Lepchas, a common name for any bee: its larvae are said to be
greedily eaten, as are those of various allied insects.

Choongtam boasts a profusion of beautiful insects, amongst which the
British swallow-tail butterfly (_Papilio Machaon_) disports itself in
company with magnificent black, gold, and scarlet-winged butterflies,
of the Trojan group, so typical of the Indian tropics. At night my
tent was filled with small water-beetles (_Berosi_) that quickly put
out the candle; and with lovely moths came huge cockchafers
(_Encerris Griffithii_), and enormous and foetid flying-bugs (of the
genus _Derecterix_), which bear great horns on the thorax.
The irritation of mosquito and midge bites, and the disgusting
insects that clung with spiny legs to the blankets of my tent and
bed, were often as effectual in banishing sleep, as were my anxious
thoughts regarding the future.

The temple at Choongtam is a poor wooden building, but contains some
interesting drawings of Lhassa, with its extensive Lamaseries and
temples; they convey the idea of a town, gleaming, like Moscow, with
gilded and copper roofs; but on a nearer aspect it is found to
consist of a mass of stone houses, and large religious edifices many
stories high, the walls of which are regularly pierced with small
square ornamented windows.* [MM. Huc and Gabet's account of Lhassa
is, I do not doubt, excellent as to particulars; but the trees which
they describe as magnificent, and girdling the city, have uniformly
been represented to me as poor stunted willows, apricots, poplars,
and walnuts, confined to the gardens of the rich. No doubt the
impression left by these objects on the minds of travellers from
tree-less Tartary, and of Sikkimites reared amidst stupendous
forests, must be widely different. The information concerning Lhassa