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There being no tidings of the arrival of expected caravans, we marched for the monastery of Hemis, crossing the Indus immediately after leaving Ladak, and following it up towards its source. Outside the town we passed a mound of the inscribed stones, which must have been nearly a quarter of a mile in length, and probably contained as many as 30,000.
Started for Ladak again, nominally at some desperately early hour of the morning, but in reality at about half-past five, the sun not shining upon our position until late, in consequence of our proximity to the mountains. Mr. Rajoo being still indisposed, and, in his own belief, dying, we mounted him upon a hill horse, where he looked like a fly on a dromedary.
The eye of the European, travelling in Kachmyr, would soon lose sight of all architecture to which he had been accustomed. In Ladak, on the contrary, he would be agreeably surprised at seeing the little two and three-story houses, reminders to him of those in European provinces. Near the city of Karbou, upon two perpendicular rocks, one sees the ruins of a little town or village.
The lamp had got over all the difficulties of the road from Lahore to Ladak and back, and had been quite a peep-show to half the natives of Thibet, who were never tired of regarding their multiplied countenances in the numerous cut circles of the glass shade, so that we felt quite grieved at its melancholy loss.
The new bridge will be completed in a few weeks. This road, however, useful though it will doubtless be when improved, leads through Ladâk, and the merchandise transported along it becomes subject to the exactions of the ruler of Cashmere. The desideratum would be a road which would be clear of his territory altogether.
As for the biographies of our saints, they are collected in Lhassa. There are even great cloisters which have not had the time to procure them. Before coming to this gonpa, I was for several years in a great convent on the other side of Ladak, and have seen there thousands of books, and scrolls copied out of various books by the lamas of the monastery."
On the way to Sealkote he was to traverse the upper valleys of the Beas, the Ravee, and the Chenab, and the mountains that divide them; his main object being to inspect the great tea plantations, public and private, recently set on foot in those parts, and to ascertain for himself what facilities or possibilities the country afforded for commercial intercourse with Ladâk and China.
In the morning, when we set forth on our journey, the Hindu told me that he could get nothing from the lamas, who were very reticent. I will not stop to describe the life of the monks in those convents, for it is the same in all the cloisters of Ladak.
He was succeeded in that year by Shah Jehan, who, in 1634, also visited his territories; and, besides improving the country by the introduction of fruit-trees, flowers, &c. from Cabul, he invaded Thibet, and taking the Fort of Ladak, annexed the country to Cashmere.
Hemis abounds in decorated buildings most picturesquely placed, it has three hundred lamas, and is regarded as 'the sight' of Ladak.
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