An Embassy to the Court of the Teshoo Lama in Tibet - Prajna Quest

TIBET. 207Vesuvius, according to M. de Saussure, 3900 feet ; Etna, 10,036feet; Monfe Velino, one of the Appennines, 8397 feet. In Owiiyhee,(latitude 18° 54' to 2,0" north) the summit of the higliest mountain,Mouna Kaah, in March was constantly buried in snow.The aUitudeof the CordeHers, according to M. de Condamine, or tropical line ofsnow, is computed at 16,020 feet; the Peak of Teneriffe, or Pico deTeyde, according to Dr. Heberden, 15,396 feet; the mountain Gemmi,in the canton of Berne, 10,110 feet; Chimberazzo, the most elevatedpoint of the Andes, 20,280 feet. The hne of congelation of Chimberazzo,or that part of the mountain which iscovered perpetually withsnow, isno less than 2400 feet from its summit.Near our encampment at Teuna, which was distant full fourteenmiles from Phari, was a small inclosure of green wheat, which had juststrength enough to give out its ear, but which I was told would proceedno further;for that the cold is too intense, both here and at Phari,to admit its ripening ; and that it is cultivated merely as forage forcattle, when the plains become bare of grass, and they are hinderedfrom going abroad, during the depth of the winter. The periodicalrains give birth to a littleherbage, whose growth stops immediately asthey cease ;from the extreme dryness of the air, the grass then beginsto wither, and at this time itmay be crumbled between the fingers intodust : yet large droves of cattle are fed in this rteighbourhood ; forthough the pasture be short and dry, it is esteemed singularly sweetand nutritive.Animals ranging in a state of nature, are found to preferit,to the more exuberant herbage of milder climates.These plains, as well as the adjacent mountains, are frequented by