[9]] distribution of animals. Your advise me about going East I cannot move a bit in that quarter except in Assam South of Brahmaputra. Bootan [Bhutan] is inaccessible & the G[overnor]. G[eneral]. has no power there of the Bors, Abors, Kamphos's, Lingphos Abos Metzos & various other O's of upper Assam the less said the better, though approachable in Griffiths time (& only with greatest risk) they are outrageous now & have just murdered a poor traveller sent by Hodgson to follow up the Bhrahm.[sic]: into Thibet [Tibet]. Jenkins says it is madness to think of it. -- I have not heard from Thomson for 2 months, which surprises me, but I suppose he is very busy. I cannot say a word about going home until I know the Gov[ernmen]ts intentions I think you must want me very much -- but I am much richer on £400 a year as a traveller in India than worked to skin & bone for £250 in England, at the remembrance of which I recoil, though I thought lightly of it at the time -- Nor until Aiton dies do I see a chance of improvement in that quarter -- I know quite well I did not cost you less than £200 a year when I was at home & when I marry that will be out of the question -- besides I am bound in honor to go to Borneo except the Gov[ernmen]t recall me & they cannot do that without giving me some restitution -- By the way you & Lindley say the Hoya of Borneo is the finest climber but it is not to compare for one moment with Beaumontia which is indeed the finest thing I ever saw -- I am very glad you have seen Miss Colvile her verdict on Kinchin is very good -- I hope it would not ruin Reeve to send me a few copies of the lithograph -- The Macoma or whatever it be has never been found on the Rhod[odendron]. arboreum in Sikkim many of these products are climatal or produced by insects or both i.e. the presence of the insect though not of the plant being due to a drier or otherwise modified atmosphere. Thus our Lac is certainly the effect of Aphis puncture on many trees; so Ehrenberg says is the manner of the Palestine Tamarix -- I do not know the cause of the flow from the V[an] D[iemens] L[and]*3.Eucalyptus but that is most abundant in dry years & unknown in wet seasons. Pinus Excelsa affords a manner in the N[orth]. W[est]. as does the Andromeda Rhododend[ron] Oak & Deodar in that country occasionally
[[10]] & a fine dry seasons -- I cannot much regret to hear of poor Ed[ward]. Forsters death -- a patriarch of the Linnaean. I thought I had said enough of the aurora & given you enough of other unbotanical matters without troubling you with it for the Journal, besides I did not think it so very wonderful as to elicit surprize[sic]& still less argument. The sceptics may content themselves with "tant pis pour le faits"*4 , it required no cunning to pronounce upon such a display as I saw & in a country like India wherein all England eats a heavy dinner at 8 & goes to bed at 10 it is not surprizing that such sights should not be observed. I suppose I should be snubbed for saying that I have seen others since & in the day time -- Did you receive my *5conclusion of the Tasmanian Spicilegia -- I dare say the letters in which these & the journal mss were acknowledged are amongst the missing -- Planchon being away you probably cannot do any--thing to it.
I have not drawn upon you yet but my agents have sent me a cheque on you for £300 for signature you never told me if it was all right[sic] about the money before.I have not yet spent £450 since leaving home[.] Ever your most affectionate | Jos D.Hooker[signature]
ENDNOTES
1. A note written in another hand records that the letter was received June 28 [1849].
2. The city formerly known as Calcutta is now called Kolkata.
3. The Island formerly known as Van Diemen's Land is now called Tasmania.
4, Meaning "so much forthefacts".
5. The address of the recipient appears here as the letter would originally have been folded in such a way that it formed its own 'envelope'. The address reads: "P&O Oriental Via Southampton | Sir W.J. Hooker | Royal Gardens | Kew | London"
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