the same violent weather, thunder, lightning, gales,
and rain, which prevailed during every midsummer
I spent in India. A great deal of Coix (Job’s tears) is
cultivated about Moflong: it is of a dull greenish
purple, and though planted in drills, and carefully
hoed and weeded, is a very ragged crop. The shell of
the cultivated sort is soft, and the kernel is sweet;
whereas the wild Coix is so hard that it cannot he
broken by the teeth. The produce is small, not above
thirty or forty-fold.
. From a hill behind Moflong bungalow, on which are
some stone altars, a most superb view is obtained to
the northward of the Bhotan Himalaya, their snowy
peaks stretching in a broken series from north-east to
north-west; all are below the horizon of the spectator,
though from 17,000 to 20,000 feet above his level.
The finest view in the Khasia mountains, and perhaps
a more extensive one than has ever before been
described, is that from Chillong hill, the culminant
point of the range, about six miles north-east from
Moflong bungalow. This hill, 6,660 feet above the
sea, rises from an undulating grassy country, covered
with scattered trees and occasional clumps of wood;
the whole scenery being parklike, and as little like
that of India at so low an elevation as it is possible
to be.
I visited Chillong in October with Lieutenant Cave;
starting from Churra, and reaching the bungalow,
two miles from its top, the same night, with relays of
ponies, which he had kindly provided. We were
unfortunate in not obtaining a brilliant view of the
snowy mountains, their tops being partially clouded ;
but the coup d'oeil was superb. Northward, beyond
the rolling Khasia hills, lay the Assam valley, seventy
miles broad, with the Burrampooter winding through it,
fifty miles distant, reduced to a thread. Beyond this,
banks of vapour obscured all but the dark range of
the Lower Himalaya, crested by peaks of frosted silver,
at the immense distance of from 100 to 220 miles from
Chillong. All are below the horizon of the observer ;
yet so false is perspective, that they seem high in the
air. The mountains occupy sixty degrees of the
horizon, and stretch over upwards of 250 miles,
comprising the greatest extent of snow visible from
any point with which I am acquainted.
Westward from Chillong the most distant Garrow
hills visible are about forty miles off ; and eastward
those of Cachar, which are loftier, are about seventy
miles. To the south the view is limited by the
Tippera hills, which, where nearest, are 100 miles
distant; while to the- south-west lies the sea-like
Gangetic delta, whose horizon, lifted by refraction,
must be fully 120. The extent of this view is therefore
upwards of 340 miles in one direction, and the
visible horizon of the observer encircles an area of
fully thirty thousand square miles, which is greater
than that of Ireland !
Continuing northward from Moflong, after five miles,
a sudden descent of 400 feet leads to a broad flat
grassy valley, called Syong, beyond which the road
passes over low rocky hills, wooded on their north or
sheltered flanks only, dividing flat-floored valleys.
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