fine sweet, loose-skinned oranges, which are largely grown about Temi and Burmiok in the Tista valley and are the only good winter fruit in Sikkim, I reached Namchi, where I put up in Lasso Kagi’s old house. Next day I went on up the ridge which leads to the top of Tendong, and found the trees covered with Dendrobes, Cœlogyne, Pleione, and other orchids, not yet in flower. On the top of Tendong at 8,000 feet the forest of oak, chestnut, magnolia and other trees is very dense, damp and gloomy, owing to the long dark moss which covers the tree-trunks. In this forest grew some beautiful terrestrial orchids such as Anæctochilus, Goodyera and Calanthe, also large Arisæmas, Solomon's Seal and many other herbs and ferns. The usual forest birds were in stiaggling parties, composed of many different species, among which a lovely little flower- pecker, Myzanthe ignipectus, was the only one new to me. I breakfasted m the forest, where the path on the right descends to Temi, and followed the ridge through very thick forest. For a long time no water could be found to camp at, but after a long search we found enough and waited for the coolies, who arrived just before dark, though my Madras boy did not turn up till next day. Though the elevation was about 7,500 feet, it was much warmer in the thick forest at night than at Darjeeling, where the radiation produces hoar frost when the sky is clear, and I had a comfortable night. At daybreak we heard the curious cry of the Tragopan pheasant not far off, and whilst I was dressing, my little shikari went out and shot a magnificent male in full breeding plumage and a female. As soon as the sun rose the birds ceased their love calls and were much more wary. Directly they leave the trees on which they seem to call in the same way as the Capercaillie in Europe, they are almost impossible to see or to follow in the dense forest and on the precipitous hillsides covered with bamboo which they frequent, and I had some difficulty in finding my way back to the path.
In this forest there are barking deer, squirrels and a few of the Panda, Ælurus fulgens, a very remarkable arboreal animal which is peculiar to this region, but which, during my trips m Sikkim, I have never seen except in captivity. It is a very handsome beast as large as a fox, with rich, reddish fur, and cannot be so rare, as living ones are often brought in for sale at Darjeeling. Its only near ally in the world is a much larger animal discovered by my late friend Abbé David, in the virgin forests of North¬ west Szechuen and known as Ælurodes melanoleucus.
For some miles farther along the ridge the forest was so dense that I had no view on either side, but at last the path came out on a steep, narrow ridge where Rhododendron Hodgsoni was in flower. On the nectar of its purple-pink blossoms were feeding two of the most beautiful birds of the Himalaya, Myzornis pyrrhura, and a honey-sucker known as Æthopyga ignicauda, which goes up to 11,000 feet during the rainy season. Both of them had their heads covered with pollen from the flowers. On open places near here I found a rare plant discovered by Sir Joseph Hooker in the Lachung valley, and I brought home bulbs which flowered in England two years later and were figured in the Botanical Magazine, Plate 6385, as Fritillaria Hookerii. It is allied to the better-known Fritillaria rosea or macrophylla, from the North-West Himalayas; though
