Himalayan Journals — Volume 1

The Sunderbunds offer Joseph Dalton Hooker no jungle spectacle—only low palms and mangroves. Yet fruits tossed up by the steamer recall fossil plants buried in the mud of England’s Isle of Sheppey.

In 1848, Hooker arrives in Calcutta and turns from its gardens and bustling river to the less-travelled country beyond. A naturalist with an eye for both botanical detail and the shape of the land, he sets out to study India’s plants and geology, from coal-bearing plains toward the Himalayan heights. The road brings its own trials: the palkee that first seems a marvel soon leaves him dusty, aching and weary of its bearers. What will the journey reveal in landscapes where even familiar plants carry clues to a vanished past?

With centuries of literature, it's inevitable that some will fall through the cracks. We hunt down public domain works and restore them so they're not lost to the world.

Who are we? We're Cairn Press. Our background is in design, publishing, typography, and technology. These skills fuel our mission to create the highest quality Public Domain eBooks available online, at an affordable price. We give them the treatment they deserve; our proprietary process restores books for a better overall user experience in design, readability, and e-reader compatibility.