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We have been working along the north side of the Lolab, as the shikari is full of bear "khubbar," and as long as the weather remains fair we really do not much care where we go!
A brisk walk of some four miles over the flat, followed by a climb up a track steep as usual to the left of the main track to the Lolab, brought us to a grassy ridge, where I sat down patiently to await the bear's pleasure. I took my note-book with me, and whiled away some time in writing the following:
It was still very wet this morning, but as it cleared somewhat after breakfast, we made up our minds to quit the Lolab and get back to our boat. Doras has sad memories for Jane, for here died the "chota murghi," a black chicken endowed with the most affectionate disposition.
At the entrance are large stores of timber, principally deodar, which is floated down from the Lolab, stored at Dubgam, and sent thence down country and otherwhere for sale. The great boom across the river to catch the floating logs had been carried away in the flood, and merely showed a few melancholy and ineffectual spikes of wood sticking up above the now calm and sluggish river.
On Thursday we left Lalpura and marched to Kulgam, a short distance of some eight or ten miles. Mr. Blunt, the forest officer, had most kindly placed the forest bungalows of the Lolab at our disposal; but, as they all lie on the other side of the valley, we are obliged to camp every night.
The Lolab Valley, into which we had now penetrated, is a rich and picturesque expanse of level plain, some fifteen miles long by three or four broad, apparently completely surrounded by a densely-wooded curtain of mountains, rising to an elevation of some 3000 feet above the valley on the south and west, but ranging on the other sides up into the lofty summits which bar the route into Gurais and the Tilail.
The pear and cherry blossom has been so lovely in and around Srinagar that we determined to go to the Lolab Valley and see the apple blossom in full flower. We started in some trepidation, for the warm weather lately has melted much snow on the hills, and Jhelum is so full that we were told that our three-decker would be unable to pass under the city bridges of which there are seven.
Hot and thirsty, we blessed the good Mr. Blunt, the kindly forest officer, who had so courteously given us permission to use the forest huts of the Lolab and the Machipura. Our blessings of Blunt turned swiftly to curses directed towards the chowkidar, who was not to be seen, and who had left the hut firmly fastened from within.
In the middle distance, rising above the level yellow of the plain, still dim and shadowy below the morning light, rolled wave upon wave of the blue hills which hold in their embrace the fruitful Lolab. At our feet the deodars, still dark with the shadow of night, crept up the dewy slope upon whose top we stood. Then suddenly "The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor eyes,"
Perhaps the most noticeable objects in the Lolab are the walnut trees; they are now just coming into full leaf, and their great trunks, hoary with age and softly velveted with dark green moss, form the noble columns of many a lovely camping-ground.
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