INTRODUCTION
M a n y years ago a little girl with knitted brows and
every outward sign of strong concentration was pulling
at one end of a chicken’s “ merry-thought.” The brows
relaxed and the mouth widened into a delighted smile,
“ I’ve won it,” she shouted,'holding up the longer end,
“ and I wish to go to Cashmere.”
“ I don’t believe you know where Cashmere is, and
you will not go now, because you have told your wish,”
shouted her cousin defiantly, „for he had not been
pleased to be beaten by a girl.
Nevertheless, by dint of hard wishing and a good
deal of patience, after long years the little girl arrived
in Cashmere, but by that time she was no longer little,
and people talked of the land of roses as “ Kashmir ”
with a K- What she saw and did when she arrived
there will be told to you in future chapters; that she
felt her wishes were not wasted is proved by the fact
that she hopes the day may come when she will be able
to return to that beautiful valley and make better
acquaintance with it. Meanwhile, if she, or rather I—
for I may as well identify myself at once with the
heroine of the merry-thought—can do anything to