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BRIAN HODGSON AND THE NYENCHHEN-THANGLA CHAIN.

96

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Transhimalaya, simply reflected his own personal opinion, or whether it was a conception he had inherited from Ritter and Humboldt. If his Transhimalaya, or as he calls it, Nyenchhen-thangla, originated from himself and the information he could have collected from natives, it would of course be of much greater value and interest, than if it were simply an imitation of the great German geographers' maps, for in the latter case he would only be an epigon and a new link in an old chain. At any rate Hodgson claims an honourable place in the history of exploration in

the Transhimalaya mountains.

Brian Hodgson was born in 1800, went out to India in 1818, came to Nepal in 182o, was Assistant Resident there from 1825 to 1833 and Resident 1833-43; 1845-58 he lived in Darjiling and returned, 1858, for good to England, where he died 1894, after a life of restless, indefatigable and brilliant work both as a scholar, diplomatist and politician.

His life was published two years after his death by Sir WILLIAM HUNTER.' It is a work of some 38o pages, written with knowledge, love and admiration. All the innumerable articles published by Hodgson on different subjects during the course of his long life are given in a list with titles and dates. We are told that during his first 25 years in the Himalaya he had seldom »a staff of less than from ten to twenty persons (often many more), of various tongues and races, employed as translaters and collectors, artists, shooters, and stuffers».2 Sir JOSEPH HOOKER, was materially influenced in his studies by Hodgson and speaks with the greatest admiration and gratitude of the advantage it was to be welcomed to the Himalaya by such a man. Hooker says: »I arrived at Darjiling in the spring of 1848. Hodgson received me cordially, and invited me to make his house my headquarters; to share his table and make every use of his valuable library, which was rich in works relating to the Himalaya, Nepal, and Tibet. Thus I had the advantage, at the outset of my explorations, of the counsel and hospitality of the man who was facile princeps in respect of knowledge of the Eastern Himalaya, its peoples, products, and natural history.» 3 Hodgson's »Nepal life would have been almost equally one of solitude but for the society of the most intellectual of the high-caste Nepalese of the Court, and of the learned Lamas of Kathmandu and especially of Tibet, the latter of whom made frequent visits to him in Nepal.» In Darjiling he studied the Races of Northern India and their languages, the physical geography of the Himalaya and Tibet, the zoology, especially the ornithology of Sikkim.

After having spoken of Hodgson's intercourse with Humboldt, Hooker relates the following interesting recollection: »This leads me to the subject of the Physical Geography of the Himalaya, upon which our discussions were long and often animated, for we differed considerably in our conceptions of the structure of the chain

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Life of. p.   Houghton Hodgson, British Resident at the Court of Nepal. London 1896.

4   . c. 244•

3 Op. cit. p. 249.