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A single pool, temporarily formed on the slopes of the mighty Nanga Parbat by the melting of the snow in 1850, was a mile and a half long by half a mile wide and three hundred feet deep just so much devastation "cocked and primed." The modern state of Kashmir dates from 1846, when the Sikh empire, of which it was a part, was overthrown by the British.
But the mercury was 92 degrees in the shade and the sun-blaze terrific, and it was a relief when the boat swung round a corner, and left the stir of the broad, rapid Jhelum for a still, narrow, and sharply winding canal, which intersects a part of Srinagar lying between the Jhelum and the hill-crowning fort of Hari Parbat.
Later in the season, as the air grew clearer, Jane and I made almost daily pilgrimages to the point, only a few minutes' walk from our hut, whence, framed by a foreground of columnar pines, Nanga Parbat could generally be seen for a time in the morning. Tuesday, August 1.
Up and up, till only pines waved over me, and the track, leading along the edge of a deep khud, opened out at last upon a plateau, hot and sunlit; here an entrancing panorama of Nanga Parbat and the whole range of mountains round Haramok caused me to stop "at gaze" until a mundane desire for breakfast sent me scurrying down the dusty and slippery descent to Larch, where I found, as I had hoped, the rest of the party assembled expectant around the tiffin basket, while the necromancer, Sabz Ali, had just succeeded in producing the most delightful stew, omelette, and coffee from the usual native toy kitchen, made, apparently, in a few minutes with a couple of stones and a dab of mud!
The view of the Kashmir plain, through which the river winds like a silver snake; the solemn ring of mountains, enclosing the valley with a rampart of rock and snow; the innumerable roofs of the city, glittering like burnished scales in the keen sunlight, densely clustered round the fort-crowned height of Hari Parbat, went to make up such a picture as Turner would have kneeled to.
Fares, 4 an. 6 pi., all the way." See that he be provided with a horn, to the hooting of which the Echo Lake will be found responsive." "From the balcony of the * Hôtel Baloo an unrivalled view of Nanga Parbat should be obtained. Glasses can be procured from the anna-in-the-slot machines which are dotted about."
Uprising from this blue interminable distance, the first crumplings of the foothills showed like purple velvet, and from these again the giant Himalayas the "home of the greater gods" sprang aloft, in a medley of lovely lines and hues, till they reached the uttermost north where the hoar head of Nanga Parbat soared twenty-five thousand feet into the blue.
To the northward rose the fantastic range of peaks that overhang the Wangat gorge, and almost below my feet, at a depth of some 1500 feet, lay a sombre lakelet, steely dark and still, in the shadow of the ridge upon which I sat. The sun was going down fast into a fleecy bed of clouds, amid which I knew that Nanga Parbat lay swathed from sight.
Down the gentle river we swiftly glided all day, while the Takht and Hari Parbat grew smaller and bluer, and Srinagar lay below them invisible in its swathing greenery.
My pet driver, having been damaged, was very evilly treated by the native craftsman, who bound up its wounds with large screws! The mountains of Kashmir have been a constant joy to us. Varying with every change of light and shade, custom cannot stale their infinite variety; but as yet I had not seen the great monarch of Chilas, Nanga Parbat.
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