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'I went off to breakfast in a small mosque, which has been turned into a salle a manger by some officers stationed here, and I confess I should have eaten with more satisfaction had I not seen, as I entered the enclosure of the mosque, a native badly wounded on a charpoy, by which was sitting a woman in deep affliction.
JULY 9th. Started an hour before sunrise and did the whole march to Ghuri, distance nineteen miles. Walked the greater part of the way in sandals and socks, which I find the most comfortable way of getting on. First half of the march along the level to the foot of the hill, then an undulating road through a pine forest, the latter half easy walking owing to the ground being covered with fallen fir leaves which made it as soft as a carpet. A fine view from the top of hill, looking down to Ghuri. The river Ghuri, a mountain torrent seen for a long distance rushing with a great roar over its rocky bed, bounded on each side by high hills, and above by mountains covered with snow, from the melting of which it arises. The water is consequently icy cold, and my tub at the end of the march was highly invigorating. Put up at the Dâk Bungalow, a neat, clean, furnished building, standing on the right bank of the river, which is crossed just in front by a very fair suspension bridge. I can trace my route for to-morrow, for several miles, and I look at it with dismay as it ascends a terribly steep hill. There are two other men in the Bungalow, but I do not know who they are. I have not mentioned my equipment. It is so simple that a few lines will tell all. Two suits of old clothes, three flannel shirts, two warm under flannels, two pair of boots, "a light pair and a heavy pair of ammunitions," socks, handkerchiefs, &c., Mackintosh, warm bedding, a small tent called a "shildaree," a two-rolled ridge tent, about eight feet square, a dressing bag containing toilet requisites, a metal basin, salted tongues and humps, potatoes, tea, sugar, flour, mustard, &c., one bottle of brandy, to be reserved for medicinal use, a portable charpoy or bedstead, cane stool, a little crockery, knives and forks, cooking utensils, brass drinking cup for every purpose, a gingham umbrella with white cover, a dandy (previously described), solar topee, and light cap, tobacco, soap, and candles, a kookery, a stout alpen stock, a pass into Kashmir, and bag of money, and "voil
The heat of the night is ominously suggestive of shed's popularly conceived temperature, and, in the absence of the customary punkah and nodding, see-sawing wallah, a villager is employed to sit beside my charpoy and agitate the air immediately about my head with a big palm-leaf fan.
On further investigation an unusual bed was discovered; the owner had decided to improve his creature comforts and had diverted the springs and linked them together to provide a more luxurious charpoy for himself; his pleasure didn't last very long however, the colonel saw to that. I left before I could find out what punishment he got.
He flung himself upon her instantly. There was a moment of furious struggle, while the cell echoed with the reverberations of the shot and the screaming of the woman on the charpoy. The pistol exploded again as he grappled with the would-be murderess; the bullet, passing up his sleeve, creased his left arm as with a white-hot iron, and tore out through the cloth on his shoulder.
Amber was vaguely aware of the figures of two women one standing in a corner, the other seated dejectedly upon a charpoy, her head against the wall. As he lifted his head after passing under the low lintel, the woman in the corner fired at him point-blank. The Virginian saw the jet of flame spurt from her hand and felt the bullet's impact upon the wall behind his head.
A chowkidar, lean, like a mummified mendicant, rose up from a squeaking, roped charpoy and salaamed. "Take the horse to the stable, Jungwa, and tell the syce to undress him. Remember to keep that monkey tongue of yours between your teeth for in my room hangs a bitter whip. It is a lie that I have not ridden home alone," Barlow commanded.
"May you never grow weary," said the Guide in the polite formula of the road. "May your riches ever increase," came the stock reply. "And how about that man on the charpoy?" bawled Abdul Mujid. "Oh, he's all right, having by the mercy of God a thick skull," came the reply. "Shahbash! come and feast with me when your business is finished.
And so it was settled, and Abdul Mujid was bound hand and foot, and laid upon a charpoy ; and beside him, with a drawn sword at his side, lay down the man who was to guard him, the two on the same bed. Charpoy, the common bed of the country. All night long Abdul Mujid lay racking his brains for a means of escape, and found none; and then just before dawn came Allah to his help.
My slumbers can hardly be said to be unbroken to-night, three pariah dogs have taken a fancy to my quarters; two of them sit on their haunches and howl dismally in response to the jackals, while number three reclines sociably beneath my charpoy and growls at the others as though constituting himself my protector.
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