Part 18

With this kafilah he left Najebabad on the 14th of February, 1783, and on the 15th arrived at Lolldong, where the province of Delhi is separated from that of Serinagur, or Gurwal, by a small rivulet. On the north of this rivulet the kafilah now encamped, and each of its members was soon busily engaged in preparing for their journey through the forest, which it was computed would occupy three days. The extreme heat of the weather rendering a tent or some substitute for one absolutely necessary, Forster purchased a large black kummul or blanket, which, being slantingly extended over a slight bamboo frame, composed of a ridge-pole upheld by two supporters, and fastened below by small pins, formed a commodious and portable lodging. His baggage, consisting of a thin mattress, a quilt, a canvass portmanteau containing a few changes of linen, which served for a pillow, together with the kummul, was stowed behind him upon his horse. The Kashmerian followed on foot.

Leaving Lolldong on the 22d, they began to ascend the mountains. Next day, as they continued their march through the forest, Forster, overcome by fatigue, sat down under a tree to enjoy his pipe; but while he was thus engaged, having apparently sunk into that dreaming state which smoking sometimes induces, the kafilah moved on and disappeared. The ground being thickly covered with leaves, no trace of a road was discernible; and when he mounted to proceed, his horse, either terrified by the effluvia of wild beasts lurking among the trees, or perceiving the embarrassment of their situation, could with difficulty be made to proceed in any direction. However, he was at length forcibly put in motion; but after traversing the forest in various directions, without perceiving either road or habitation, or the vestige of any creature, except great quantities of elephants’ dung, he discovered a narrow path leading through a wilderness to a small valley, whose inhabitants kindly conducted him to the halting-place of the kafilah.

In two days they arrived on the banks of the Ganges, twelve miles above Hardwar. It was here about two hundred yards broad, from ten to fifteen feet deep, and rolled along rapidly through gloomy forests or barren flats. The woods in these parts abounded with wild peacocks. On the 6th of March he crossed the Jumma, which here equalled the Ganges in breadth; both, however, were at their lowest ebb. The scenery all the way from Lolldong to the Ganges is woody, mountainous, and picturesque; and the principal game are wild elephants, which are hunted merely for their tusks. Before them, to the north, was the vast snowy range of the Himalaya, among the inaccessible pinnacles of which the Hindoo has placed the heaven of India. Among the roots of this Indian Olympus, which stretch out their rough huge masses far into the plains below, affording safe haunts for tigers and banditti, the kafilah toiled along, continually ascending, towards Kashmere.

On the 20th of March they arrived at Bellaspoor, on the frontiers of the Punjâb, or country of the five rivers. Here they remained three days, when, growing weary of attending the slow motions of the caravan, our traveller, with his servant and another Kashmerian, pushed forward, crossed the Sutlej, and on the 25th arrived at the camp of the Rannee of Bellaspoor, then engaged in war with the chief of Kangrah. The encampment of these rude soldiers was a curious spectacle. Eight thousand foot and three hundred horse, armed with matchlocks, swords, spears, and clubs, were huddled together in extreme confusion on two sides of a hill, under small sheds composed of the boughs of trees. Four ordinary tents, the only ones in the camp, afforded shelter to the general and the principal officers.

Forster now learned that his progress towards the enemy’s army, unless accompanied by an escort, would be attended with much danger; and he accordingly applied for the necessary protection to the commander-in-chief, whom he found sitting under a banyan-tree, surrounded by a number of naked officers, and reviewing some new levies who had just come in from the woods. These wild recruits, hitherto accustomed to a life of licentious freedom, appeared to be so many members of the fawn and satyr family, so fierce were their looks, so rude their costume. On explaining his desires to the general, he obtained a promise to be allowed to accompany the first messenger who should be despatched to the Kangrah camp.

However, our traveller was shortly afterward delivered from the necessity of depending on the protection of this uncouth mountaineer by the arrival of a drove of asses laden with iron, which was pursuing the route to Kashmere. To this party he now joined himself, and, bidding adieu to the rannee’s army, he proceeded towards that of the Kangrah chief, which, after plundering the ironmongers of a considerable sum, and putting the whole body in great terror, affected to treat them with civility. In this army there was a large detachment of Sikh horsemen, and it was them that Forster, who well understood their licentious manners and habits of plundering, principally dreaded. At this moment, therefore, he would willingly have sacrificed the moiety of his property to ensure the remainder. But there was no retreating; they were already in sight; so, assuming to the best of his ability an air of confidence and ease, he boldly advanced into the midst of these formidable marauders. “Imagining our approach,” says he, “to be that of the enemy, the Sikhs were preparing for the fight, to which they loudly exclaimed, in the tone of religious ejaculation, that their prophet had summoned them. In token of respect I had dismounted, and was leading my horse, when a Sikh, a smart fellow, mounted on an active mare, touched me in passing. The high-mettled animal, whether in contempt of me or my horse, perhaps of both, attacked us fiercely from the rear, and in the assault, which was violent, the Sikh fell to the ground. The action having commenced on the top of a hill, he rolled with great rapidity to the bottom of it, and in his way down left behind him his matchlock, sword, and turban. So complete a derangement I feared would have irritated the whole Sikh body; but on evincing the show of much sorrow for the disaster, and having assiduously assisted in investing the fallen horseman with his scattered appurtenances, I received general thanks.”

It was about the middle of April when Forster arrived at Jummoo, where, being supposed to be a merchant from whom some advantage might be derived, he was received by a Kashmerian with truly oriental expressions of welcome. Upon a banker in this city he had a bill for a considerable amount; but on examining it he found, that having been frequently soaked by the rain, and by his having fallen into a river on the way, the folds adhered together as if they had been pasted. However, the banker contrived, by steeping it in water, to decipher its import, and at once paid the money; though its shattered condition might have afforded him a sufficient pretext for delay. Being thus furnished with cash, our traveller began to think of enjoying the pleasures of Jummoo.

The trade and consequent wealth of this city arose from the insecurity of the road through Lahore, occasioned by the invasion of the Sikhs, which caused merchants to prefer this tedious and difficult but secure route. All articles of merchandise constituting the trade between Kashmere and Jummoo are transported by men, principally Kashmerians, who carry their extremely heavy burdens, two of which are considered a load for a strong mule, upon their back, as a soldier does his knapsack. When he desires to rest, the porter places under his pack a kind of short crutch, which he uses in walking. “The shawls, when exported from Kashmere, are packed in an oblong bale containing a certain weight or quantity, which in the language of the country is termed a _biddery_, the outward covering of which is a buffalo or ox’s hide, strongly sewed with leather thongs. As these packages are supposed to amount, with little variation, to a value long since ascertained, they are seldom opened until conveyed to the destined market.”

On the 17th of April he set out on foot from Jummoo, accompanied by a Kashmerian servant. The roads were steep and rocky; and not having been much accustomed to travelling on foot, he soon found that it would be necessary to proceed more slowly. His feet, in fact, like Bruce’s in the desert of Nubia, were so severely bruised and excoriated, that he walked with extreme pain and difficulty; though, somewhat to assuage his sufferings, he had carefully wrapped them round with bandages steeped in oil. However, the cool bracing air of the mountains, united with a feeling of security, and the certainty of finding commodious lodgings and a good supper at night, prevented his spirits from sinking; and still further to invigorate his resolution, fancy ever and anon placed before his mind the rich smiling landscapes and sparkling streams of Kashmere.

After a tedious and harassing journey of ten days, they reached on the 26th the summit of a lofty mountain, from whence he enjoyed the first glimpse of Kashmere. He now travelled in the suite of a Mohammedan rhan, with whom he had fallen in on the road; and this gentleman being a native of the country, and held everywhere in the highest esteem, he enjoyed the rare privilege of passing the custom-house untaxed and unmolested. He therefore entered with an unsoured temper into the paradise of Hindostan, where the face of nature exhibited all those features whose tendency it is to call up in the mind images of cheerfulness and pleasure. “The road from Vere Nang,” says Forster, “leads through a country exhibiting that store of luxuriant imagery which is produced by a happy disposition of hill, dale, wood, and water; and that these rare excellences of nature might be displayed in their full glory, it was the season of spring, when the trees, the apple, the pear, the peach, the apricot, the cherry, and mulberry, bore a variegated load of blossom. The clusters also of the red and white rose, with an infinite class of flowering shrubs, presented a view so gayly decked, that no extraordinary warmth of imagination was required to fancy that I stood at least on a province of fairy land.”

It is in such regions as these, and not in our northern climates, that the month of May is a season of beauty. The plains, dotted with numerous villages, and intersected by small rivers, were already waving with a rich harvest; while every copse and woody knoll gave shelter to innumerable singing-birds, whose notes made the whole atmosphere appear alive with music. Having reached Pamper, our traveller embarked in a boat on the Jylum, and proceeded by water to the city of Serinagur, which, with its houses covered with parterres of beautiful flowers, possesses at a distance a splendid and imposing aspect, answering in some degree to the idea which the historians of the flourishing days of India have given of it. But on entering the streets the illusion is quickly dissipated. Slaves are invariably filthy in their habits, and the people of Kashmere are now the slaves of the Afghans.

One of the principal beauties of this magnificent valley is its lake, a sheet of water five or six miles in circumference, interspersed with numerous small islands, and surrounded in its whole extent by shores singularly picturesque and romantic. We have already given, in the life of Bernier, some account of Serinagur and its environs; but it may be interesting to add here the picture of the Shalimar, which our traveller drew upon the spot nearly one hundred and fifty years after, when the power of the Moguls had passed away, and their palaces become the haunts of tenants more destructive than the owls and serpents of Babylon. “In the centre of the plain,” says he, “as it approaches the lake, one of the Delhi emperors constructed a spacious garden called the Shalimar, which is abundantly stored with fruit-trees and flowering shrubs. Some of the rivulets which intersect the plain are led into a canal at the back of the garden, and, flowing through its centre, or occasionally thrown into a variety of water-works, compose the chief beauty of the Shalimar. To decorate this spot the Mogul princes of India have displayed equal magnificence and taste, especially Jehangheer, who, with the enchanting Moormahal, made Kashmere his usual residence during the summer months, and largely contributed to improve its natural advantages. On arches thrown over the canal are erected, at equal distances, four or five suites of apartments, each consisting of a saloon, with four rooms at the angles, where the followers of the court attend, and the servants prepare sherbets, coffee, and the hookah. The frame of the doors of the principal saloon is composed of pieces of stone of a black colour, streaked with yellow lines, and of a closer grain and higher polish than porphyry. They were taken, it is said, from a Hindoo temple by one of the Mogul princes, and are esteemed of great value. The canal of the Shalimar is constructed of masonry as far as the lower pavilion, from whence the stream is conveyed through a bed of earth, in the centre of an avenue of spreading trees, to the lake, which, with other streams of less note, it supplies and refreshes.”

The environs of the city are adorned with private gardens. Here, and throughout the whole valley, the oriental plane-tree is carefully cultivated, and arrives at greater perfection than in any other country. It commonly attains the size of an oak, and, with its straight taper stem, silver bark, and pale-green leaf resembling an expanded hand, is, when in full foliage, a splendid and beautiful tree, and affords a grateful and refreshing shade. But the chief glory of Kashmere is its rose, of all the vegetable world the most exquisite production, unrivalled for its brilliancy and delicacy of odour, and yielding an essential oil, or attar, in comparison with which all other perfumes are as dross. The season when the rose first opens into blossom is celebrated as a festival by the inhabitants of the valley, who, repairing in crowds to the surrounding gardens, give loose to their passions, and riot in every species of licentious rejoicing.

But the wealth and fame of Kashmere have been chiefly derived from the manufacture of shawls, unrivalled for their fineness and beauty. The wool, or rather down, from which they are fabricated is not the growth of the country, but brought from districts of the high table-land of Tibet, a month’s journey to the north-east, where alone the shawl-goat will properly thrive. Various attempts have been made by the emperors of Hindostan and the kings of Persia to introduce this species of goat into their dominions; but the wool has always been found to be of an inferior quality. The French have lately imitated the examples of the Mogul and Persian sovereigns, and they may no doubt succeed in procuring a coarse kind of wool from which very useful shawls may be manufactured; but it may without much rashness be predicted, that in the attempt to rival the shawls of Kashmere they will inevitably fail, since no part of France is sufficiently analogous to the lofty plains of Tibet to afford the shawl-goat an exactly similar position with respect to climate, water, and food. Of all imitations that of the Persians, from the wool of Kerman, is said to approach most nearly to the shawl of Kashmere.

The wool, when imported, is of a dark-gray colour, and is bleached in Kashmere by means of a certain preparation of rice-flour. The whitest down, which is said to be brought from Rodank, is reckoned the best, and sells in the valley from ten to twenty rupees the turruk, about twelve pounds. No exact estimate of the number of shawls manufactured in the year can be made. There are said to be about sixteen thousand looms, each occupying three men, employed; and supposing, with a contemporary author, that five shawls on an average are made annually to each loom, the total number would amount to eighty thousand. The shop of the weavers consists of a kind of framework, at which the workmen sit on a wooden bench. Two persons are employed on the plainest shawls, and the number is sometimes doubled. The shuttle made use of is long, narrow, and heavy. When the pattern of the shawl is variegated, the flowers of figures are worked with wooden needles, there being a separate one for every different-coloured thread; and in such cases the operation is exceedingly slow.

“The _oostand_, or head-workman,” says Hamilton, “superintends, while his journeymen are employed near him, under his directions. If they have any new pattern in hand, or one with which they are not familiar, he describes to them the figure, colour, and threads that are to be used, while he keeps before him the pattern on which they happen to be employed drawn on paper. During the operation the rough side of the shawl is uppermost on the frame, notwithstanding which the head-workman never mistakes the regularity of the most finished patterns. A shop may be occupied with one shawl above a year, provided it be a remarkably fine one, while other shops make six or eight in the course of that time. Of the best and most noted sorts not so much as a quarter of an inch is completed in one day by three persons, which is the usual number employed. Shawls containing much work are made in separate pieces at different shops; and it may be observed, that it very rarely happens, when the pieces are completed, that they correspond in size.”

Forster was much disappointed in the women of Kashmere. They were handsome brunettes, but by no means endowed with that extreme beauty or elegance of form which has been attributed to them by other travellers. It is probable, however, that since the period of the Afghan invasion, which introduced into the country a rabble of adventurers from Kabul and the neighbouring regions, the race may have been deteriorated by a mixture with these ill-favoured foreigners; and that poverty, compelling them to have recourse to inferior food, and inducing habits of filth and a general squalidness, may have considerably aided in producing this result. In fertility they have by no means degenerated. Their families are numerous, whether poor or rich,—a circumstance which our traveller, who participated in Montesquieu’s opinion respecting the fecundity of all ichthyophagi, partly attributes to the great abundance of fish in their lakes and rivers.

During his stay in this country he was much alarmed at the suspicions of a Georgian, who, on observing the form of his head, which he averred was too flat at the top to be that of a Mohammedan, declared him at once to be a Christian. Forster, understanding that this man possessed an estate at Benares, in order to check his indiscretion or impertinence, disclosed to him his true story, informing him at the same time, however, that should any evil arise from his treachery or want of discretion, his estate would be confiscated, and the person of his commercial partner residing in the British territories exposed to punishment.

This circumstance, together with an increasing disgust at the character of the people, induced Forster to hasten as much as possible his departure from Kashmere. But this was a measure not easily effected. No person could leave the province without a passport from the governor, who, when this document was applied for, observed, that the Turks were good soldiers, and that as he just then happened to be in want of men, he would employ the traveller in his army. Forster now began to perceive that his Turkish character, which had hitherto procured him respect, was likely to advance him to a post of honour which he had very little ambition to occupy. One agent after another was employed to obtain the passport from the governor, a ferocious and sanguinary Afghan, who, like Charles IX. of France, shot men for his amusement; and at length, by dint of unremitted perseverance and a trifling bribe, the selfsame Georgian who had conjectured his religion from the form of his scull, with a sagacity which would have done honour to Dr. Gall himself, contrived to deliver him from the honour intended him by Azad Khan, and obtain the tyrant’s permission for his leaving the country.

Fearful lest the khan should alter his determination, and transform him, whether he would or not, into a trooper, he took into his service a Persian boy, hired a horse of a native of Peshawer, who was returning to that city, and on the 11th of June set out from Kashmere. His evil genius, in the form of vanity, had suggested to him the propriety of adorning his person with a gaudy red coat, in the pocket of which he deposited his passport. This showy garment, which no doubt excited the envy of many an Afghan beau, on the second day of his journey was snatched by a thief from his bed just as he was awaking, who, in spite of every obstacle, succeeded in bearing off his plunder. Not having passed the frontiers, he began to apprehend that a return to the capital might be necessary; but found, upon trial, that his Indian gold was considered every whit as good as Azad Khan’s written permission.

The scenery through which his road now lay was of a magnificent description, mountainous, rocky, savage, gloomy; forests below, snowy pinnacles above, with here and there a torrent bursting and dashing through rocky chasms with the noise of thunder. The path, impassable to horses, which were sent by another route, wound round the projections of the mountains, and sometimes consisted of a floor of planks laid over beams which were driven into the cliff. The rivers were crossed in baskets slung upon ropes, or on sheep’s or dogs’ skins inflated, and placed under the breast, while the traveller impelled himself forward by the motion of his feet. In other places a sort of bridge was formed in the following manner:—A stout rope, fastened to wooden posts on either shore sustained a number of carved pieces of wood resembling oxen-yokes, with forks placed vertically. The sides of these yokes being embraced by smaller ropes afforded a hold to the passengers.

On the 10th of July they crossed the Indus, about twenty miles above the town of Attock. “The stream,” says Forster, “though not agitated by wind, was rapid, with a rough undulating motion, and about three-quarters of a mile or a mile in breadth where it was not interrupted by islands, and having, as nearly as I could judge, a west-and-by-south course. The water was much discoloured by a fine black sand, which, when put into a vessel, quickly subsided. It was so cold from, I apprehend, a large mixture of snow then thawed by the summer heats, that in drinking it my teeth suffered a violent pain. In our boat were embarked seventy persons, with much merchandise and some horses. This unwieldy lading, the high swell of the current, and the confusion of the frightened passengers made the passage dangerous and very tedious.”