days or a week or two, were rapidly causing the disappearance
of all game in the nearer nullahs. The
sportsmen s life in the wild, rocky, barren hills beyond
the Happy Valley is an exciting and an interesting
one. The stalks are frequently over hills that to ordinary
folk would appear quite inaccessible, and quite impassable
for all porters ; consequently, the keen shikari must
learn to face all weathers and spend nights unsheltered
from the elements save by such clothes as he stands up
in, and perhaps a sleeping bag of felt and fur. This,
and the long days spent on the hillsides, season him to
the conditions of a hunter’s life in a way nothing
else will- and from the intimate knowledge those
men acquire, who have been long among the
various mountain tribes, of language, habits, and
customs, they become very valuable in time of
unrest when fighting is in the air, and as is usually
the case in distant corners of our vast empire, there are
but few at hand to control the disturbance or to understand
its causes. Ladies have often accompanied these
distant sporting expeditions, and have found plenty of
work—securing food supplies, superintending the camp
arrangements, mending, and washing—besides amusing
themselves with a rifle when game was to be had within
reasonable distance. Many women become very expert
rifle shots when they can find scope for their skill without
over-fatigue, a thing which seldom fails both to unsteady
hand and eye.
To return to my march from Revel,—from
a village about six miles beyond it, Gagangair,
where the camping-ground even for Kashmir was
unusually beautiful, the path began to ascend at times
gently, at other points with a swiftness and abruptness
not a little disconcerting. The mountains were closing
in on either side, and the whole character of the scenery
changed, for the path rose gradually some five thousand
feet in six miles. For the first three miles the Sind raced
Rocks and rapids near Sonamerg
along in its narrow bed with a wild fury that made its
progress a succession of rapids; twisting, turning, tormenting,
the tawny, foam-flecked waters hurled themselves
along, sweeping in their wild career over stones