he map the new territories; and in doing so, he hoped for the first time to push up to the Himalayan foothills in the west and perhaps penetrate them to locate the sources of the Ganges and Jumna rivers.
His resultant survey of 1807–8 had no pretensions to the accuracy of Mackenzie’s in Mysore, let alone to the ‘correct mathematical principles’ in which Lambton took such pride. Colebrooke travelled as much as possible by river-boat. Distances were measured along the bank with a wheeled apparatus known as a perambulator, and bearings were taken to plot locations and occasionally establish latitude, but not with a view to triangulating the territory. It was, in fact, what was called a ‘route survey’, and its purpose was largely strategic and military. Roads and rivers by which troops could be moved were of the essence; so were fortified towns and other obstructions. The hills were of interest less for their heights than their hollows through which an enemy might invade or, more realistically, a British force advance.
But Robert Colebrooke was well aware of Lambton’s work and, while complaining that nothing had been heard of the elusive Yorkshireman for a long time, chanced to mention that it was ‘a pity that a survey conducted on such scientific principles is not extended all over India’. Others would soon be thinking along the same lines. Lambton was setting new standards of accuracy which rendered all prior surveys approximateif not redundant. There was no point in wasting weeks plotting triangles with pocket-size theodolites if the Great Trigonometrical Survey with its half-ton instruments and its page-long equations might one day appear over the horizon.
A family man and a happy one, Robert Colebrooke took along on his survey his wife Charlotte, or ‘my young lady’ as he always calls her, plus the two eldest of the nine children which she had borne him in as many years of marriage. Travelling light was not, therefore, an option. According to Colebrooke’s diary, when they forsook their boats his ‘equipage consisted of 4 elephants which carried two marquees and 6 private tents; five camels for my baggage; a palanqueen, a mahana and a dooly [different kinds of litters] (the latter two carrying my two children and their nurse), 12 bhangies [bearers for carrying the litters], 12 coolies [all-purpose porters], 12 lascars for pitching the tents, and an escort of 50 sepoys [Indian soldiers]’. Not surprisingly the Colebrookes stuck mainly to their boats.
Throughout his diary Colebrooke happily mixes domestic details with professional notes and extempore sketches. Tigers kept them awake at night, the boats got repeatedly stuck on mud banks, and whole districts turned out to stare at them. Clearly the people had not previously come across a European – let alone a breeding pair complete with offspring. Colebrooke bore it all with grace and humour. Out with his gun of a dewy morning, nostrils flared to enjoy the post-monsoon freshness, the forty-four-year-old Colonel was loving every minute of it. This was the life. It was snipe for breakfast, it was tea with the Nawab, it was India in all its pre-colonial innocence. There was no better place, no better job.
During 1807 the Colebrookes pushed up the Gogra and the Rapti, tributaries of the Ganges, and came within sight of the mountains. At Gorakhpur Robert took his first series of observations of the snowy peaks. Christmas was spent with thesmall European community in the city of Lucknow. Then, leaving his family behind for what would be a long overland slog, in early 1808 he pressed on to the north-west.
Working along the foot of the mountains, he now encountered thick swamp-forest and the most tiger-infested jungles in India. This was the infamous terai , a low-lying belt of tall grasses and towering trees which skirted Nepali territory and was a more effective frontier than the hills themselves. It would claim the lives of a legion of surveyors.
His resultant survey of 1807–8 had no pretensions to the accuracy of Mackenzie’s in Mysore, let alone to the ‘correct mathematical principles’ in which Lambton took such pride. Colebrooke travelled as much as possible by river-boat. Distances were measured along the bank with a wheeled apparatus known as a perambulator, and bearings were taken to plot locations and occasionally establish latitude, but not with a view to triangulating the territory. It was, in fact, what was called a ‘route survey’, and its purpose was largely strategic and military. Roads and rivers by which troops could be moved were of the essence; so were fortified towns and other obstructions. The hills were of interest less for their heights than their hollows through which an enemy might invade or, more realistically, a British force advance.
But Robert Colebrooke was well aware of Lambton’s work and, while complaining that nothing had been heard of the elusive Yorkshireman for a long time, chanced to mention that it was ‘a pity that a survey conducted on such scientific principles is not extended all over India’. Others would soon be thinking along the same lines. Lambton was setting new standards of accuracy which rendered all prior surveys approximateif not redundant. There was no point in wasting weeks plotting triangles with pocket-size theodolites if the Great Trigonometrical Survey with its half-ton instruments and its page-long equations might one day appear over the horizon.
A family man and a happy one, Robert Colebrooke took along on his survey his wife Charlotte, or ‘my young lady’ as he always calls her, plus the two eldest of the nine children which she had borne him in as many years of marriage. Travelling light was not, therefore, an option. According to Colebrooke’s diary, when they forsook their boats his ‘equipage consisted of 4 elephants which carried two marquees and 6 private tents; five camels for my baggage; a palanqueen, a mahana and a dooly [different kinds of litters] (the latter two carrying my two children and their nurse), 12 bhangies [bearers for carrying the litters], 12 coolies [all-purpose porters], 12 lascars for pitching the tents, and an escort of 50 sepoys [Indian soldiers]’. Not surprisingly the Colebrookes stuck mainly to their boats.
Throughout his diary Colebrooke happily mixes domestic details with professional notes and extempore sketches. Tigers kept them awake at night, the boats got repeatedly stuck on mud banks, and whole districts turned out to stare at them. Clearly the people had not previously come across a European – let alone a breeding pair complete with offspring. Colebrooke bore it all with grace and humour. Out with his gun of a dewy morning, nostrils flared to enjoy the post-monsoon freshness, the forty-four-year-old Colonel was loving every minute of it. This was the life. It was snipe for breakfast, it was tea with the Nawab, it was India in all its pre-colonial innocence. There was no better place, no better job.
During 1807 the Colebrookes pushed up the Gogra and the Rapti, tributaries of the Ganges, and came within sight of the mountains. At Gorakhpur Robert took his first series of observations of the snowy peaks. Christmas was spent with thesmall European community in the city of Lucknow. Then, leaving his family behind for what would be a long overland slog, in early 1808 he pressed on to the north-west.
Working along the foot of the mountains, he now encountered thick swamp-forest and the most tiger-infested jungles in India. This was the infamous terai , a low-lying belt of tall grasses and towering trees which skirted Nepali territory and was a more effective frontier than the hills themselves. It would claim the lives of a legion of surveyors.
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