Note 280 — Chapter XXIV

These are probably the Ghassa mountains of Turners narrative: bearings which I took of one of the loftiest of them, from the Khasia mountains, together with those from Bhomtso, would appear to place it in latitude 28° 10′ and longitude 90°, and 200 miles from the former station, and 90° east of the latter. Its elevation from Bhomtso angles is 24,160 feet. I presume I also saw Chumulari from the Khasia; the most western peak seen thence being in the direction of that mountain. Captain R. Strachey has most kindly paid close attention to these bearings and distances, and recalculated the distances and heights: no confidence is, however, to be placed in the results of such minute angles, taken from immense distances. Owing in part no doubt to extraordinary refraction, the angles of the Ghassa mountain taken from the Khasia give it an elevation of 26,500 feet! which is very much over the truth; and make that of Chumulari still higher: the distance from my position in the Khasia being 210 miles from Chumulari! which is probably the utmost limit at which the human eye has ever discerned a terrestrial object.