Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Beyond, to the left, rose the sloping bulk of Apharwat, one of the range of the Pir Panjal; while to the right low, wooded hillocks bounded the valley and fell, on their outward flanks, to the Kashmir plain. Immediately in front of us a small village or bazaar swarmed with native life, and sloped down to a stream which wound through the hollows.
We sat on the upper deck and watched the dream like beauty drift slowly by until we emerged beneath a little bridge into the fairy land of the lake which the Mogul Emperors loved so well that they made their noble pleasance gardens on the banks, and thought it little to travel up yearly from far off Delhi over the snowy Pir Panjal with their Queens and courts for the perfect summer of Kashmir.
On the right hand the ground sloped slowly up in a succession of wooded heights, the foothills of the Pir Panjal, whose snow-crowned peaks enclose the Kashmir valley on the south.
Beyond the green, tree-studded levels to the south, the range of the Pir Panjal spread wide its array of dazzling peaks, while on the right towered the mountains which enclose the Sind Valley, culminating in the square-headed mass of Haramok. In the clear air the snows seemed quite close, although we knew that the snow-line was really some three thousand feet above the level of the valley.
Here it has rained with vehemence ever since they left; up in the high ground it has doubtless snowed; and although they were well armed with cards and whisky, yet it would appear but a poor business to play bridge all day in a snow-bound tent on the top of the Pir Panjal! Nothing short of a hundred aces every few minutes could make the game worth the candle!
Silence everywhere, except for the distant and perpetual voice of many waters murmuring in the unseen depths below. To the south showing clear above the serrated back of the ridge beyond the camp stood the Pir Panjal; pale ivory in the pale horizon below the sun.
Bernier kept his eyes open, and left not only a good account of the manners and life of the Great Mogul and his court, but a fair itinerary. His description of Srinagar and its vicinity still holds good, and modern books point us to the pass of the Pir Panjal so disastrous to the imperial ladies.
And Ram Lal Kashmiri salaamed and said, "Obedience!" and went forth and pondered night and day, journeying even over the snows of the Pir Panjal to Kashmir, that he might bathe his eyes in beauty where she walks, naked and divine, upon the earth, and he it was who imagined the black marble and white that made the way of approach.
Reaching Sumbal at sunset, we turned to the left down a narrow canal, and soon the Wular lay a sheet of molten gold upon our right; and by the time we had moored alongside a low strip of reedy bank, the glorious rosy lights had faded from the snows of the Pir Panjal, and their royal purple and gold had turned to soft ebony against the primrose of the sky.
Word Of The Day