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SPORT AND TRAVEL IN
THE FAR EAST

SPORT AND TRAVEL
IN THE FAR EAST

BY

J. C. GREW

WITH A FOREWORD BY THEODORE ROOSEVELT

AND
WITH EIGHTY ILLUSTRATIONS

FROM PHOTOGRAPHS BY THE AUTHOR

TOUT BIENxKUf' OU JUEH

BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY

PHELAN

COPYRIGHT, IpIO, BY JOSEPH CLARK GREW
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

Published May iqio

TO MY WIFE

774194

FOREWORD

June 16, 1910.

MY DEAR GREW, — I was greatly interested in
your book "Sport and Travel in the Far East," and
I think it is a fine thing to have a member of our
diplomatic service able both to do what you have
done, and to write about it as well and as interest-
ingly as you have written. I particularly enjoyed
the two chapters on "Ibex Shooting" and "Mark-
hor and Wild Sheep Shooting" in Baltistan. Your
description, both of the actual hunting and the
people and surroundings, is really excellent; and
even more should be said of the chapter in which
you describe your really noteworthy experiences
in hunting the cave tiger of China. Following the
tiger into caves, guided by professional spear hunt-
ers of the neighborhood, is a kind of sport new to
most white men ; and its interest is heightened by
the danger attendant upon it. I cannot imagine a
more thrilling or thoroughly sportsmanlike experi-
ence than that of your crawling through the narrow
rock passages and shooting the tiger in its cavern
lair not four feet from you.

Sincerely yours,

J. C. GREW, Esq.

" So for one the wet sail arching through the rainbow round the bow,

And for one the creak of snow-shoes on the crust;
And for one the lakeside lilies where the bull-moose waits the cow,

And for one the mule-train coughing in the dust.
Who hath smelt wood-smoke at twilight ? Who hath heard the
birch-log burning ?

Who is quick to read the noises of the night ?
Let him follow with the others, for the Young Men's feet are turning

To the camps of proved desire and known delight!

" Let him go — go — go away from here I

On the other side the world he's overdue.

'Send your road is clear before you when the old spring-fret comes o'er
you

And the Red Gods call for you ! "

CONTENTS

I. MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE i

II. THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 22

III. IMPRESSIONS OF NORTHERN INDIA: BOMBAY,

JAIPORE, AMBER, AGRA 47

IV. IMPRESSIONS OF NORTHERN INDIA: CAWN-

PORE, LUCKNOW, BENARES 66

V. WAIMUNGU AND THE HOT-SPRING COUNTRY

OF NEW ZEALAND 91

VI. THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR no

VII. IBEX-SHOOTING IN THE MOUNTAINS OF BAL-

TISTAN 134

VIII. MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING IN BALTIS-

TAN 158

IX. BLACK BEAR HONKING IN THE VALLEY OF

KASHMIR 193

X. KASHMIR TO CHINA 204

XI. HUNTING THE CAVE-DWELLING TIGER OF

CHINA 226

INDEX 255

NOTE. — Some portions of this book have already appeared in Harper* s Maga-
zine, Outing, and the Badminton Magazine of Sports and Pastimes.

ILLUSTRATIONS

TIGER SHOT NEAR AMOY, CHINA, OCTOBER 3, 1903 Frontispiece

CEYLON COAST SCENE SHOWING CATAMARANS 3

STREET SCENE IN SINGAPORE 6

A ROAD IN COLOMBO 8

A MALAY BULLOCK CART 11

THE HARBOR, SINGAPORE 14

THE HARBOR OF PENANG, BRITISH STRAITS SETTLEMENTS . 14

A MALAY VILLAGE OR KAMPONG 19

A MALAY TOWN 22

REST HOUSE AT KWALA KANGSAR 22

A WATER BUFFALO OR CARIBAO, THE BEAST OF BURDEN OF

THE EAST 27

OUR PACK ELEPHANTS 30

THE "OUTFIT" 32

WILD BOAR SHOOTING IN MALAY 35

THE BAMBOO RAFT 38

A TYPICAL INDIAN GROUP 51

STREET SCENES IN JAIPORE 54

VlEW FROM THE BATTLEMENTS OF THE DESERTED PALACE

OF AMBER 56

THE DESERTED PALACE OF AMBER 56

THE ELEPHANT WHICH TAKES ONE UP THE HILL TO AMBER 59

THE TAJ MAHAL 62

THE ANGEL OF THE RESURRECTION 67

Memorial over the Massacre Well at Cawnpore

HINDUS 70

A HINDU WATER-CARRIER 70

xiv ILLUSTRATIONS

THE RESIDENCY, LUCKNOW 75

THE CAWNPORE BAZAAR 75

GHATS AND TEMPLES AT BENARES 78

THE GHATS AT BENARES 83

SOME OF THE GREAT PALACES AT BENARES 83

MOUNT TARAWERA AND LAKE ROTOMAHANA 86

THE LAVA-FORMED COUNTRY SURROUNDING WAIMUNGU . 86

THE BURNING GHAT, BENARES 88

Three bodies are in the process of cremation; a fourth lies
in its shroud on the slope, while a fifth is being brought
in on the shoulders of two coolies.

THE CRATER OF WAIMUNGU 96

GEYSER AT WHAKAREWAREWA 99

STEAM ISSUING FROM HOLES IN THE ROCK WITH THE REGULAR

BEAT OF STEAM ENGINES 102

THE GREAT WAIRAKEI GEYSER 105

MAORI WAR CANOE 107

THE "HA KAHAKA TAMAHINE" 107

THE " ORPHAN" KONIMBLA VALLEY, NEW SOUTH WALES,

AUSTRALIA no

THE " THREE SISTERS," KONIMBLA VALLEY, NEW SOUTH

WALES, AUSTRALIA no

THOMAS 112

THE TONGA 112

HOUSEBOATS ON CANAL AT SRINAGAR 115

CHOOSING SHIKARIS 118

THE SHIKARIS, CHOTO-SHIKARIS, AND TIFFIN-COOLIES . .118

SCENE NEAR SRINAGAR 120

OUR OUTFIT 123

ILLUSTRATIONS xv

ENTRANCE TO THE SONAMARG GORGE 126

THE KASHMIR BAG 128

A BALTI VILLAGE, SHOWING STONE HUTS 131

A BALTI NATIVE DANCE 131

A BALTI BOY COOLIE 134

ROPE BRIDGE ACROSS THE INDUS 139

IBEX HEAD 142

THE 44-iNCH HEAD 142

SEARCHING FOR IBEX 147

IBEX COUNTRY 147

MY Six IBEX 150

CENTRE OF THE ROPE BRIDGE 156

The BARA MAHARAJAH SAHIB AND HIS STAFF . . . .161

THE RAJAH OF SHIGAR AND HIS SUITE 161

THE MEETING BETWEEN THE RAJAH AND THE BARA MAHA-
RAJAH SAHIB 163

A "ROAD" IN BALTISTAN 166

THE Two MARKHOR HEADS, SHOWING KADERA, SIDKA, AND

THE LOCAL SHIKARI l68

A "ROAD" IN BALTISTAN 171

ONE OF OUR CAMPS IN BALTISTAN 174

SHARPU HEAD, KADERA, SIDKA, AND LOCAL SHIKARI . . 176
COOLIES WAITING TO BE PAID AFTER A DAY*S MARCH . .179

A CULTIVATED VALLEY IN BALTISTAN 182

ASTORE 187

BANDIPUR VILLAGE 190

CAMP NEAR BANDIPUR 195

CAMP IN THE BEAR COUNTRY 195

xvi ILLUSTRATIONS

THE GREAT FLOOD OF 1903 IN KASHMIR 198

Showing doongas, the Kashmir travelling boats

BEAR AND SHIKARIS 203

BURMESE WORSHIPPERS » 206

WORSHIPPERS ON THE TERRACE OF THE SHWE DAGON PAGODA 209

THE KUTHODAW PAGODA, MANDALAY 211

PAVILIONS SURROUNDING THE KUTHODAW PAGODA, MANDA-
LAY 214

THE KUTHODAW PAGODA, MANDALAY 214

ENTRANCE TO THE KUTHODAW PAGODA, MANDALAY . .214
ONE OF THE GRIFFINS OF THE KUTHODAW PAGODA, MAN-
DALAY 216

CITY OF HONGKONG FROM THE HARBOR 222

HONGKONG HARBOR 222

WATER SCENE NEAR AMOY 227

CHINESE JUNK 227

THOMAS, LIM, AND THE HUNTERMEN WITH THEIR TRIDENTS 230

HUNTERMEN, GOATS, AND TORCHES 235

TIGER CAVES 238

A TYPICAL TIGER CAVE 238

RETURN TO THE VILLAGE AFTER TIGER HUNT 240

THE VILLAGE OF CHI PHAW 243

A CHINESE THEATRICAL COMPANY 246

THE HARBOR OF AMOY 250

SAMPANS 250

SPORT AND TRAVEL IN
THE FAR EAST

SPORT AND TRAVEL IN
THE FAR EAST

CHAPTER I

MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE..- /-V :.

HEN, on the morning of the fifteenth of
September, 1902, the steamship India
of the Peninsular and Oriental Line
backed from her berth at Marseilles,
slipped through the crowded shipping along the
water-front, and, leaving behind the yellow cliffs,
the hot sun-baked houses of the town, and the grim
white walls of Monte Christo, steamed slowly out
into the cool Mediterranean, it seemed that nothing
was left to be desired in the pleasure of the prospect
before us.

The anticipation of eighteen free mouths to be
turned to good account in seeing as much as possible
of foreign lands must at all times be most pleasing.
Especially is this so when the traveller plans, as we
had done, to combine a maximum amount of sport
with a minimum of stereotyped sight-seeing. For
several years the prospect of such travels had led me,

2 SPORT AND TRAVEL

and the various friends who at one time or another
had considered joining the party, to spend many a
winter evening poring over maps and formulating
delightfully hazy plans, from which the elements of
time and conditions of travel were entirely elimi-
nated. But as the date for setting out approached,
tKe only arrangement which could be called quite
decided was our intention to avoid so far as possible
the beaten track of tourists, and, by taking trips into
the interior of the various countries we visited, to
combine what sight-seeing should really attract us
with plenty of big-game shooting, a certain amount
of roughing it, and much valuable experience in
becoming familiar with the more natural and primi-
tive parts of foreign lands.

Even up to the time of starting, our arrangements
had taken no more definite shape than this. Tele-
grams had come to me from Mr. A. H. Wheeler and
Mr. H. P. Perry, who were at the time travelling in
Japan, one dispatch asking me to meet them in
Sydney, Australia, whence we could take a previ-
ously discussed cruise among the South Sea Islands,
and a second, shortly after, requesting that I come
instead to Yokohama, in order to go on a tiger-
shooting trip in Korea. When, a few weeks later,
came a third telegram, saying" Cholera Korea, meet
Singapore," and for a second time I was obliged to

MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE 3

ask that my steamship tickets be changed to so
radically different a destination, I believe the clerk
in the P. & O. office must have thought that he was
dealing with either a lunatic at large or an abscond-
ing bank cashier. At any rate, the alteration was
effected, my berth cheerfully booked to Singapore,
and in delightful ignorance of the purpose of this
change or what lay before me, I found myself, that
bright September day of starting, in the possession
of the three conditions most necessary to the perfect
contentment of the average traveller — little bag-
gage, fewer cares, and no plans at all.

From the moment of setting foot on the India, I
felt that I was already in the East. She smelled of
the tropics, her cabins and wide decks were built to
secure the greatest possible amount of ventilation
in tepid seas and breathless eastern ports, and the
barefooted Lascars with their simple blue tunics
and red turbans and their inimitable monkey-like
agility in going aloft, might have come straight
from the Indian jungle, so little did they resemble
white sailors. At night the British officers, of whom
there were, as always, many on board, returning
from leave of absence to their posts in India, wore
cool duck mess-jackets with silk cumerbunds, which
contrasted cheerfully with the sombre black of the
staid western evening dress; the deck piano was

4 SPORT AND TRAVEL

always opened after dinner, and with the noted
good-fellowship of all Anglo-Indians, the evenings
were spent in music-making, in which every one,
whether soloist or chorister, took his part. Only the
low temperature and the long Mediterranean swell
served to show that many miles still separated us
from Suez and true eastern waters. For five days
we steamed peacefully along, dropping down be-
tween Sardinia and Corsica, on to the Straits of
Messina, between Scylla and Charybdis, and so
past the barren cliffs of Crete to Port Said.

On the third night of the voyage we were afforded
what must be, I believe, the most imposing spec-
tacle produced by natural phenomena, namely, the
eruption of a great volcano. The Lipuarian Islands,
which lie off the coast of Sicily, were to be reached
about two in the morning, and rumor had gone
around that Stromboli was in eruption. When that
splendid solitary cone of earth and lava rose slowly
into sight, cropping up out of the sea in perfect
profile against a white moonlit sky, every passenger
was in the bow, waiting and watching. Suddenly
from the flattened top of the cone which forms
the mouth of the crater a great round mass of
what seemed to be molten gold appeared, poised for
a moment on the brink, then rolled in bright bur-
nished streams down the steep sides of the moun-

MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE 5

tain. There was no noise of any kind, the molten
lava quickly cooled, and in a moment only the dark
form of the volcano remained in view, all the more
dim and mysterious for the sudden contrast of
color. Ten minutes later the same thing was
repeated, and so it continued at intervals until
Stromboli was lost to sight on the horizon.

I do not envy the lot of the unfortunate man who
has to live in Port Said. Since my first short glimpse
of it from the deck of the India, I have spent many
a weary hour there, and I can say from experience
that of all hot places on this climatically unsatisfac-
tory globe, there is none where one feels the heat
more intensely than in that squalid, dusty, fever-
ridden, desert-built town. And yet, if there is one
thing that can partially compensate the resident of
Port Said for its many deficiencies in matters of
cleanliness and climate, it is the ceaseless succession
of ships which pass his very door from morning till
night, and through the night till morning. To many,
a ship is nothing but a hull of wood and iron, sur-
mounted by a certain number of masts and funnels,
and perhaps a flag. To the resident of Port Said
every single vessel that plies through the Canal has
a distinct personality — is, in fact, an acquaintance
or more often an old friend, whose home and des-
tination, business, mission, and personal character-

6 SPORT AND TRAVEL

istics are as well known to him as are those of
his next-door neighbor; and as each appears and
departs, and, months later, appears and departs
again, he mentally welcomes and god-speeds her as
he would an intimate companion, whether she be a
little black coaling tramp or a palatial liner. When
one considers that up to the opening of the Trans-
Siberian Railway, which has not detracted in the
slightest degree from the number of vessels using
the Suez Canal, every person, every letter, and
almost every case of merchandise passing directly
between Europe and the Orient was carried through
that narrow strip of water, within a stone's throw
of the hotels and houses of Port Said, one realizes
what a busy scene is presented by the water-front
of the little town.

A year or two ago the accidental discharge of a
cargo of dynamite totally wrecked a steamer in the
middle of the Canal, leaving her in such a position
as entirely to block the traffic in both directions, and
necessitating the closing of the waterway for ten
days until the wrecked steamer could be removed.
During those ten days the ample harbor at the Port
Said entrance to the Canal became so congested
that literally not another ship could find a berth ;
the vessels lay in rows but a few feet apart, like
beds in a hospital ward, side by side and nose to

MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE 7

stern, till, toward the end of the period, new-comers
found themselves crowded out into the Mediter-
ranean and were obliged to take refuge in near-by
ports.

But the most extraordinary sight of all, and one
which may be seen at all times, appears to the rail-
way traveller from Port Said to Suez or to Cairo,
on both of which journeys the railroad holds closely
to the Canal as far as the half-way station at Ismail-
ieh. From the car-window you look across miles
and miles of thirsty, barren, undulating desert, the
only view which can become more monotonous than
the monotony of the ocean, stretching off to the
horizon, shimmering in waves of atmospheric heat.
The presence of water in such a place would seem
a miracle. Suddenly, from the corner of the car-
window, the shadow of some huge object catches
your eye; you lean out, and there, lo and behold,
apparently moving leisurely across the waste of
sand, rises a mighty vessel, her funnels belching
smoke, her officers on duty on the bridge, the pas-
sengers playing cricket or shuffle-board or lounging
about the decks, so close that you could readily
recognize a friend among them, every detail of the
ocean life being enacted on this desert stage in per-
fect verisimilitude. What marvellous incongruity !
The train rushes by, the scene is swept out of sight,

8 SPORT AND TRAVEL

and again the monotony of the rolling desert
remains unbroken, save for here or there a knot of
white-robed Arabs or a distant camel caravan.

The India dropped anchor at Port Said at five
o'clock on the fifth evening from Marseilles. I do
not know whether the captain was merely a wag, or
whether he had ulterior motives in keeping the pas-
sengers on board during the stifling sixteen hours
of our stay, but certainly he so frightened the
greater number by his assurances of the likelihood
of catching cholera ashore, and his graphic descrip-
tion of the horrid fumigating process through
which they would have to pass before returning to
the ship, — an ordeal in which each person would
be confined separately for ten minutes in a carbolic-
acid steam bath, his clothes meanwhile undergoing
a different method of disinfection elsewhere, —
that less than a dozen adventurous spirits took their
lives in their hands and went ashore. Was it the
prospect of acquiring a permanent and ineradicable
perfume of carbolic acid, I wonder, or merely the
risk of an untimely death, that most influenced so
large a percentage of my fellow passengers? Per-
sonally, it occurred to me that, were there any real
danger, the captain would have commanded, not
advised; and anyway, not even death by cholera
could have outweighed the awfulness of the stifling,

A ROAD

MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE 9

breathless heat aboard the India just then. So I
joined the shore-goers to the landing-stage, where
we mounted absurdly minute donkeys and romped
off through the bazaar out into the desert, lying
white as snow in the moonlight. Whatever may
have been our secret fears, the fumigating ordeal,
when we returned to the quay, was at least support-
able ; holding our v/rists for a period of five seconds
each, the quarantine doctor pronounced us free
from cholera, and to the astonishment and chagrin
of our fellow passengers, we boarded the India unac-
companied by even a suspicion of carbolic acid.

But what a change had taken place on board!
Two enormous coal-barges were moored by the ves-
sel's side, gang-planks had been run to them, and
now four continuous streams of Arab coolies, black
as night originally, now doubly black from the coal
which they carried in baskets on their shoulders,
ascended and descended in endless chains. Canvas
tarpaulins had been hung over the decks, to protect
them from the clouds of coal-dust which arose from
below; but even with their protection, the atmos-
phere was full of it, and with every breath we in-
haled quantities of coal-dust with the stifling air.
As all the doors, windows, and port-holes of the
ship were tightly closed, and were to remain so all
night, to have ventured into the interior of the ship

io SPORT AND TRAVEL

would have been one degree more insupportable
than to stay on deck. So we gathered in a corner
where there seemed to be the greatest percentage
of air mixed with the least amount of coal-dust,
and told stories till dawn. The coolies sang some
weird rhythmic chant in time to their pace up and
down the gang-planks, never varying the words or
the tune, or ceasing for a second throughout the
night. What were the words? I knew no Arabic,
but indeed they sounded strangely like English:
they beat into my brain in persistent dull mono-
tony, over and over and over again: — ' Tireless
Hell, Fireless Hell." Certainly they were appro-
priate to such a night.

But day came at last, and with it the same cheery
cloudless sky that smiles on Egypt without a break
from April till November. One of the India's four
sister ships, the Persia, bound homeward with the
eastern mails, had come in during the night, and
before breakfast was over, the little Isis, in every
respect a perfect counterpart, on a diminutive
scale, of her larger sisters, steamed up from Brindisi,
and like a colt beside its mother snuggled up along-
side us. The English mails do not join the ships at
Marseilles ; they wait a day longer and then are hur-
ried across Europe on the Brindisi express, whence
they are embarked on the little Isis or Osiris and are

MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE n

carried at a 22-knot pace to catch up with the
larger mail-steamers at Port Said. We dutifully
received the mails from the Isis, weighed anchor,
and at last, at nine o'clock in the morning, pushed
our nose into the first reaches of the Suez Canal.

If the night had been stifling, that day and the
ensuing night in the Canal were little less so. We
crept along at a snail's pace, five knots an hour
being the limit allowed, occasionally tying up at
one of the buoys along the bank to allow another
larger vessel to go by, but generally able to pass
comfortably whatever ship appeared from the op-
posite direction. The hours dragged interminably,
— all day the desert wastes of Egypt to starboard
and Arabia to port glaring away into the distance.
On deck we sprawled in steamer-chairs and gasped.
The night brought little relief. Our progress was
aided by a powerful searchlight, which threw ex-
traordinary shadows and altered into fantastic
shapes whatever craft passed us. Fortunately the
last stains of the previous night's coal-dust had
been washed away, mattresses were dragged on
deck, and we slept in rows in what comfort such
heat would allow.

The three days that followed in the Red Sea were
scarcely more comfortable. On the contrary, we
lay about in steamer-chairs, in costumes the uncon-

12 SPORT AND TRAVEL

ventionality of which only the circumstances per-
mitted, drank abnormal quantities of lemonade,
and tried to persuade ourselves that we were com-
paratively cool, which was a pitiful farce. The only
event of the day which I truthfully can say I en-
joyed was the morning bath, and the method of
indulging in this ever-gratifying but now doubly
delightful ceremony was so unusual that I am
tempted to describe it. On ships running to the
East the greater number of passengers sleep on
deck during the hot weather, the forepart of the
deck being fenced off with tarpaulins for the ladies,
the remaining space being at the disposal of the
men. Each passenger's mattress is brought up by
his steward, and his bed made wherever he prefers
or can find space not already appropriated. The
intensity of the heat conduces to sociability rather
than to sleep, and not only is the first half of the
night spent in much chatting and story-telling, but
promptly at dawn the deck-sleepers are routed out
and their beds carried below. At this time the
ladies retire, not to reappear until eight, leaving
the field clear for the men. Now takes place an
extraordinary scene. The pyjama brigade for a
moment has disappeared. The sailors are busily
washing down the decks with swabbing brooms and
hose. Suddenly from the smoking-room appears a

MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE 13

rather apprehensive-looking passenger. He is fol-
lowed closely by others, all clad in bath towels and
all looking equally apprehensive. They advance into
the open. The enemy, in the shape of the swabbing
crew, becomes aware of their presence ; it gathers
in close formation, the hose is levelled, there is a
swish of cold water, a few short gasps from startled
subalterns — and then, oh, wonderful display ! no-
thing can be seen but hysterical passengers dash-
ing wildly about in the midst of a deluge of spray
and jets of foaming water, shrieking, gasping, and
spluttering. I know of no more effective method
for suddenly and conclusively dispelling any desire
on the part of the passenger to turn over and go
to sleep again.

No one was sorry that our short stay in the harbor
of Aden prevented landing. Certainly a less invit-
ing-looking town, with its barren, rocky surround-
ings and total lack of vegetation, would be hard to
imagine. Passing the fortress of Perim and so
through the straits of Bab-el-Mandeb, we dropped
anchor only long enough to transfer the India-bound
passengers to the Egypt, another of the five sister
ships, and steamed on almost immediately into the
Arabian Sea. How delicious that cool monsoon
breeze felt after the breathlessness of the last four
days! No wonder that the remaining passengers

I4 SPORT AND TRAVEL

should become suddenly imbued with new life and
energy, appoint committees, organize sports, and
from morning till night during the seven days to
Ceylon keep the ball of entertainment rolling.

Very early in the morning of the day of our arrival
in Colombo I dressed and went to the bow, where
the breeze came fresh and clean from landwards. It
was then that I first realized that the writer who
describes the smell of the East is in no way drawing
upon his imagination to add atmosphere to his word-
pictures. The aroma which came out to sea with
that morning breeze was as perceptible and as dis-
tinct from all other land-smells as is the odor of a
greenhouse from that of a cactus field, — a tangible
fragrance, soft, warm, and carrying with it the scent
of spices, temple-incense, and flowers. The morning
came up in a flood of golden glory, disclosing a low,
palm-fringed shore ; we rounded a point, and there,
lying white and red behind the countless masts and
funnels of her great roadstead, lay Colombo, the
welcome resting-place at the cross-roads of every
ocean highway of the Orient.

At the entrance to the harbor we were met by a
horde of naked little Cingalese urchins propelling
craft of every description, from catamarans to logs
of wood rudely lashed together ; displaying prowess
in diving after and recovering coins, when half-way

THE HARBOR, SINGAPORE

THE HARBOR OI

British Straits Settlement!

MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE 15

to the bottom, which only the continual exercise of
their hazardous profession, day in and day out, year
by year, could develop — hazardous because the
harbor of Colombo is infested with sharks, and
many an unfortunate urchin is levied as toll for the
plying of their trade. But judging from the interest
of the passengers and the prodigality with which
the contents of their pockets are cast into the harbor,
the calling must be a lucrative one.

To come to Colombo from the West is like being
dropped from a dusty road into a luxuriant garden.
There have been no intermediate steps to accus-
tom you to the sudden transformation. You left the
staid grays and browns, the familiar sights and pro-
saic smells of the Occident: you find yourself pre-
cipitated unprepared among unknown scenes and
surroundings, brilliant colors and strange aromas,
which from the first hour leave upon your senses
indelible impressions. From the landing-stage you
are whirled off in rickshaws through the town, over
clean wide roads of dark red earth, reducing to a
minimum the dazzling reflection of the tropic sun,
and sheltered by a regular canopy of luxuriant
growth. Once past the bazaar, the fascination of
whose booths must tempt even the most hardened
traveller, the buildings run no longer in monotonous
blocks, but are separated by little gardens of ferns

16 SPORT AND TRAVEL

and palm trees. You swing on through the dwelling
quarter, — where cool white and green villas, built
all of open piazzas and trellis-work rooms, lie back
from the road, — past little plaster huts with black
Cingalese natives squatting cross-legged on their
thresholds, along the great Galle Face Esplanade, —
where the waves of the Indian Ocean beat cease-
lessly on the palm-lined shore, — and so out
through the outskirts of the town into the open
country. Here it is that the tropical foliage first
strikes upon the westerner's eye with its full rich-
ness and wealth of color. The road is bordered on
either side by a tangled mass of verdure, — palms,
ferns and cacti, banana, cocoanut, and mango trees,
overrun with festoons of lace-like creepers, breaking
here and there into brilliant-hued blossoms and
forming a perfect network of jungle growth. Vividly
colored birds romp among the foliage and seem to
revel in the fragrance and sunshine. Creaking bul-
lock-carts and fierce-looking black water-buffaloes
lumber past you; a continuous stream of natives
hurry this way and that on their various errands,
women with jewels in their noses and silver rings
on fingers, toes, and ankles, young girls balancing
on their heads queer-shaped earthen rice-pots, old
men with long, snowy beards showing against their
black skins, boys with flowers and spices to sell, and

MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE 17

all naked save for a loin-cloth or a brilliant sarong
thrown about them, a kaleidoscope of life and color
of surpassing interest and fascination. Java is called
the Garden of the East ; but has not Ceylon an equal
right to claim the title ?

Three times during the year in the East my
wanderings brought me back to Ceylon ; and though
my stays were short, generally while waiting for a
ship to some other part of the world, I invariably
looked forward with the greatest enjoyment to
every voyage which was to end in that delightful
country. Later I was able to visit Kandy and
Nuwara Eliya, that splendid mountain resort in the
interior, where, after a long siege of fever, the brac-
ing air was worth to me its weight in gold. But for
the present we had but a few hours ashore, and
after lunching at the famous Grand Oriental Hotel
a dozen of us were obliged to bid farewell to our
fellow passengers of the India, now bound for
Australia, and board the little Chusan for still
farther eastern ports.

At four in the afternoon we sailed from Colombo
harbor, and, heading out into the Bay of Bengal,
turned toward Penang, the Malacca Straits, and
Singapore. The voyage requires little description.
Five days of quiet steaming brought us to Penang,
— days when the surface of the sea was actually,

i8 SPORT AND TRAVEL

not metaphorically, mirror-like in its calm, rippled
only by the trails of innumerable flying-fish ; dawns
when the sun shot from the horizon like a molten
cannon-ball in a flood of unimagined color; and
nights when the stars blazed with a brilliancy never
beheld by any northern land or sea. A few hours in
the harbor of Penang, and we turned down into the
Malacca Straits, emerging two days later at Singa-
pore, — for me, at least, a temporary destination.

If I were to be taken by some kind spirit and sud-
denly dropped blindfolded in the midst of Singapore
to-day, seven years after my last stay there, I should
recognize my whereabouts. No city in the world
smells just like it. There is the spicy smell of Co-
lombo, and the B. C. S. of Calcutta, upon which
Kipling has distinct, not to say aggressive, opinions ;
and Bombay, at certain seasons, comes very close
to resembling Calcutta, with just a shade of original-
ity of its own. But no one could mistake the smell
of Singapore. In my mind it is inseparably asso-
ciated with a long, very dusty road, bordered by
Chinese chow-shops and incense-burning temples,
and thickly peopled with representatives of every
eastern race, from the all but naked Tamil to the
indolent, self-satisfied Malay, and from the mighty
fierce-bearded Sikh to the little squat, smelly Javan-
ese. Perhaps it is the evil messes concocted in the

MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE 19

chow-shops and sold along the road by innumerable
vendors that most contribute to the general effect,
or perhaps the incense burned in the hundreds of
little shrines and temples is primarily responsible.
But I think the very air which lies over Singapore
like a steaming blanket, thick, heavy, and motion-
less, must itself contain all the elements of that
inimitable odor, absorbed through countless genera-
tions of contact with unwashed humanity and
temple incense, and diffused throughout the city
with a poignancy all too marked for the delicately
adjusted senses of the conventional westerner.

My quarters in Raffles' Hotel were of the plea-
santest. In front of my room was a little veranda,
furnished with cane lounging-chairs and looking
directly out upon the harbor, where the thousands
and thousands of Malay junks lying huddled to-
gether by the quays, or lazily wandering hither and
thither among the larger shipping, afforded a scene
unequalled in picturesqueness. Before my door
passed a continuous and varied stream of brown
humanity ; in all the world there is no ethnological
museum like Singapore ; people from every eastern
country and tribe, and indeed from nearly every
land in the two hemispheres, are gathered there,
and to one who has never before seen the Orient,
this heterogeneous procession of natives continu-

20 SPORT AND TRAVEL

ously passing by is truly of extraordinary interest.
But ascend the hill to Fort Canning at evening, and
look down on the great city spread out below, where
like myriads of fireflies the fourteen thousand rick-
shaws of the town, each with its lantern, flit here
and there in the haze of an eastern twilight. Then
will you know the truest charm of Singapore.

At last, after many delays, Wheeler and Perry
arrived from Hongkong. They had had marvel-
lously good sport in the cave-country about Amoy,
both having bagged tigers and at one time having
seen four animals break cover simultaneously.
This to me was the best of news, not only in the sat-
isfaction it gave me to learn of their success, but also
because hitherto, although hoping most earnestly
that we should run across the sport somewhere, I
had been vague and rather sceptical as to where
and how it was to be found ; and now the prospect
of eventually securing good tiger-shooting myself
seemed assured. As will be seen, however, it was
not until a full year later that my ambition was
finally realized.

To attempt to describe the various hunting-trips
which we considered during the fortnight of our
stay in Singapore would be but a waste of words.
It is sufficient to say that expeditions into French
Cochin China, the Philippines, Borneo, Sumatra,

MARSEILLES TO SINGAPORE 21

Java, and Johore were all contemplated and fully
discussed, and even a projected cruise to the South
Sea Islands was abandoned only when negotiations
for chartering a schooner fell through, just as we
seemed on the point of making an excellent bargain.
Meanwhile we gleaned much information of a good,
bad, and indifferent nature from various residents
and officials, and by taking cross-country runs every
evening after the heat of the day, put ourselves into
the best of physical condition for the hard work
which in any case was to lie ahead.

The solution of the problem where we should go
was finally arrived at only by our agreeing to take
the first ship which should leave Singapore bound
in any direction. This proved to be the Italian
steamer Capri, scheduled to sail, within half an
hour of our decision, for Penang, whence the rail-
road leads into the interior of the Malay Peninsula ;
and with no further ceremony than hurriedly to
throw our jungle kit into canvas bags and dash in
gharries to the wharf, we caught the ship by a flying
leap from the dock as she was pulling out into the
harbor.

CHAPTER II

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE

JUR object in planning an expedition
into the interior of the Malay penin-
sula was twofold ; first, the big-game
shooting for which, from the accounts
of others, the peninsula seemed to be a veritable
paradise ; then, to see this rapidly developing coun-
try before the hand of British progress should have
opened up its last hidden corners to the light of
civilization.

In the first respect we were destined to be wholly
disappointed. The time chosen for our trip, al-
though unavoidable, had brought us into the jungle
at the height of the rains, the worst possible time of
year; the rivers were in flood, the salt licks sub-
merged, and although continual signs of wild ele-
phant and seladang were to be seen in the lowlands,
all the great quantity of game which must have been
there but shortly before our arrival had disappeared
into the hills and the depths of the jungle where
tracking was impossible. Only once, as I shall nar-
rate, did we come on a fresh seladang track; but

A MALAY TOWN

REST HOUSE AT KWALA KANGSAR

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 23

after following it for several hours until almost
on the animal, we were obliged to abandon the
chase on account of the darkness. Tiger-spoor
were everywhere, and more than once news came
to us of a native or bullock killed in some near-by
village ; yet to carry out a successful beat in such
vast stretches of thick jungle would have been
absolutely impracticable.

In the other respect, however, we were well re-
warded, for though rain poured almost incessantly
day after day and week after week, with a tenacity
and vigor which are known only in the tropics, all
such handicaps were many times repaid by the in-
terest of seeing at close hand the wilder places and
people of this comparatively little-known country.

British influence is fast bringing the Malay Fed-
erated States to a condition of civilization and
prosperity undreamed of thirty-five years ago.
Then the country was unopened, wars between the
tribes were continuous, the murder of white settlers
the rule rather than the exception. To- day each
district is orderly and progressive under the able
guidance of a British Resident, cities are springing
up, roads are daily being pushed farther into the
interior, and as far as the roads extend, the smallest
kampong, with its schoolhouse and police-station,
is learning the demands of a higher civilization. In

24 SPORT AND TRAVEL

a few more years we shall be able to travel from
Singapore to Bangkok by rail, for even now railways
are being pushed rapidly through Johore to the
south, and northwards towards Si am.

It was in 1874 that England first sought to
interfere in the state of perpetual warfare which
existed between the various independent states of
the peninsula. Agents were sent, one at least was
killed, his death avenged, and from that epoch
England's rule became predominant in the four
States of Perak, Pahang, Negri Sembilan, and
Selangor ; while during the past year, through treaty
with Siam, Kelantan, Kedah, and Trengganu have
passed also under British control. Now, under the
title of the Federated Malay States, which came
into existence in 1896, the government of the pe-
ninsula is carried on under the supervision of the
British Governor and the Residents in the various
districts, though the Sultans and Rajahs of the differ-
ent states still retain much of their former state
and power.

With the coming of British control, industry be-
gan to awaken. Hitherto it had been dangerous to
accumulate wealth, for no rich man's life was safe ;
now, under peaceful conditions, the vast tin mines
of the country are opening up, pepper and spices are
cultivated, rubber plantations begin to yield enor-

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 25

mous dividends. It is not, however, the Malay who
is responsible : he is satisfied with the existing order
of things so long as no personal toil is involved, and
when hungry he has only to turn to his banana
patch: the thrifty Chinaman organizes the com-
panies, the wealthy Hindu finances them, the Tamil
from Madras supplies the labor, and the English-
man guarantees peace. Thus development goes
steadily forward, and the Malay Federated States
are taking their rightful place in the great markets
of the world.

We entered the peninsula from the port of Pe-
nang, which with Malacca, Province Wellesley, and
Singapore forms what are known as the British
Straits Settlements. A railway journey through
great palm forests and vast stretches of rice-culti-
vated country, — where big black water-buffaloes
were in evidence in all directions, carrying burdens
or turning irrigation wheels, and where hundreds of
coolies in their pagoda-shaped hats worked knee-
deep in the flooded padi-fields, — brought us to
Taiping, a large town in the state of Perak. It was
here, I remember, that a trifling incident gave me
my first insight into the true Malay character.

We found ourselves on the unlighted station plat-
form at night, in utter darkness and a most dis-
piriting deluge of rain ; hungry, weary, and wet as

26 SPORT AND TRAVEL

we were, the cheer of the rest-house appealed most
strongly. Rickshaws were engaged, and in a mo-
ment we were speeding up the road at that satis-
factory pace which a gentle reminder with one's
cane on the coolie's back always secures. I took it
for granted that my coolie knew where we wanted
to go; for although my knowledge of the Malay
language did not then include either of the much-
needed nouns " rest-house" or "hotel," I had care-
fully repeated both these words to him in English,
and he had bowed with such an expression of entire
comprehension that I felt no misgivings as to a
speedy arrival at the desired destination. So we
spun along in the darkness, I already beginning to
feel the cheer of the anticipation of a hot dinner
and dry clothes.

Alas, for a traveller's innocent trust in the moral
responsibility of the oriental mind ! We were well
out in the country now ; the rain was pouring harder
than ever and dripping dispiritingly through the
rickshaw- top down my face and neck; not a light
was in sight to show signs of human habitation, and
the driving storm had quickly separated me from
my companions, shutting out all other sounds.
Then it was that I finally grasped the situation : my
coolie not only had no knowledge of my intended
destination, but took absolutely no interest in learn-

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 27

ing it : he was a wonderful piece of brainless, heart-
less mechanism, wound up to go until forcibly
stopped ; that was his purpose, his duty, his whole
function, and he was fulfilling it to the letter, going
on straight until ordered to cease, as unconcerned
with the why and the wherefore of the matter as
a bullock drawing a cartload of stones. When I
stopped him and shouted despairingly, " Rest-
house, hotel, rest-house!" he grinned as compre-
hensively as before and changed his course ; when I
expressed my opinion of him in the choicest and
strongest words at my command, he beamed appre-
ciatively, and obediently started off in still another
direction. Under the circumstances I was at the
time unable to appreciate the humor of the situa-
tion. But the matter ended happily: for after an
hour or more of aimless wandering, we happened
by good luck to pass a police-station, where the
word " rest-house" was understood, and my coolie,
after an ostentatious dressing-down by the little
Malay policeman, was directed thither. Wheeler
and Perry, I found, had both enjoyed exactly the
same experience as myself.

Kwala Kangsar, the capital of Perak, was reached
some days later, the dato, or headman of the town,
who had been apprised of our arrival, receiving us
with great cordiality and escorting us to the rest-

28 SPORT AND TRAVEL

house, where a day was spent in making final pre-
parations for the trip.

We were to have had an audience of the Sultan of
Perak, but as he was indisposed at the time, this
unfortunately was impossible, and our shooting per-
mits were sent us by the da to instead. I happened,
however, through an amusing mistake, to be pre-
sented to one of the three sultanas, each of whom
lives in a separate istana or palace. The chief native
physician, having been introduced to us by the
dato, called at the rest-house on the morning after
our arrival to see if one of us would not care to
accompany him on his rounds in order to see some-
thing of the town; and as the others were busy
packing, I agreed to join him. He showed me the
hospital, which though simple was neat and orderly
in a degree worthy of the most civilized of cities;
and having attended to several cases, started for an
istana, where he was to visit one of the Sultan's
wives. We entered and passed upstairs to a large
anteroom from which a door led into the Sultana's
apartments. As the doctor opened this door he made
a sign to me which I misinterpreted to mean that I
should follow, and I was ushered in at his heels.
The Sultana was sitting on a dais at one end of the
room with her handmaidens grouped about her, and
in her lap a baby born but a few weeks before, per-

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 29

haps some future Sultan of Perak. The group made
a decidedly oriental picture and in my interest at
observing it I did not for the moment realize how
unconventional my presence was. As the doctor
turned and saw me, his jaw fell in surprise, for he had
in reality motioned me to wait outside. He was,
however, to be credited with much diplomatic tact,
for without a moment's hesitation, having salaamed
to the Sultana, he presented me as a noted foreign
physician who had come especially to advise con-
cerning her health ! I bowed low, my presence was
approved, and what might have been an embar-
rassing situation turned out happily.

Kwala Kangsar is, so to speak, the outpost of
civilization : the railroad from the coast ends here,
and to go farther one must arrange transport for
one's self. Our plan, briefly, was to push on through
Upper Perak to the state of Pahang, make the head-
waters of the Pahang River, build a raft of bamboo,
and float down-stream to the eastern coast of the
peninsula, where we should trust to find some sort
of boat to Singapore. As Malay life centres chiefly
around the great rivers, our plans promised no little
interest.

A clear starlit night saw us packed in three bul-
lock-carts at the rest-house at Kwala Kangsar, one
of us and the luggage in the first, the other two in

30 SPORT AND TRAVEL

the second, and Ahmed, our worthy cook, holding
down the third. The impressions of the following
fourteen hours are as clearly marked in my memory
as at the time they were on my person : they were
a medley of springless swaying and creaking, the
sharp "ja!" of the Kling driver coming at regular
intervals through the night, the damp evil smell of
the padi -grass which served as bedding, the odor of
our driver's vile cigarettes and areca nuts, which
alone must have kept him awake, and above all, the
pitiless swarms of flies that came from the padi-
fields through which we passed, to render sleep as
impossible as it was longed for. The cart jolted
along at scarcely two miles an hour, never once
stopping through the long, hot, soul-trying night.

Dawn disclosed the jungle, like an impenetrable
wall on one side and a valley on the other, luxuriant
with ferns and cocoanut palms and hundreds of
brilliantly colored song-birds. We were hungry —
as hungry as any healthy mortals might be after
such a night. Ahmed proved his efficiency from the
first by binding his ankles with a fibre-thong and
proceeding to clamber up the nearest cocoanut-tree,
whence he soon returned with a full breakfast under
either arm.

Arriving at Lenggong we repaired as usual to the
rest-house. Now the British rest-house is a most

OUR PACK. ELEPHANTS

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 31

gratifying institution. It is intended originally for
the government officials on their rounds of duty,
whether it is the Resident of a district on a tour of
inspection, or the roads commissioner building new
highways into the interior; and among the regula-
tions on the wall of the dining-room you will read
that in every case an official has first call in the mat-
ter of accommodations. In the more frequented
places a servant will be found in charge, who performs
the combined duties of cook, butler, valet, and any-
thing else that may be required. Farther away from
civilization, where travellers are few and the officials
are given larger tracts to cover, there is no servant,
but the key of the rest-house will be found in charge
of some privileged old inhabitant of the village, who
unlocks it with the greatest pomp and ceremony,
and sweeps it out as though preparing a palace for
the king's arrival. Up in the interior these buildings
are raised high above the ground, in case of flood,
a porch runs along the outside, and the single floor
inside is simply furnished with plenty of plain
wooden chairs and tables, pots and pans for cook-
ing, and, above all, mosquito-netting.

It was at Lenggong that our first news of a tiger
came. The headman, or penghulu, of the village
called on us one morning with two old trackers, who
said that within the week a tiger had killed a bullock

32 SPORT AND TRAVEL

some three miles down the road, and that if we
cared to investigate, we might find him still around
the carcass. We accordingly took out our guns and
walked to the spot on the road where the animal had
been killed. Here the jungle was dense on both
sides of the road, but we found the path the tiger had
made in dragging his prey away, and followed it
straight into the rukh to the remains of the slaugh-
tered bullock, whose limbs had evidently been well
chewed and scattered not far from the body itself.
I noticed several fresh paw-marks in the mud,
which on account of the rains could not have been
more than a day old. As we were bending over
them, there was the distinct sound of an animal
escaping into the jungle ; both trackers at once said,
"Rimau!" ("tiger!") and appeared much excited.
But a tiger slinks away silently, and though the
men assured us that they had heard a growl, we at-
tributed the noise to a deer and returned to the vil-
lage, feeling that, however much game there might
be in the country, tracking was out of the question,
so dense and pathless was the jungle.

Rain had now poured steadily for several days,
turning the roads into sluices, which rendered the
journey to the next post, Janing, exceptionally try-
ing ; to take a bullock-cart through that wilderness
of mud was out of the question. We learned, how-

THE

^ A ,>. - - ;•»> -• •^•-^ .f~3?'r* '* »•> v'x-.-r^. "

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 33

ever, that government elephants might be secured
from the British Resident at Janing; and trusting to
be able to send them back for the luggage, we set
out to cover the twenty-odd miles on foot. This was
no easy task; the highway had become a veritable
quagmire into which one sank at every step, and
since we had neglected to carry sufficient drinking
water, thirst came on with painful intensity. Dark-
ness found us with our bearings completely lost, as
we had missed the right road and taken one which
apparently led nowhere; we were much too fatigued
by the twenty- two mile tramp to hope to reach
Janing, and the prospect of a night in the open
jungle, with no means of guarding against the
beasts which might happen to be there, was not
pleasing. But by good chance we stumbled upon
the small village of Kwala Kinering, where an Eng-
lish tin miner, prospecting alone in the interior,
brought tea and rice, the first food we had had since
morning, and made us comfortable for the night.

It gave us somewhat of a start, however, when
we learned the next day that a native had been
killed and eaten by a tiger at a spot on the same
road which we had passed but an hour or two
earlier on the previous evening.

Janing, which we reached at noon on the follow-
ing day, proved to be a pretty little town on the

34 SPORT AND TRAVEL

bank of the great Perak River. Our stay there was
rendered most pleasant by the hospitality and
cheery personality of the British Resident, Mr. B.
The picture made by his little white bungalow,
sheltered by palm trees and surrounded by smooth
green lawns, like an oasis in the dark jungle desert,
its cool interior well fitted with pictures and game-
heads, its library and many long, comfortable cane
lounging-chairs, is one which I shall not soon forget.
Whether such comforts can make up for a life of
almost absolute loneliness, so far as intercourse with
white men is concerned, is a question which only a
man's personal character can decide ; many of these
officials, their wives and children at home, remain
for years up in the interior of the countries they
labor in, without a holiday, with almost never the
sight of a white man's face, and few indeed with the
comforts I have described, their whole nature ab-
sorbed in their work, all their sympathies centred
in their black charges, whom they doctor, teach,
and govern. It is a true labor of love and patriotism
this, and one worthy of admiration. Mr. B.'s face
lighted with affection and pride when he spoke of
the men he worked among ; perhaps, after all, there
are better things in the world than creature com-
forts.

On the day after our arrival the whole village,

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 35

including the police force, was turned out to beat pig
for us, — perhaps, for the sake of the uninitiated, I
should say, to drive wild boar. While we stood at
short distances apart, on a jungle path, the natives
formed in a long line and came down a hillside yell-
ing at the top of their lungs, beating tin pans and
setting off fire-crackers, making indeed a pande-
monium before which the heart of the most intrepid
boar might well have quailed. The sportsman
stands in a little clearing, his gun cocked and he
well on the alert; the din approaches, there is a
rustle in the bushes, and what appears to be a
black torpedo shoots like a thunderbolt across the
path. For the first few times the hunter then grad-
ually recovers his breath and uncocks his still un-
discharged rifle, the boar being by this time sev-
eral miles away and still going strong. Occasionally
the animal, happening to emerge exactly where the
expectant sportsman is standing, makes a bolt
between his legs, and the hunter, being unable to
shoot accurately while turning a somersault in the
air, thus also loses his game. However, with a little
experience, he learns to judge where the boar will
appear, and to catch him in midair as he springs
across the path.

While we were shooting, the Resident of the neigh-
boring district happened to call at Janing, and not

36 SPORT AND TRAVEL

finding a single inhabitant in or near the village,
came to the obvious conclusion that an earthquake
had swallowed up the entire population.

Mr. B. had most kindly sent back government
elephants for the luggage, and on their return pro-
posed that we should take them on to the next post,
Grik, where others could probably be hired from the
natives. This suggestion we gladly accepted, and
on a clear sunny morning, which contrasted cheer-
fully with the previous downpour, set out with five
elephants and a baby elephant accompanying its
mother. The jungle was at its best that morning;
the foliage, from the refreshing rains, was of the
most vivid green and sparkled in the sun ; on many
trees and shrubs rich orchid-like flowers were in
full blossom, while among them darted birds of all
descriptions, surpassing in the brilliancy of their
plumage and sweetness of note any that I have seen
in other lands. Occasionally a troop of chattering
monkeys swung by us overhead, pausing to regard
us with curiosity, and to hurl down twigs and bits
of bark as they passed ; the whole jungle-world was
full of movement and life, every bird and animal
apparently drinking in with pure enjoyment the
glorious freshness of the sunshine after rain.

A source of continuous amusement to us were the
antics of the baby elephant. You have seen a kitten

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 37

career madly around after its tail, or a puppy
tumble over itself in paroxysms of playfulness ; but
have you ever witnessed an elephant at the tender
age of six months expressing its uncontainable
spirits? I assure you there is nothing more excru-
ciatingly funny. To begin with, he suddenly charges
a bamboo thicket, butting down great trees as care-
lessly as though they were cornstalks; these fall
across the way, together with a small avalanche of
rotten boughs, placing your life distinctly in jeop-
ardy and causing you to wonder anxiously whether
in the event of a dearth of bamboo you yourself
may not be selected as a substitute. He then tears
up a large sapling by the roots, breaks it in pieces,
and hurls the bits in every direction, while you
vainly attempt to dodge the missiles. Tired of this
pastime, you will observe him surreptitiously filling
his trunk with the semi-liquid mud by the road-
side, which he appears to have swallowed until a
sudden carefully aimed jet covers you from head to
foot. The next moment he is trotting docilely by his
mother's side, his whole being radiating innocence
and defying calumny. Perhaps the most amusing
episode in our baby's infinite variety of entertain-
ment was once when, fording a brook, he slipped on
the muddy bank and landed on his back in mid-
stream, where he lay with his legs waving absurdly

38 SPORT AND TRAVEL

in the air, as helpless as an overturned beetle. The
fond parent, seeing his predicament, was obliged
to return and support him until he could regain his
feet.

The glorious sunshine of the morning was not to
last. Toward noon the clouds rolled up, and soon it
was pouring in tropical torrents ; frequently we had
to ford rivers up to our waists in water, while the
road, from the mud and pools, became almost im-
passable. As my feet had become sore from the
gravel which chafed in my shoes at every step, I
mounted an elephant, and for five hours endured
the uncomfortable swaying motion and the chill of
the drenching rain; the others kept on, however,
until at nightfall pitch-darkness found them alone
in the jungle, some miles ahead of the elephants. In
attempting to ford a river they got in up to their
necks, and only with the greatest difficulty managed
to escape being swept away by the now much-
swollen current. The outlook was serious, as it was
a question whether the elephants would be able to
keep to the road in the darkness. Meanwhile my
gajah had been lumbering along, while the driver
belabored him continually on the head with his
stick, and now and then gave him a prod with the
ankus, all the while addressing him in a comical
reproving voice as one talks to a young child. After

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 39

dark he became frightened at the noises in the
jungle, and tried to turn, but the driver kept him on
with an ever-increasing volubility of epithets, and
finally we met the others, who of course were de-
lighted to find that they would not have to spend
the night alone. We forded the river, reached Grik,
a small kampong composed of a few little thatched
huts, and turned in, wet and very weary.

Through the assistance of the penghulu of Grik,
Ibrahim ben Ishmail, a bamboo hut was now built
for us on a game-field some seven miles away,
called Padang Sambai. These penghulus, by the
way, invariably showed us the greatest courtesy
and good-will, and indeed all the natives with whom
we had dealings proved the recognized cheeriness
and light-heartedness of the Malay character. But
indolence is their vice ; it is the Tamil from Madras
and the Chinaman who do the work in Malay.
Even in the most solitary places we were continually
running across well-ordered Chinese farms ; were it
not for the great number of Chinamen who have
settled in the peninsula, and who by their thrift and
energy have established themselves in successful
farming and commercial enterprises, the Malay
Federated States would be very much more back-
ward in civilization and exploitation than they are
to-day.

40 SPORT AND TRAVEL

Padang Sambai, the game-field which I have
mentioned, lay in the thickest part of the jungle,
approached only by a scarcely perceptible trail.
We were guided there by some hunters from the
Sakai hill-tribes, who had put in an appearance at
Grik the night before our departure. These were
truly remarkable specimens of humanity, — short
of stature, wild-looking, and stark naked except for
a narrow loin-cloth. They went ahead through the
thickest jungle, absolutely noiselessly, and at a pace
which quickly exhausted us, over logs, through
streams, and always in mud nearly up to our knees.
The hut was found to be nearly finished, several
natives having been working on it for some days —
a bamboo floor raised three feet off the ground, and
covered by a roof of cleverly interwoven leaves
which proved to be quite waterproof. Fortunately
it was near the river, where, in spite of Ahmed's
warning to look out for alligators, we at once in-
dulged in a refreshing swim. Our legs were in a bad
way from the elephant-leeches, which attach them-
selves when one is tramping in the jungle ; the exhil-
aration of walking prevents one's feeling the bite,
so they stay there and continue to suck the blood,
soon becoming three or four times their natural size.
Even with carefully wound putties I found it diffi-
cult to keep them out ; they attach themselves when

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 41

extremely minute, and succeed in getting inside in
spite of all precautions. Eight were on my legs from
this one walk, leaving sores which bled badly ; and
others were found to have dropped on us from the
trees, and actually crawled down our necks without
being felt. Black scars result from the bites, and
remain for years.

Our stay at Padang Sambai soon proved the use-
lessness of the trip so far as the shooting was con-
cerned, and in fact led us to abandon all idea of
going into Pahang ; for day after day the rain poured
with a dreary and dispiriting persistency. This
great open game-field, with its tall grass, ponds, and
marshes, was all marked up with the tracks of wild
elephant and seladang. Yet morning and evening,
day after day, we waited and watched to no purpose.
Every animal, with the exception of a few deer, had
effectually disappeared from the country. A few
shots at these deer were small recompense, and I
found that shooting from the back of an untrained
elephant, which at the report of the gun tries to
imitate a bucking broncho, is anything but condu-
cive to accuracy.

It was finally decided to build a raft here on the
Perak River, and to float down its course instead of
crossing into Pahang. Seven natives were put to
work, and in a few days had made, with no material

42 SPORT AND TRAVEL

but bamboo, a very ingenious construction. Some
twenty pieces of bamboo, about thirty feet long, had
been lashed together with bamboo thongs, and upon
these, in the centre, was a raised platform about fif-
teen by six feet. A light frame supported the tent
and fly as a covering over this. Not a single nail had
been used in the construction.

The trip down river would have been thoroughly
delightful had it not been for the rain. As it was,
the mornings were bright and warm, and the river-
banks, as we floated leisurely past, were always
full of interest. As on our journeys through the
jungle, gorgeously colored birds kept flying and
singing around us; the shores were here and there
lined with banana and other fruit trees, in which
monkeys played and squabbled, and occasionally
we passed a little kampong, half hidden in the foli-
age, with natives working and babies sprawling on
the thresholds of the huts.

In one place we had to go over a rather formidable
set of rapids, which our paddlers had been discussing
for days beforehand, and which apparently caused
them some apprehension. The barang, or luggage,
was carefully lashed, a huge steering paddle con-
structed in the stern, and, with paddlers and polers
at their posts, we pushed out into the stream. As
we drifted toward the first pitch, the pilot, a gray-

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 43

headed officious old man, took a charm from his
turban and threw it at a big rock in mid-stream,
crying out a prayer to the river spirit to see us safely
through. There were four pitches, each successive
one a little worse than the last ; and as we went over
them the old man appeared to go mad; he leaped
from side to side, brandishing his bamboo pole quite
uselessly in the air, and yelling as though he were
possessed of devils, beating the poor coolies, who
were doing all the hard work, on the back as he did
so. They were all shouting, too, and when on the
last pitch the flood rushed over the platform on
which we were sitting, they also seemed to lose
their heads and rushed about the raft like a stam-
peded herd of cattle. To a spectator on the bank
the sight must have been a ludicrous one.

At another spot the fresh seladang track of which
I have spoken was found on the bank; and as it
was evidently but a few hours old, we followed it
for hours through the worst tangle of underbrush
it has ever been my lot to encounter. When we
were so close that the water in the animal's hoof-
prints was still muddied, the trackers who had
accompanied us refused to continue nearer; an
Englishman had not long since been killed by a
bull seladang in the same country, and the accident
had left too serious an impression on the natives'

44 SPORT AND TRAVEL

minds. We ourselves followed on, but the seladang
had moved swiftly, and at dark we were obliged
to turn back, bleeding all over from scratches and
leech-bites.

The remainder of the trip was a disheartening
story of rain, rain, rain. Occasionally a night was
spent in some native's hut on the bank, where we
slept on wooden shelves in opium-thickened atmos-
phere ; but as a rule things were made as comfort-
able as possible on the raft. At the best, we slept
in pools of water, with mosquitoes biting ceaselessly,
and rivulets from the soaked canvas dripping on
our faces.

Of course, after this continual subjection to the
bites of swamp-mosquitoes, there was but one re-
sult to expect, namely, malarial fever. Our blood
must have been full of the poison when we emerged
from the interior at Penang, but as yet no symp-
toms of what awaited us had developed. We re-
turned to Singapore on a little Chinese tub, the Pin
Seng, which was so filthy and so swarming with ver-
min, that, after a single glance at the cabins which
had been allotted us, we took refuge on deck and
remained there throughout the voyage, without
once again venturing below.

From Singapore we immediately entered Johore,
the country which occupies the foot of the Malay

THROUGH THE MALAY JUNGLE 45

Peninsula. After many fruitless interviews on our
part and much procrastination on his, the Sultan
of Johore had finally given us permission to look for
tiger in his domains, and as he himself had already
vshot fourteen within a radius of seven miles of his
palace, the chances of success looked promising.
After a few days of beating the jungle, which re-
sulted in bringing out innumerable pig but not a
sign of tiger, Perry decided to abandon the quest in
favor of the wilder regions of Borneo, Wheeler and
I promising to follow him in another fortnight. Dur-
ing the next few days we were on foot from morning
till night, soaked to the skin one moment and baked
dry by the glaring sun the next. There was some ex-
citement in waiting on a narrow path while the dogs
and beaters approached noisily through the jungle,
for there was always the possibility and the hope
that a tiger might emerge within range, and indeed
fresh spoor had been found almost at once after
Perry's departure.

Then one morning a sudden end was put to my
hopes of success. For the past week I had had con-
tinual headaches, and at times had found myself
almost incapable of standing. When finally my
temperature was taken, it proved to be so high that
no further doubt as to the presence of fever existed,
and I was obliged to start ignominiously for the

46 SPORT AND TRAVEL

coast, in a hammock swung from the shoulders of
four coolies. Eventually, under the care of a Singa-
pore physician, the fever was temporarily mastered ;
Wheeler, who had been unsparing in his kindness
and assistance, returned to Johore, and I, under
doctor's orders, sailed on November 27 for the
more healthful climate of Northern India.

CHAPTER III

IMPRESSIONS OF NORTHERN INDIA: BOMBAY,
JAIPORE, AMBER, AGRA

HEN we started on our trip around the
world we had had no intention of doing
much stereotyped sight-seeing, simply
because the wilds and a gun had ap-
pealed to us much more strongly than the beaten
track of tourists and a guide-book. But now the
fever had put me out of action, so far as shooting
trips were concerned, for several months at least,
and it seemed that I could not better improve this
period of convalescence than by jogging across
Northern India and visiting some of her more fa-
mous cities. Accordingly, on reaching Ceylon after
the Malay trip, I went ashore only long enough to
rebook my passage to Bombay, and continued up
the coast on the P. & O. S. S. Massilia, which had
brought me from Singapore. The journey across
India was a thoroughly pleasant one, and notwith-
standing the numberless times it has been written
up before, I am tempted to jot down a few of the
purely personal impressions received in that fasci-

48 SPORT AND TRAVEL

nating country. For I know of no land that can com-
pare with it in point of architectural, historic, and
human interest, and no country that repays so well
a trip of sight-seeing and study.

As one looks back at Bombay, one remembers
first of all that splendid seaside drive out to Mala-
bar Point, through the hot, spice-laden atmosphere,
where the fashionable carriages of Bombay society
dodge in and out among the lazy, swaying bullock-
carts, and the rich Parsee dashes in state past his
toiling low-caste brethren. One remembers it first
of all because it leads one past the Towers of
Silence; and gruesome as is their character, the
Towers of Silence, with their surrounding woods,
lawns, and gardens, have no counterpart. The
system which goes on within those ivy-covered •
walls, which from their aspect suggest to the visitor
some grim mediaeval fortress, is as admirable as it
is startling. One of the chief tenets of the Parsee
religion is that fire, earth, and water, being sacred,
must not be polluted by contact with putrifying
flesh, so that their mortal remains may not be
burned, buried, or thrown into the sea. Hence the
bodies of their dead are taken and placed reverently
upon marble slabs within these circular battlements
— there being three concentric circles, for the bod-
ies of men, women, and children respectively.

BOMBAY 49

Upon these battlements are perched some five hun-
dred vultures, waiting only for the pall-bearers or
Nasr Salars to withdraw ; a few minutes suffice ; the
bones of the dead, cleansed of mortal flesh, are then
allowed to remain until thoroughly bleached by sun
and rain, when they are reverently dropped into
the well which forms the centre of the circles. Here
they crumble into ashes, and are borne by covered
drains to four deep wells placed at equal distances
outside the towers, where, by passing through sand
and charcoal, they are purified before entering the
ground. Rich and poor thus meet together on a final
level of equality, and observe the injunction of their
religion, that " Mother earth shall not be defiled."

The surrounding gardens form a cemetery, the
beauty, solemnity, and peacefulness of which bear
fitting tribute to the memory of the dead, and
cause the sight-seeking visitor to forget, in his
admiration of the reverence with which this admir-
able and most sanitary system is carried out, his
first feeling of repulsion and the sight of the grue-
some birds perched above him in attitudes of con-
tinual expectancy.

Among all the various races in the world the
Parsees stand unique. Somewhere back in the dim
prehistoric ages, their ancestors formed one of the
greatest of Asiatic nations, having their home in

50 SPORT AND TRAVEL

what is now Persia, where they ruled in magnifi-
cence and glory. Many centuries before the opening
of the Christian era, their religion was founded by
Zoroaster — a monotheistic faith based on the en-
lightened principle of a single right-loving deity, the
maker, preserver, and ruler of the universe, and
teaching the advanced doctrine of the resurrection
of the body. When, in the seventh century, A. D.,
the Persian Empire was destroyed by the Saracens,
and the great mass of the nation forced to adopt
Islamism, a small number still adhered to the Zoro-
astrian faith, and in order to escape persecution fled
into the Persian province of Korasan, whence they
eventually migrated into India. To-day the num-
ber of Parsees all told scarcely reaches one hundred
thousand souls, of which over seventy-five per cent
are said to live in the Bombay Presidency, and
nearly fifty thousand in the city of Bombay itself.
The extraordinary thing is that, through all these
centuries, while living in the midst of the vast all-
absorbing Hindu population, this handful of people
has remained unabsorbed, retaining its individuality
and handing down its customs, characteristics, and
religion from generation to generation in essentially
the same form in which they were received from
its Persian ancestors ages ago.

In point of education and business ability, the

BOMBAY 51

Parsees stand preeminently at the head of all the
races of Western India, many of them being among
the wealthiest merchants in India, while others
have won high positions in the government, and
their universal liberality is well known in Bombay,
where numberless public buildings, hospitals, and
colleges have been endowed by their public-spirited
generosity. It is indeed greatly to their credit that
the one hundred thousand followers of Zoroaster,
who still tend the sacred flame, should, in spite of
their numerical insignificance, play so large a part
in the development of India.

The streets and buildings of Bombay may be
lightly passed over, for splendid as is the " Queen of
Cities," she is by no means typical of India: the
hand of the Anglo-Saxon rules supreme ; her great
public edifices, her shops, her churches, imposing as
they are, would be as much in place in London or
New York as out here in the East.

Then, too, one has no great enthusiasm for a place
where for a month one has been flat on one's back in
bed, with a temperature somewhat too high for
either convenience or safety; for the fever, which
on my departure from Singapore had appeared
to be cured, had on my arrival in Bombay come on
again with redoubled intensity, and quickly laid me
low. If these pages are ever glanced at by Mr.

52 SPORT AND TRAVEL

William Thomas Fee, formerly American consul-
general in Bombay, I wish here to express my grati-
tude to him for his most kindly interest in my wel-
fare during those unpleasant weeks, and to thank
him most heartily for having on his own initiative
looked up and interested himself in a temporarily
helpless American citizen.

When, on December 25, after a solitary bowl of
soup for a Christmas dinner, I had gathered
strength enough to take the express for the north,
and two days later descended at Jaipore, the prin-
cipal city of Rajputana, I found myself at last in
true Indian surroundings, and began to realize the
fascination of that most fascinating of all countries.

Let no one labor under the delusion that India is
always hot. On the morning of my arrival in Jaipore
I should have been mightily glad of a fur coat.
Moreover, Indian trains have a way of invariably
arriving at important places at hours in keeping
with the paganism of the country. The train
reached Jaipore before sunrise of a bitter cold
December day, and so frozen was I by the time I
reached the hotel, that it was necessary to devote
the hours between chota-hazri and breakfast to sit-
ting close to an open fire before I was sufficiently
thawed out to be capable of walking. Then, when
the sun was well up, we started out to see the city.

JAIPORE 53

Of all the cities of India, Jaipore, from the point
of view of life and color, leaves with one the clearest
and most lasting impressions. It is not the Maha-
raja's palace, gardens, or stables that one recalls,
though they are striking, nor the Albert Museum,
though that too is of the greatest interest ; nor yet
is it the architecture of the regular blocks of plaster
houses, which is monotonous and commonplace : it
is the whole city itself, the great broad-s tree ted,
wall-inclosed city, with its ring of encircling hills
and its seven great gates, hiving with life and
gaiety, that impresses one with its charm. Imagine,
if you can, a street of such length and breadth that
the avenues of our greatest cities would appear
small beside it, and two far-reaching lines of flat-
topped plaster houses, colored — of all colors in the
rainbow — a brilliant pink, forming with the in-
tensely blue sky above and the reddish earth below
a combination of hues which in anything but nature
would jar atrociously, but which here combine in
the most pleasing harmony; imagine a throng of
natives of the most varied castes, continually min-
gling and remingling like the bits of glass in a kalei-
doscope, every caste being represented by a dis-
tinctive color or shade of turban, and every man
with some gay blanket or lui thrown about his
shoulders; imagine a continuously passing stream

54 SPORT AND TRAVEL

of every manner of beast of burden, — gorgeously
tattooed camels and elephants, bullocks, donkeys,
and water-buffaloes, goats and homeless pariah
dogs innumerable, lazy sacred cows wandering
across the street in utter disregard of the respectful
but impeded traffic, gray apes galore swarming on
the housetops, imagine all this, and add to it the
noise of creaking wheels, the clang of brass cymbals,
the cries of vendors, the hum of the market-place,
and you will understand a little why Jaipore is
fascinating.

On the morning after my arrival, we started by
carriage for the deserted city of Amber, some five
miles distant, which previous to the founding of
Jaipore by the Maharaja Siwai Jai Singh in 1728 —
due to a lack of water at his previous residence, it
is said — was the capital of Rajputana. The colors
of Jaipore, as we hurried through it, impressed me
even more than on the day before. It was bitterly
cold, and the natives squatted in circles in the road
about small fires, completely hidden in their gaudy
comforters. The sky seemed bluer than ever, and
the pink blocks of houses stood out clearly against
it in remarkable contrast. Soon we passed out of
the city and down a dusty road, with ruined houses
and temples, overgrown with cactus, on either side,
where we were able to see the hills which rise

STREET SCENES IN JAIPORE

AMBER 55

abruptly on three sides of Jaipore and are crowned
by the ancient city wall, with fortifications and tur-
rets at all the highest points. The carriage takes one
only to the end of the level, where one is conveyed
by bullock-cart or elephant up the hill to Amber.
As we reached the top of the pass and started down
into the next valley, the whole deserted city lay
stretched before us, its houses and temples crum-
bling and overgrown with weeds. Above rose
abruptly another hill, and on its top in imposing
prominence towered the ancient palace of the
Maharajas. The elephant eventually dropped us
in the courtyard, whence we passed through the
many halls and rooms of the palace, admiring
especially the fine inlaid work of the walls, which
was always the strong point of the ancient Mogul
designers. It is said that an underground passage
connects this palace with the one in Jaipore, six
miles away; so that in former days the Maharaja,
if attacked, could flee to what was then his summer
country home, but this assertion I could not per-
sonally verify.

After seeing the palace and obtaining a magnifi-
cent view of Amber and the surrounding country
from its topmost turrets, we descended to a live
temple to Krishna, where worship was going on.
The god's breakfast-bowl had just been removed

56 SPORT AND TRAVEL

by the priest, a stalwart, clear-eyed young man, so
nearly naked that I feared for the susceptibilities
of the ladies I was accompanying; and a most
frightful din of tom-toms and great bells was an-
nouncing the fact of the deity's repletion in a man-
ner which, considering the desertedness of the city,
seemed to me superfluous as well as painful.

That night I departed for Agra. The compart-
ment was all too full, and among my fellow passen-
gers was an extraordinary individual covered with
jewels, especially about his ears, in front of which
the hair hung long, having with him an outfit of
bow and arrows, a sword, and, of all incongruous
articles, a bag of golf-clubs. My boy, James An-
thony by name, informed me that he was a king,
but of what, heaven only knew. The train was
scheduled to go to Agra, but about one A. M., long
after we had retired, James awoke me with the
pleasing news that, on account of the pressure of
travel northwards, the train's destination would be
changed to Delhi, to accommodate the many pas-
sengers who had been unable to find accommoda-
tions on the regular Delhi express. A sigh of relief
went up from the Englishmen and the "king,"
while I, cursing, had to dress in the cold and wait on
a wind-swept station platform for the next train to
Agra.

VIEW FROM THE BATTLEMENTS OF THE DESERTED
1'Al.ACE OF AMBER

THE DESERTED PALACE OF AMBER

AGRA 57

Before going to Agra, you must learn something
of the ancient Mogul kings who built and beautified
it, for then, besides the keen aesthetic pleasure you
will have merely in beholding the works of archi-
tecture which they have handed down to posterity,
you will know a little of the romances which in-
spired these works, and will more thoroughly ap-
preciate the delicacy and matchless charm of their
conception. For the mosques and tombs of Agra
are undeniably the most beautiful monuments ever
erected by man. It has well been said that the
Moguls designed Titans and finished like jewellers;
but they did more ; they embodied in their works
the delicacy, refinement, and effeminacy of the
women who in almost every instance inspired their
efforts, and whom in many cases their monuments
were to commemorate.

The high-water mark of the Mogul dynasty lasted
through the reigns of three great kings, — Akbar
the Great, Jehanghir, and Shah Jehan, — and it
was during these reigns that the Indian architecture
reached its perfection and that the palaces, mosques,
and tombs of Agra were built. Akbar's works were
inspired by a woman, and his son Jehanghir's reign
was a success only through his devotion to the
beautiful and brilliant Nur Jehan. Shah Jehan,
Jehanghir's successor, had many wives, but one

58 SPORT AND TRAVEL

whom he loved above them all ; and it is to the
romance of that marriage that the world owes its
possession of that one unrivalled work of architec-
ture, the Taj Mahal. They were great and powerful
men, these Moguls, and some of them were among
the wisest and most enlightened of monarchs.
Akbar the Great stands preeminently above them
all. He reigned from 1556 to 1605, and it is said
that in physical strength and prowess, personal
charm, benevolence of character and broadness of
views, he was the greatest of living men. But with
all his strong and statesmanlike qualities he was a
true artist, and it is to his refined taste and appre-
ciation of the beautiful that we are indebted for
many of India's greatest monuments. It was he
who removed his capital from Delhi to Agra, and
spent his life in making it the most beautiful city in
India.

I spent the first day of my stay at Agra rambling
through the big Fort, which was begun by Akbar, and
which, always excepting the Kremlin at Moscow,
is without doubt the grandest citadel in the world.
It is a city in itself, being two miles and a quarter
in circumference, with walls seventy feet high and
thirty feet thick, and protected by a correspondingly
broad and deep moat. The palace which it incloses
wanders over a vast extent of ground, each succeed-

AGRA 59

ing king apparently having built for himself and his
wives entirely new apartments ; and as there were
many kings and very many wives, the halls, mosques,
chambers, and secret passages of the palace seem
to have no end. It is here that you first begin to
appreciate the marvellous workmanship of the
Mogul designers and decorators. Nothing could be
more charmingly and delicately carried out than the
carving of the marble walls and the inlaid work of
every color of stone, — agate, jasper, lapis-lazuli,
malachite, and hosts of others, — with more pre-
cious stones frequently finding place in the centre of
some slab or panel. The finest precision, the most
perfect taste, the truest artistic touch, is universally
evident in their work and reminds one continually
of the mosaics of Italy.

This is especially marked in the apartments set
aside for the Sultan's zenana. The ladies of the
court had little liberty in those days, but their
prison, if it could be called such, was made as beau-
tiful and attractive as taste and money could ac-
complish. They could sit in their rooms high up
above the battlements of the fort, and, protected
by lace-like marble screens, could look out over the
city and watch the busy life below. They had
courtyards for walking, and gardens and great
fountain-baths, all laid out high above the public

60 SPORT AND TRAVEL

part of the palace, and all carefully shut off from
the sight of man, save for the Sultan and the
eunuchs who guarded them.

Of course these palaces seem a little bare now and
give no impression of the comfort and luxury which
we know the Mogul kings loved above all else. But
one must let his imagination rove a little, and pic-
ture the halls and chambers furnished, as they must
once have been, with magnificent Persian carpets
and thick curtains and draperies, beautiful tapes-
tries, luxurious divans and cushions, and soft rugs
to deaden the sound of feet on marble floors, which
now echo rather mournfully through the corridors.
History tells us, too, that the sultans and their wives
dressed in unimagined splendor, that their robes
were of the finest silk and satin and embroidered
with gold, and that they wore jewels of untold
value. It is not surprising that the apartments of
their palaces should seem unending ; in the zenanas
alone the sultanas had five thousand women around
them, including representatives of every profession
and trade, — artists, musicians, seamstresses, em-
broiderers, hair-dressers, cooks, and innumerable
other servants, besides the wives themselves and
some three hundred concubines. When you add to
this the number of the Sultan's suite and servants,
and the soldiers who guarded the palace, you can

AGRA 6 1

imagine to some extent the proportions of a building
which could house so vast a throng. Indeed, one
needs a guide to explore the palace at Agra.

Every palace has its private chapel, and the
palace of Akbar is no exception to the rule ; but no
king ever knelt to pray in a more beautiful spot
than the interior of the Moti Musjid, or Pearl
Mosque, at Agra. It is the most exquisite little
building of its kind in existence; the marble of
which it is constructed is of the purest white, with-
out flaw or tint, inlaid here and there with verses
from the Koran in precious stones or black marble.
The roof, which bears three domes and innumerable
minarets, is supported by graceful marble arches,
the western side of the mosque, which looks toward
Mecca, being open and facing on a courtyard where,
in a great marble tank, the faithful performed their
ablutions before going to prayer.

Akbar himself sleeps in a beautiful mausoleum on
the road to Delhi from Agra. At the head of his
cenotaph stands a marble column, finely carved,
and in the centre of the top is a rough hole, the pre-
sence of which, considering the flawlessness of its
surroundings, is a cause for surprise. It once was
filled by what was then the greatest diamond in the
world, the Kohinoor, which the Emperor Jehanghir
had had imbedded there after Akbar's death, in

62 SPORT AND TRAVEL

order that it might be admired by the thousands of
people who made pilgrimages to his father's grave.
It remained there untouched for seventy-one years,
guarded only by the single attendant of the tomb.
Only in 1737, when the Shah of Persia invaded India,
and sacked the palaces and tombs of the Moguls,
was it carried away, eventually to find its way to
England, where it is now one of the chief jewels in
the British crown.

On the day following my exploration of the Fort
and Palace, I crossed the River Jumna to the tomb
of Itimad-ud-Daulah, which is one of the master-
pieces of Mogul architecture. Itimad-ud-Daulah
was the prime minister of Akbar; from an obscure
Persian traveller he had been raised to the highest
office in the Empire, and he filled it with ability and
wisdom until his death. His daughter was that bril-
liant and beautiful lady, Nur Jehan Begam, the
Sultana of Jehanghir, who became not only empress
in her own right, but the most powerful influence
in the East as well, and who, during her husband's
reign, controlled the destinies of all India. It was
she who built the famous mausoleum which bears
her father's name and which was erected to his
memory.

The tomb of Itimad-ud-Daulah lies in a garden on
the bank of the River Jumna, a mile and a half from

AGRA 63

the city, and from it can be seen the domes and
minarets of the Taj. Like the Taj it is built of the
purest white marble, almost every square inch of
which is inlaid with colored stones. The towers
which rise at the four corners are of the most grace-
ful design, and around the top of the tomb, inclos-
ing the towers and the central pavilion, runs a
perforated marble screen of the most delicate lace-
like structure. Inside are the tombs of Itimad-ud-
Daulah and his wife, and in chambers opening from
the central one repose the remains of five members
of his family.

But let us turn to the supreme centrepiece of
Agra's architecture. Shah Jehan, as I have said,
had one wife whom he loved above them all. This
good woman, whose name has come down to us as
Mumtaz-i-Mahal, "The Pride of the Palace," made
her husband happy for eighteen years, during which
time, it is said, he had no other wife, and finally
died in giving birth, history tells us, to her four-
teenth baby. The following year Shah Jehan began
the building of the Taj Mahal, which means "The
Crown of the Palaces," and for eighteen years kept
twenty thousand unpaid workmen employed upon
his wife's memorial. The original architect is not
known, but among the designers were a Frenchman,
an Italian, and a Persian, showing that the best

64 SPORT AND TRAVEL

talent of the world was brought to assist in its con-
struction. Finally, in 1648, the work was finished,
and when Shah Jehan died, his body was placed
beside that of his wife in pure white marble tombs,
sheltered from the untempered light outside by a
screen of beautiful pierced marble tracery, which
allows the reflection of the glaring Indian sun to sift
gently into the interior of the mausoleum, and
insures by day a perpetual twilight in keeping with
the solemnity of the surroundings.

It was fitting that the Emperor should have
commemorated the perfect love of his marriage
with a monument to which alone, even to-day, the
word perfect may be applied, — perfect in propor-
tion, perfect in detail, perfect in the exquisite
beauty, grace, and delicacy of its conception. It is
useless to attempt to describe the Taj ; poets have
raved over it during the centuries of its existence,
prosaic guide-books have set down its dimensions
and enumerated its cupolas and minarets, innumer-
able photographers and painters have reproduced
its form. But neither pen nor camera nor brush has
ever been able to convey the faintest impression
of its true beauty, the gracefulness of its design, the
softness of its symmetry, the delicacy of its decora-
tion. Mr. W. E. Curtis, in his book on ''Modern
India" sums it up in a particularly pleasing figure:

AGRA 65

" One might as well attempt to describe a Beethoven
symphony," he says, "for if architecture be frozen
music, as some poet has said, the Taj Mahal is the
supremest and sublimest composition that human
genius has produced."

When you drive through the wood which leads
to its entrance, pass under the red sandstone gate-
way, and stand at last in the gardens which sur-
round the tomb, you will perhaps not at first appre-
ciate its full value. You will regard it from each
corner of the gardens, and then enter to examine
the mural decorations and the pierced marble
screens and the cenotaphs, of which as usual the
more imposing imitation ones lie above, and those
which actually hold the bodies of the Emperor and
his wife in a sepulchral chamber below. But only
when you have finished examining its details, have
seated yourself on one of the benches in the garden
before its eastern face, and there, hour after hour,
in the peacefulness and silence of the surroundings
have let the effect of the tomb impress itself upon
your senses as a whole, while the fading afternoon
sunlight slowly shifts the lights and shades and
varies the tints upon its flawless marble, — only
then will you wholly understand why the Taj Mahal
is called the most beautiful of all buildings.

CHAPTER IV

IMPRESSIONS OF NORTHERN INDIA: CAWNPORE, LUCK-
NOW, BENARES

]HE scene changes wholly when you
move from Agra to Cawnpore; from
the lavish days of the Moguls you pass
over a couple of centuries to a time
when India had come under British control, and
you are appalled to remember that those few months
which made Cawnpore famous were not back some-
where in a half-veiled mediaeval era, but were in
the lifetime of our own fathers. You find yourself
in imagination living through those dark days of
1857 ; and as the guide leads you from landmark to
landmark, you picture all too vividly the scenes of
outrage which took place on that cheerless sun-
scorched landscape but half a century ago. The ar-
chitecture has changed too ; mausoleums, mosques,
and palaces have vanished, and in their place your
eye is held only by two quite modern edifices. One
is a little red-brick chapel, such as you would see in
an English village, and the other a marble statue
representing the Angel of the Resurrection, clasping

THE ANGEL OF THE RESURRECTION

Memorial over the Massacre Well at Cawnpore

CAWNPORE 67

two palm branches across her breast, and sur-
rounded by a marble gothic screen, which stands in
such a grove as might skirt some cemetery at home.
The church is dedicated " To the Glory of God and
in memory of more than a thousand people who
met their deaths hard by betwixt 6th June and
I5th July, 1857"-; the monument, "Sacred to the
perpetual memory of a great company of Christian
people, chiefly women and children, who near this
spot were cruelly murdered by the followers of the
rebel Nana Dhundu Pant, of Bithur, and cast, the
dying with the dead, into the well below, on the
XVth day of July, MDCCCLVII." Both com-
memorate the most terrible massacres of the Indian
Mutiny, which have made Cawnpore undoubtedly
the saddest spot on earth.

It is difficult to imagine a more desolate and pa-
thetic landscape than the scene of these unparalleled
tragedies. An empty, brown, sun-baked plain ex-
tends in all directions ; one scarcely can find shade
from the scorching Indian sun, and a fine burning
dust fills the atmosphere. It was in the midst of this
shadeless plain that the British garrison, composed
largely of women and children, held out for over
three weeks in the middle of summer, under con-
tinuous fire from the rebel troops.

The siege began on June 6. Sir Hugh Wheeler,

68 SPORT AND TRAVEL

in command of the British, had thrown up five-
foot intrenchments about the cantonment and had
lodged therein some eight hundred persons, of
which number the wives and children of soldiers
and civilians formed a large percentage. These
were gathered in two bungalows in the centre of the
intrenchments, which, during the three weeks of
the siege, were pounded day and night by the grape-
shot and cannon-balls of the rebels. Their rations
consisted of a handful of flour and split peas daily,
increased only when some horse or dog strayed into
the cantonment, and they suffered fearfully from
thirst, their only water being drawn from the well
outside by brave men who took turns in sacrificing
their lives to alleviate the pain of the women and
children within.

Finally, on June 25, the Nana offered to those
who would surrender a safe journey down the river.
They marched to the Ganges, this ragged, half-
starved band, and there, from the steps of a washing
ghat, prepared to enter the thatch-covered boats
which lay in readiness for their passage to freedom.
The oars were in the locks and the native crews sat
ready to man them. After their weeks of anxiety
and suffering the thought that their troubles were
past and that now, after all, they were to see home
and friends once more, must have given them a

CAWNPORE 69

moment of actual joy such as they had never ex-
pected to experience again. Major Vibart, now in
command since the wounding of General Wheeler,
stood with his staff to the left of the ghat ; the Nana
was on the right. Apparently no other human be-
ings were present to witness the commencement
of their journey.

But if they could have looked behind the walls of
the ghat and through the brush that skirted the
river-banks, if they could have had but one glimpse
of the cannon trained upon the boats which they
were about to enter, and the rows of silent rebel
soldiers waiting for a signal from their chief, who
knows in what respects the history of Cawnpore
might have been altered. The men still had their
arms, and desperation lends might even to the few.
They would at least have died in action.

But this was not to be. There was no reason to
doubt the Nana's good faith. Up to the beginning
of the siege he had professed friendship for the Brit-
ish, and it was but rational to suppose, either that
he was now repentant, or that policy was prompting
him to friendly action. The boats were entered, and
the word given by Major Vibart to shove off. At
that moment a bugle sounded, there was a flash
from the bank, and volley after volley of ball and
bullets was poured into the helpless mass of English

70 SPORT AND TRAVEL

men and women below. They tried to push off from
the sand-bar, but the crews had unshipped the oars
and plunged with them to safety just before the
signal was given. Three only of the boats managed
to swing out into the river, two of which grounded
and their occupants were quickly killed by grape
and bullets. The third drifted out of sight down-
stream. The male passengers of the other boats
were slaughtered to a man, the soldiers rushing into
the water and dispatching those who tried to swim
away.

The one hundred and twenty women and children
who remained alive, many of them, be it remem-
bered, being the wives of British officers, who had
never known a day's hardship in their lives, were
taken by the Nana back to the cantonment over the
same scorching road which an hour before they had
thought was leading them to liberty, and placed in
a small bungalow with two rooms twenty by ten
feet, a couple of servants' rooms at the back, and a
verandah running along the front. Here they were
confined for ten days, with others who had been
captured' about Cawnpore, — two hundred and
eleven of them, of whom but five were men, —
locked up in a house scarcely large enough to ac-
commodate a single family. There was no bedding
and they were fed on unleavened bread and lentil

CAWNPORE 71

soup. Twenty-eight died in those ten days, and
they were fortunate, for they escaped the last act
of the tragedy of Cawnpore, which was the most
terrible of all.

At five o'clock on the afternoon of July 10 it was
decided that the entire number of prisoners should
be put to death. The Nana sent for the men and
had them shot down in his presence. Then he di-
rected his Sipahis to shoot the women and children
through the doors and windows of the house. Ap-
parently they possessed the one remaining spark of
humanity which he lacked, for they refused. They
were threatened with death at the cannon's mouth,
but even then they purposely avoided aiming at
their wretched victims. The Nana laughed and sent
to Cawnpore town for butchers to come with their
knives, and the massacre was accomplished. In the
morning three women could still speak and several
children were unharmed. They were taken, the dy-
ing with the dead, and thrown into the well before
the house. And when Havelock's column arrived
the next morning, it was one day too late.

It is interesting to follow the course of the single
boat which escaped from the Massacre Ghat and
drifted down the Ganges, for it was four of that
indomitable crew who alone out of all the eight
hundred of the siege reached safety and carried the

72 SPORT AND TRAVEL

story of Cawnpore to the outside world. The boat's
rudder was shot away, and without oars steering
was impossible; but by noon it had drifted out of
range of the Nana's guns. Infantrymen followed it
along the bank, firing whenever it swung within
range. At night it stranded on a sand-bank, and a
burning boat was sent down, which however missed
its mark. Then flights of arrows tipped with red-hot
charcoal were tried, and the British were obliged to
throw overboard the now burning thatched top
which alone had protected them from the sun's
fearful intensity. The following day was spent
in desperate efforts to dislodge the boat from the
sand-bars on which it continually became wedged ;
a heavy fire was still kept up from the bank, both
Major Vibart and Captain Moore, who had been
the executive officer and the leading figure for
bravery during the siege, being wounded while at
work in the water. At sunset a boat containing
sixty armed rebels approached, but with extraor-
dinary spirit the British rushed upon them and
completely routed the entire band, leaving few
alive to escape. On the following day Lieutenants
Thomson and Delafosse, with Sergeant Grady and
eleven privates, waded ashore to drive back the
rebels who were firing from the bank. When they
returned to the river the boat had disappeared. It

CAWNPORE 73

was eventually captured, and the eighty occupants
returned to Cawnpore, the men, and one woman
who refused to leave them, being immediately shot,
while the women and children were sent to the
bungalow to join the other survivors of the ghat
massacre.

Meanwhile the little band of thirteen on shore
wandered along the bank, with bare heads and feet,
and continually under fire from natives who how-
ever dared not close in, till they came to a large body
of rebels in front of a temple on the bank. Troops
were posted on the opposite shore to shoot them
down should they attempt to swim. They were
completely surrounded. Thomson gave the order
to rush the temple, which they did with success,
Sergeant Grady, however, being killed as he entered.
The men then kneeled in the doorway behind their
bayonets, on which the foremost rebels, pushed for-
ward by those behind, fell transfixed and formed a
rampart of bodies to shield the remaining British
soliders. Every method was taken to dislodge the
remaining twelve; undermining the temple failed;
then the natives attempted to set fire to the building
with burning fagots, without success. Finally bags
of gunpowder were thrown on the embers, over
which the British charged with their bare feet, and
by means of their bayonets seven of them succeeded

74 SPORT AND TRAVEL

in reaching the river-bank. They plunged into the
water, where two more were shot and one, giving up
exhausted, was beaten to death on the bank. But
Thomson and Delafosse and privates Murphy and
Sullivan, naked and passing several alligators on the
way, swam and floated for three hours, when they
finally came to a friendly village, where, exhausted
from hunger, fatigue, and suffering, they were
kindly treated and eventually conducted to safety.
Thus only four out of eight hundred escaped.

That is the story of Cawnpore. As you wander
through the intrenchments and down to the Massa-
cre Ghat, it is difficult to imagine the events which
took place on that quiet landscape. To-day it has an
air of peace and solemn calm, as if the place were
in perpetual mourning, the cause for which neither
time nor new-made history could ever make it for-
get. And when you pass to other surroundings and
are looking at cheerier scenes and places, you will
take away with you a little of the seriousness with
which even the shortest stay at Cawnpore must
permanently impress you.

Apart from its historic interest there is nothing
to hold the visitor at Cawnpore ; the town itself is
unprepossessing ; the narrow streets on which open
the booths of the natives are bordered by monoto-
nous plaster houses, and the chief impression one

THE RESIDENCY, LUCKNOW

THE CAWNPORE BAZAAR

LUCKNOW 75

gets is of dust everywhere — on the trees, on the
buildings, and especially on the natives. One must
go farther East to find Kipling's " cleaner, greener
land," and as for the "neater, sweeter maiden/' the
Punjabi lady can hardly claim to share that dis-
tinction with her Burmese sister. But Lucknow as
a city is very much more imposing. The richest
Mohammedans of India live there, and they have
built palaces which, though monstrosities of archi-
tecture, show that lavish wealth has been put into
their construction. The city, too, is broadly laid out
and is interspersed with many charming parks and
gardens.

I reached Lucknow after a single day at Cawn-
pore, and went to a hotel which though second-rate
was the best I had yet seen in India. On the follow-
ing day, January i, was celebrated the coronation
of the new King, Edward the Seventh being pro-
claimed Emperor of India amidst a mighty salute of
guns and the stirring singing of the national anthem
by thousands of troops and civilians gathered on the
great parade-ground. During the singing an Eng-
lishman standing near me noticed a native gentle-
man who, with his family, although in western dress
and wearing no turban, had failed to uncover. With
a " Why the devil don't you remove your hat, sir,"
he raised his stick and sent the man's bowler flying

76 SPORT AND TRAVEL

to the ground. The native, without even turning to
see his assailant, picked up his hat in a quiet man-
ner and remained uncovered until the end of the
anthem.

The historic interest of Lucknow centres about
the Residency, which, though in ruins, gives the
impression of neatness and freshness, for green
lawns extend to the base of its roofless old gray
walls, and well-kept parks and gardens surround it.
But every square foot of the Residency and the
other blackened buildings which were within the in-
closure during the siege is scarred with the iron hail
of battle, which during the five months of the siege
of Lucknow stormed about the intrenchments of the
British.

The story of Lucknow is very different from that
of Cawnpore. It is a grim one, for the tale of the
dead far outnumbered the losses at Cawnpore, but
it is stirring from start to finish and ends in suc-
cess, for the Residency neither surrendered nor was
taken. Into that little cluster of buildings were
gathered nearly three thousand persons ; there were
seven hundred British soldiers, two hundred and
twenty European volunteers, seven hundred and
sixty-five faithful natives, and thirteen hundred
non-combatants, more than five hundred of whom
were women and children. On June 30 Sir Henry

LUCKNOW 77

Lawrence went out to meet the army of rebels who,
having finished their work at Cawnpore, were
marching on Lucknow; he was defeated by over-
whelming numbers, and driven back to the city, and
the siege began.

The five succeeding months were thrilling ones,
for the stubbornness of the garrison's resistance, the
determination of the attacks and counter-attacks,
the individual acts of bravery, for which many a
Victoria Cross was awarded, and finally the gallan-
try of the struggle of the relieving force through
the city, only themselves to be besieged in turn, are
unsurpassed in the annals of war. At dawn on the
2d of July Sir Henry Lawrence started on a tour of
inspection of the defences, encouraging the men and
explaining his views for the conduct of the siege. It
was very hot, and on returning to the Residency
at 8 A. M. he said that he would rest for a couple of
hours and then move to a safer and lower room,
since his own apartment had been struck by a shell
on the previous day. Half an hour later, while he
was lying on his bed listening to a report by Cap-
tain Wilson, a second shell tore through the wall,
knocked Wilson down, cut off the foot of a native
servant, and carried away the top of Sir Henry's
thigh. He appointed Lieutenant-Colonel Inglis to
succeed him in the military command, gave detailed

78 SPORT AND TRAVEL

instructions for the conduct of the defence, calmly
discussed the causes and mistakes of the Mutiny,
and finally died at sunrise on the 4th, having said
that he wished to be buried " without any fuss, as
became a British soldier," and dictated his epitaph,
"Here lies Henry Lawrence, who tried to do his
duty."

The following weeks were occupied with continual
sorties and attempts to blow up houses offering
shelter to the besiegers, which in many cases were
carried out successfully with the greatest daring.
By September the garrison had been reduced by
bullets and sickness to about one third of its origi-
nal number. Cholera and smallpox were rampant,
all were afflicted with scurvy, a terrible plague of
flies had set in, which was increased by the unsani-
tary conditions of the inclosure, and the nervous
strain resulting from poor food and incessant anx-
iety and physical exhaustion was beginning to tell
cruelly on the women and children.

Meanwhile Havelock had been attempting to
fight his way up from Cawnpore, but as yet with
little success on account of the overwhelming num-
bers of the enemy through which his comparatively
small force had to pass. It was on September 15
that Major-General Sir James Outram joined him,
having been recalled from Persia, where he had been

LUCKNOW 79

in command of the expeditionary force. Outram
was a small, quiet man, whose gentle and polished
manner covered one of the strongest characters and
most dauntless spirits of the British army. His
unselfish nature was shown by the order which, as
Havelock's superior officer, he immediately issued
to the relieving force, to the effect that he consid-
ered " the strenuous and noble exertions which
Havelock had already made to save the Lucknow
garrison entitled him to the honor of relieving it,
and that he had decided to accompany the column
in his civil capacity as Chief Commissioner of Oudh,
as a private in the volunteers until the Residency
was occupied." It was a praiseworthy sacrifice, for
it meant giving up not only the great honor of
relieving Lucknow, but also the chief share of the
treasure which had been gathered in the Residency
and which would go as prize money to the relievers.
But he carried out his decision, following the col-
umn through the hail of lead which it encountered
at every step of the last part of the way, carrying
only a cane. Unfortunately, as will be seen, he later
had occasion to regret his decision, and acknow-
ledged that it was a foolish act and that sentiment
had obscured duty.

The Ganges was finally crossed and the head of
the column, under Brigadier-General Neill, reached

8o SPORT AND TRAVEL

the bridge which crosses the canal on the outskirts
of the city. This bridge being subjected to a heavy
fire by the natives, Neill did not think it advisable
to cross till the rear of the column had moved up
and the order had been given by the general in
command. The other officers were impatient, for a
reconnoitring party had reported that the bridge
might be carried, and fora moment there were mur-
murs of dissatisfaction. Then occurred one of those
episodes which add humor even to war. Young
Havelock, the general's aide-de-camp, spurred his
horse and dashed back over the road towards his
father's position. Halting at the first turn, however,
he waited for a few moments and then came gallop-
ing back to Neill. " You are to carry the bridge
at once, sir!" he said. The order was issued and
Colonel Tytler, Captain Willis, and Lieutenants
Havelock and Arnold immediately charged with a
dozen soldiers each of their respective regiments.
At the end of the bridge was a seven-foot earthwork
armed with six heavy rebel guns and protected by a
wide range of rebel musketry fire. Tytler and Willis
were wounded, and Arnold fell shot through both
thighs, while five men at his side had their right legs
shot off. In a minute Lieutenant Havelock and
Corporal Jacques were the only two unwounded men
on the bridge. Jacques continued firing and reload-

LUCKNOW 81

ing as unconcernedly as at target practice, while
Havelock, who was sitting on his horse at the open-
ing of the parapet, received a bullet through his
helmet. Then drawing his revolver and dropping
the Sipahi who had come so near to killing him, he
cheered on the men who had closed up behind him
and carried the battery at the end of the bridge.

It was then that the great mistake in the ap-
proach to the Residency was made. Outram saw
that to push through the streets which led directly
to the besieged garrison would be to run a gauntlet
of close fire from the rebels who held the houses on
each side and were themselves practically protected.
He would have made a detour which, as examina-
tion later proved, would have enabled the relieving
force to make an almost bloodless approach to the
Residency. But night was coming on and Have-
lock with his fiery spirit could not brook the delay.
Outram would gladly have taken command and
avoided what he saw would entail unnecessary and
terrible slaughter, but it was now too late. The
order was given, and at fearful loss the column swept
forward through those lead-whipped streets. At the
end of a lane a courtyard was entered at whose end
was an archway, and here, while sitting on his horse
steadying the column, Neill received the bullet
from a rebel on the roof which ended his brilliant

82 SPORT AND TRAVEL

career. A few moments later, having lost seven
hundred officers and men in the approach to the
Residency, the column breached the intrenchments
of the garrison. One unfortunate incident marred
the triumph of the entry. Lieutenant Aitken, on
hearing the cheers of the approaching soldiers, took
out a party of loyal native Bengalis to meet them ;
unfortunately the approaching Highlanders in their
excitement took them for the enemy and promptly
bayoneted three of Aitken's men. As one lay bleed-
ing to death, realizing the fatal mistake, he said
simply, "It does not matter, I die for the Gov-
ernment." Then the Residency was entered and
grimy soldiers wrung the hands of officers' wives
and embraced little children in the supreme joy of
the moment of success.

But it was not until November 17 that Lucknow
was effectually relieved. Havelock and Outram had
entered, but they were powerless to do more. The
enemy closed in again, and the relievers found them-
selves in turn besieged. The final honor of relieving
Lucknow belongs to Sir Colin Campbell, and it was
only accomplished after the garrison had held out
for one hundred and forty days and had known
many times over the worst things that war can
bring.

THE GHATS AT BENARES

SOME OF THE GREAT PALACES AT BENARES

- -

"* * * < '

BENARES 83

To my mind the great fascination about India is
the continual novelty one finds as one passes from
place to place. One can never become bored as is so
easy in European travelling, for no two cities are
ever just alike ; each seems to be in a land of its own
and to possess its distinctive characteristics, afford-
ing to the tourist that continual change of scene
which is the greatest charm of travel. But when
you pass from Lucknow to Benares you come upon
a city which is so absolutely different from anything
you have seen before, that you wonder whether it
really belongs to our earth and is not a town in
some other world, with other people, other forms of
architecture, and other manners of living than we
are accustomed to.

Indeed, Benares is not of our world. It comes
down to us from an era thousands of years ago,
when Buddha adopted it as his home and began to
spread his doctrines throughout the East ; but even
then it was ancient as a holy city and had seen one
religion after another rise and decay within its
walls. It is still to-day the holiest city in India, and
is the headquarters alike of Buddhism and Brah-
minism ; to drink and bathe in the sacred waters of
the Ganges, which runs through it, purges the soul
of sin, and to die within its precincts insures to
believer and infidel alike an immediate and uncon-

84 SPORT AND TRAVEL

ditional entry into the highest heaven. That is why
the ghats along the river bank present one of the
liveliest scenes to be beheld in the world, for thou-
sands and thousands of naked natives are bathing
and washing their clothes in the filthy water, and
that is why the death rate of Benares is so enor-
mous and the funeral fires along the Ganges are kept
busy day in and day out ; for from far and near come
the aged and infirm, in all stages of illness and
disease, dragging themselves to the sacred water for
a last purification before passing on to a certain
paradise.

On the morning of my arrival I entered a boat
and rowed slowly up-stream, a few yards away from
the line of ghats on which were taking place the
same morning ablutions which have been per-
formed for centuries by the followers of the Hindu
gods. Never have I seen such an enlivened sight.
The ghats extended along the river in apparently
endless succession — great flights of stone steps
descending to the water, separated here and there
by some crumbling ruin fallen from above, and sur-
mounted by tier upon tier of temples, mosques,
palaces, dwelling-houses, and ancient buildings of
every description, which rose in a crowded jumbled
mass high above the stream below. Along the ghats
themselves crouched thousands and thousands of

BENARES 85

black naked natives, scooping up handfuls to drink,
washing clothes, or submerging themselves in the
filthy waters of the sacred stream.

Of all gruesome sights the burning ghats of
Benares are undoubtedly the most loathsome, and
they lie open to the view of every passer-by on the
river. When a Hindu dies — and I have remarked
on the high death rate in Benares — his body is
promptly carried to one of these ghats, where, if the
place be not already too crowded, it is immediately
placed on a funeral pyre. If the family of the de-
ceased be rich, the body is covered with costly silks
and shawls; otherwise a simple linen sheet forms
the only shroud. The fire is started, the covering
quickly burns, and the body is left in full view,
twitching and writhing as the fire catches and con-
tracts its muscles. When it has been partially con-
sumed, men with long poles rake the limbs from
the ashes and push them carelessly into the river,
where they are carried away down-stream in close
proximity to the drinkers and bathers on the ghats
below. The family will perhaps sit upon a small
terrace beside the burning ghat to witness the cere-
mony, or the body may be accompanied only by the
fire-builders. After the burning certain contractors
search the ashes for jewels which may have been
placed upon the deceased by relatives before crema-

86 SPORT AND TRAVEL

tion, and have escaped combustion. Then a new
pyre is built and a few moments later another body
is similarly disposed of. If the relatives cannot af-
ford the three rupees charge which is the minimum
for cremation, they simply launch their dead on
the river, and the bodies go floating down the sa-
cred stream while the bathers continue their ablu-
tions undisturbed. At the big burning ghat I saw
three funeral fires burning, while a fourth shrouded
figure lay on the bank, and as I watched, a fifth was
carried in on the shoulders of the undertakers and
laid beside the others to wait its turn.

The greater part of the morning was spent in
watching the river-side life of the city, as we rowed
slowly past the ghats and the jumbled buildings
behind them. One remarks especially the many
imposing palaces which at the end of the succession
of stone steps rise straight from the water's edge.
Just as we at home own villas at the seashore or in
the country, so the rich Hindu possesses his palace
at Benares, where he may spend a portion of every
year in holy contemplation and in sin-purging ablu-
tions ; and many of these palaces showed that vast
sums had been put into their construction.

Finally I landed at one of the ghats and climbed
up into the crooked, filthy little alley-ways of the
town. Here one sees sights which disgust the senses

MOUNT TARAWERA AND LAKE ROTOMAHANA
New Zealand

THE LAVA-FORMED COUNTRY SURROUNDING WAIMUNGU

BENARES 87

but move the heart, for such wretchedness, igno-
rance, filth, and poverty as one sees at every step
cannot well exist in the same degree elsewhere. At
every step there is a temple to one or another of the
Hindu gods ; to Siva, the vicious, the cruel, or one
of his horrible wives ; to Vishnu, or Krishna, or to
Ganesha, the elephant-headed, or to one of the
thousands of other deities which are worshipped in
this terrible city with the blindest and most abject
superstitious awe.

There is no reverence in the Hindu worship, it is
merely the propitiation of cruel, unjust gods, in
order that their chronic anger may temporarily be
soothed and evil thus averted. A Hindu may com-
mit murder one moment, but by worshipping at
Siva's temple and drinking at the "Well of Know-
ledge" the next, he obtains complete absolution;
and if he dies immediately thereafter within the
sacred precincts of the city, he goes at once to para-
dise. No wonder that in Benares disease is rife.
The " Well of Knowledge*' is a hole filled with stag-
nant, putrid water, every drop of which must be
rank poison ; yet an old priest is continually ladling
it out to pilgrims and inhabitants alike, and day
after day the crowds throng about the well for
" purification" by drinking from this most filthy
and infectious source.

88 SPORT AND TRAVEL

The alley-ways which intersect the town are none
too wide to accommodate the stream of passers-by ;
but as almost every square foot of public highway
is privately appropriated progress becomes almost
impossible. Here a merchant has his brass and tin
wares spread upon the pavement; a little farther
along, a farmer squats among his vegetables in the
middle of the way; a step more and you have to
pass gingerly by a barber who sits on his haunches
before the employer of his services, both in the same
attitude, occupying all but a fraction of the high-
way. Then conies a sacred bullock, wandering
lazily along, bedecked with the flowers of pious wor-
shippers ; he stops to help himself casually from the
vegetables and fruits of the poor but unresisting
farmer, and continues his course among the wares
of the merchants, which he scatters to right and
left, while pedestrians edge up against the walls of
adjacent buildings to give him ample room. There
are many hundreds of these sacred animals in
Benares, and to injure or restrain them in the pur-
suit of their fancies would be an act of impiety
which would be visited by the utmost wrath of the
protecting gods.

Filthy temples open from the alleys, as I have
said, at every few steps, and within, filthy priests
receive contributions of money and food for the pro-

THE BURNINl

Three bodies are in the process of cremation ; a fourth lies

shoulder:

iAT, BENARES

shroud on the slope, while a fifth is being brought in on the
wo coolies

BENARES 89

pitiation of their respective deities. Beggars literally
swarm at their thresholds : in no city of the world
are the beggars so numerous and so hideously dis-
gusting as at Benares ; maimed, blind, paralyzed,
diseased, they gather from every part of India and
crowd before the temples where the pious will not
overlook their appeals. But repulsion overcomes
one's sense of pity, and prompts one to hurry past.
The hotels in Benares, fortunately, are far from
this centre of filth and degradation, and great was
the relief when at the end of a day of sight-seeing I
returned to the pure, untainted open air. Benares
had seemed to me like a great festering sore on the
clean surface of the land, aggravated by the thou-
sands drawn thither by the irresistible force of
superstition, fostered by the practices carried on
under the guise of religion. That this hotbed of
vice, filth, ignorance, and degradation should be
called the holy city of India is irony of the deepest
description. On looking back at that virtueless
place, if one wishes to include any pleasure in one's
recollections, one must remember only the sun-
sparkling waters of the Ganges, the thronging life
of the ghats, and the rising mass of ancient build-
ings which have come down to us, some ruined,
many crumbling, all jumbled one above the other
in reasonless confusion, through unnumbered cen-

90 SPORT AND TRAVEL

turies. This exterior aspect can interest, even
please; but to look closer is to court disgust and
sure repulsion.

From Benares I journeyed to Calcutta, and after
a most pleasant visit in that delightful city, sailed
on January 4 by the P. & O. S. S. Peninsula for the
other side of the world.

CHAPTER V

WAIMUNGU AND THE HOT-SPRING COUNTRY OF NEW
ZEALAND

|N the North Island of New Zealand, if
you drive from Rotorua straight back
through the scarred and roughened
lava-strewn hills toward Mount Tara-
wera, that old volcano of such grim associations,
you will come upon what appears to be a peaceful
pond lying motionless in a depression among the
hills. Among its dreary and barren surroundings
not a living thing is to be seen ; the thin steam that
rises gently from its surface and from the other
pools near by is the only sign of movement that
breaks its stillness. From the plateau in which it is
sunk rises in two directions great rugged cliffs, and
these form, as it were, a natural stadium in whose
arena below is enacted at intervals one of the most
marvellous and sensational spectacles which the
natural phenomena of the world produce. For this
is Waimungu, the largest geyser in the world, but a
geyser whose action resembles far more the eruption
of a great volcano than it does the slender jets of

92 SPORT AND TRAVEL

steam and water with which one usually associates
the name.

When in 1886 the appalling eruption of Mount
Tarawera altered the face of the whole country,
leaving in its path widespread loss of human life,
destruction of villages and of millions of acres of
cultivated fields, New Zealanders did not realize
what a mighty landmark had been given them as
compensation. They could only bemoan the loss
of their famous Pink Terraces, which Tarawera had
so ruthlessly torn from them, and they could not
foresee the monument which was then set in course
of construction to commemorate that terrible June
night. For Waimungu, though it was undoubtedly
formed by that great upheaval, did not at once
make known its birth. For fourteen years it lay
quiescent slowly gathering power for the day on
which it would first leap into action and proclaim
its sovereignty. Suddenly, in 1900, the outburst
came. The quiet pool which lies within its cra-
ter was stirred, steam rose from its surface, and
with no further warning, the very bowels of the
earth, as it seemed, were hurled through it into the
air in one tremendous explosion. Two men pro-
specting for ore in that uninhabited region saw
the eruption and brought back the news: Wai-
mungu had broken loose; New Zealanders hence-

HOT SPRINGS OF NEW ZEALAND 93

forth could boast the greatest and grandest geyser
in the world.

It seems to have taken the people of Rotorua
some little time to realize that from the erratic
and wholly ungovernable character of Waimungu,
a near approach to its crater must at all times be
attended with the greatest personal risk; for al-
though the explosions were soon found to come at
average periods of thirty-six hours, irregular erup-
tions were of frequent occurrence, and took place
without warning when least expected. As is the law
with all new dangers, somebody had to be hurt
and sacrificed before steps were taken to prevent
the ignorant and foolhardy from venturing too near.
In the summer of 1903 two girls and a guide visited
the crater, and though previously warned of the
risk, they stood near the brink to secure a photo-
graph at close quarters. An eruption occurred, the
pond was thrown bodily into the air to a height of
some fifteen hundred feet, with enormous quantities
of mud, huge rocks, and steam, the unfortunate
visitors were caught by the backflow of the boiling
water and swept down into the crater, from which
the bodies were later recovered, terribly burned
and mutilated. From that day the geyser basin was
railed off in such a manner that nobody could ap-
proach near enough to incur the slightest danger.

94 SPORT AND TRAVEL

It was but a few months before this mishap that,
while staying at Rotorua in the hot spring district,
my friend B. and I visited Waimungu. In those
days the only warning of the risk of near approach
was a small sign-board affixed to a post beside the
path leading to the crater, which said simply, " Dan-
ger Limit." All questions as to the magnitude of
the risk and the advisability of approaching nearer
were left to the visitor himself. What could be more
innocent - looking than this little pond set deep
down in the rocky basin between the hills ? What
more unlikely than that it should choose the very
moment when one was leaning over its brink, to
explode? So people argued and so visitors like our-
selves continued to come and approach near to its
edge, little knowing that within a few short months
Waimungu, like the dragon of old, was to rise with-
out warning and levy a toll of three human lives
for the privilege of beholding it breathe forth its
smoke and steam. If I had fully realized at the time
the extent of the danger, I doubt if I should have
taken a photograph on the very edge of the crater,
or have paused for some time to watch the steam
and bubbles rising from the pool's surface. But
Waimungu was propitious, for although it had
worked the night before and we had been told that
we could venture into its basin with impunity, it

HOT SPRINGS OF NEW ZEALAND 95

exploded marvellously just five minutes after we
had left the danger-zone and climbed the adjacent
cliff.

The road through the hills from Rotorua toward
Waimungu led us over the most desolate country :
in all directions only the lava-formed, rolling wil-
derness was to be seen. Occasionally we passed
terraces of sulphur, silica, and alum, where jets of
steam or boiling mud-holes showed the volcanic
nature of the land. So far as any natural earthlike
features were to be seen, one might have been in
the nether regions. Then, after scrambling up a
steep hill to the westward of Rotorua, a superb view
suddenly appeared : at our feet lay the azure surface
of Lake Rotomahana, of such a blue as one sees por-
trayed and believes unreal, a turquoise in an old-gold
setting, for the encircling mountains were bathed
in the yellow haze of afternoon sunlight, and rose as
tawny protectors of their charge below. Grim and
foreboding in the background stood Tarawera, pas-
sive now and smokeless, brooding over her dark
deeds of bygone years, dreaming perhaps of the day
when power would once more be given her to rise
and strike the land with terror.

From the hill beside Rotomahana we descended
to Waimungu's basin. The boiling pool which occu-
pies the centre of the crater, some three hundred

96 SPORT AND TRAVEL

feet in width, was quite still, except for the bubbles
which rose to its surface and the thin steam drifting
lazily upward. We passed the danger-line, threaded
our way carefully between the boiling springs, and
then, climbing down into the crater, stood finally on
the brink of the pool itself. One cares to remain but
a moment in such a position: Waimungu had ex-
ploded during the night and was not actually due to
work again for thirty-six hours ; yet the thought of
what would be our fate should an irregular eruption
occur rendered the spot a peculiarly unattractive
one and caused us to climb without delay back to
the plateau and so on up to the cliff above the basin.
It was well that we did so. Five minutes had
scarcely elapsed from the moment that we had stood
within the crater. My camera was pointed down
for a photograph from the summit of the cliff and I
had made the exposure. Then, even before there
was time to change the plate, the surface of the pool
began suddenly to seethe, I heard B. at my elbow
shouting, "My God, man, the thing's going off!"
But his voice was quickly drowned in the fearful
uproar that immediately ensued. For Waimungu
was in eruption ; the formerly placid pond was shot
in one terrifying blast into the air far above our
heads, black water, black mud, black rocks, and fol-
lowing them with the hissing of a thousand rockets

^

THE CRATER

VVA1MUNGU

HOT SPRINGS OF NEW ZEALAND 97

and the roar of a thousand cannon, a burst of whit-
est steam quickly outstripped and enveloped the
uprushing mass. The explosion was awe-inspiring,
terrible, grand beyond comparison. No more ap-
palling yet fascinating spectacle can exist; no
greater satisfaction can be experienced, than to see
such a phenomenon at close range. The sight alone,
I am sure, is worth the travelling thousands of miles
of land and water to behold.

The outburst had taken place in the hundredth
part of a second ; almost immediately we were
pelted with the sand and small stones which fell as
the exploded mass shot back into its crater, causing
us to take refuge in the shelter-hut provided for that
purpose on the summit of the cliff. In a moment
all was over ; the pond regained its usual placid sur-
face, and no sign save the continued shower of sand
told of the mighty eruption which had taken place.
Silently we descended again to the basin, a little
serious at the thought of what would have been our
fate had the outburst occurred a short five minutes
earlier. It is well indeed that visitors may now no
longer approach within the zone of danger.

Waimungu, I say, is worth the travelling many
thousands of miles of land and sea to behold ; yet
Waimungu, though the greatest, is by no means the
only feature which renders New Zealand a wonder-

98 SPORT AND TRAVEL

land of never-failing interest. I was almost glad of
the illness which had brought me down there. The
journey was a long one, — five days from Calcutta
to Ceylon, three weeks more to Sydney, and a final
four days to Auckland, whence the railroad led to
Rotorua in the hot spring country.

If after the long lazy sea- voyage anything re-
mained necessary for my complete recovery, a few
weeks in the clear and bracing atmosphere of New
Zealand quickly accomplished it. Nor did I have to
number myself among the many invalids who come
to the hot-spring region for the wonderful curative
powers of its mineral baths, for Rotorua is famous
for its healing springs, and baths of water, mud, and
vapor. If you are afflicted with gout or rheumatism,
you will spend most of your time in the well-known
" Priest's Water " ; or if something is to be desired
in the smoothness of your skin or the loveliness of
your complexion, the " Rachel" bath, according to
tradition, will make you beautiful forever. But so
far as combined benefit and enjoyment go, you will
find more absolute pleasure by passing all your
available moments in the big, hot sulphur swim-
ming-pool, where you can float lazily, for hours at a
time, in water above one hundred degrees Fahren-
heit, and leave it feeling as vigorous and energetic
as though newly wakened from a refreshing sleep.

GEYSER AT WHAKAREWAREWA

HOT SPRINGS OF NEW ZEALAND 99

As the traveller approaches Rotorua, a strange,
unearthly smell of sulphur fills the air ; white puffs
of steam rise for no apparent reason from green hills
and valleys, huge mud-holes by the roadside seethe
and bubble like porridge in a cauldron ; hot lakes of
extraordinary colors, — yellow, blue, pink, green, -
and brilliantly colored strata along the mountain-
sides, make one stare and rub one's eyes to be sure
that such apparent unrealities exist. Your nearest
conception of a Methodist's hell will be truly real-
ized when you enter the Valley of Tikitere, some ten
miles from Rotorua. The earth is hot beneath your
feet, the country gapes with steaming cracks, and if
a cane be thrust a few inches into the soil, a jet of
steam or a spout of boiling water reminds you that
just beneath the very bowels of the earth are seeth-
ing toward the surface. You are surrounded by a
perfect inferno of boiling mud-holes, bubbling lakes
of hideous colors, and blasts of steam issuing from
hillsides with the regular exhaust of powerful en-
gines. Follow the guide closely, for a single wrong
step may land you in some loathsome abyss, and
there are pleasanter ways of reaching eternity.
Here you are pointed out the "Heavenly Twins,"
two horrid bubbling mud-holes side by side, one of
which boils the thickest of brews while its twin con-
tains the thinnest. On one side "The Devil's For-

ioo SPORT AND TRAVEL

ridge-Pot" seethes and rumbles with some foul
glutinous concoction ; on the other you look down
through the "Gates of Hell" into a slimy lake,
whose thickened waves rise and recede as if about to
break upon the banks above, and whose sulphurous
fumes send you back gasping for a breath of pure
air.

But we have had enough of this. Heaven and
Hell rub elbows in this country : let us have a look
at some of its more cheerful features. We will leave
behind the boiling mud, uncanny jets of steam and
sulphur-laden air, and cross over to Rotorua Lake,
where the fresh lake breeze washes the poisonous
fumes from our lungs and cools our skins from the
burning breath of those horrors behind. A small
steamer carries us across the rippling lake, dotted
with white sails of robroy canoes and knockabouts,
passes between green islands, and lands us in thick
woods on the opposite shore, where we enter a row-
boat and row lazily up an enchanted river to a
fairyland of extraordinary beauty. The banks are
thickly grown with great overhanging trees and
blossoming shrubs, ivy and tall ferns, which shade
marvellously clear depths of opalescent color. Sud-
denly the river narrows, turns, and stops short, cut
off and walled in by the same luxuriantly wooded
banks. For a moment we are astounded that a

HOT SPRINGS OF NEW ZEALAND 101

flowing stream should come so suddenly to an end,
till we look over the boat's side and see, far below
through the transparent water, a jagged opening in
the bed of the stream, from which great quivering
volumes of ice-cold water well up to the surface,
glancing with rainbow colors and shot with arrows
of crystal light. Now we see the cause, for this is the
famous Hamurana Spring, the source of the beauti-
ful river which flows full-grown from this hidden
wooded spot down into Rotorua Lake, — a spring
from which five million gallons are poured forth
every twenty-four hours. Looking into its depths,
we can see delicate shells and ferns growing far
below, which from the perfect transparency of the
icy water appear almost within reach. The force of
the up-rushing torrent is so tremendous that coins
which are thrown in will remain suspended half-way
to the bottom and finally drop to one side of the
spring, where they lie glittering below, safe forever
from human hands. The Maoris, who are expert
divers, have tried again and again to reach this
tempting store of treasure, but have never suc-
ceeded and never will.

We will pass half a day and lunch near this beau-
tiful spot, and then, in the afternoon, drive over to
the geyser region of Whakarewarewa, a small Maori
settlement on the other side of Rotorua. The

102 SPORT AND TRAVEL

country here is less fearful than at Tikitere fortu-
nately, but none the less active for all that. Within
a radius of less than a hundred yards, some ten or
a dozen geysers play at intervals ranging from two
minutes to several hours, and the display, when
several of them happen to be in action at the same
time, is most effective. Waikite, the famous twin
geyser, has ceased working now, and has been suc-
ceeded as queen of Whakarewarewa by Wairoa ; but
even Wairoa plays no longer of her own accord, and
only under the inducement of a plentiful supply of
soap does she consent to perform for the curious
multitudes. As is well known, too much soaping of
a geyvser causes it eventually to cease its action alto-
gether, so that the matter becomes an important
ceremony, and in the Rotorua thermal country is
allowed by the government only when some dis-
tinguished visitor comes to see the display. I was
fortunate in being on hand when Wairoa was thus
induced to play for the son of the late Premier of
New Zealand, Mr. Seddon. The wooden cover,
always padlocked over its mouth, was solemnly
removed, the crowd warned to stand back out of
danger, and a bag of bar soap thrown into the
diminutive crater. Almost immediately the water
foamed lathering up to the edge of the silicious
opening, but not until almost twenty minutes later

HOT SPRINGS OF NEW ZEALAND 103

did the actual playing begin. There was a deep
rumbling below, a choking gurgling noise came
from the depths of the crater, and with a last grand
roar Wairoa shot into the air full one hundred and
thirty feet, a graceful, slender column of whitest
steam and water, breaking at the top into silvery
feathers which drooped, dissolved, and drifted off
into the sunlight.

If it should occur to any one to wonder why a
town like Whakarewarewa should be built in the
midst of this hot-spring terrace with boiling pools
between the very houses and steaming holes scat-
tered about so plentifully that a visitor must look
pretty carefully where he walks lest he disappear
into one of them, the answer is almost too obvious ;
— the Maoris are a thrifty race, coal and fire-
wood are expensive, stoves rust and kettles require
tending; then why go to superfluous expense and
trouble when nature has supplied fuel, stoves, and
constantly simmering kettles as free of charge as
sunlight and fresh air ? For here at their very doors
these steam holes or "fumaroles" are at all times
ready for use; over the openings are laid small
boxes, the food to be cooked, wrapped in leaves,
is placed within, and soon an appetizing smell an-
nounces that dinner is ready. If other domestic
cares delay the dinner hour — if the father of the

104 SPORT AND TRAVEL

family is late, or the baby has fallen into a mud-
hole and requires a precipitate change of garments
— no penalty is imposed in the way of a burned
meal ; for the stew having been cooked or the soup
boiled, they simply remain there as in an oven,
keeping nicely hot, but suffering no extra scorching
as a result of the delay. And as for the Monday
clothes washing, why it is simply a question of
kneeling beside one of the big hot pools and sousing
the garments until they are as white and clean as
new. True, both clothes and dinner may savor
more or less strongly of sulphur, but who so fastid-
ious as not to be able to cultivate a taste for sulphur
as well as for any other spicy flavor?

The Maori, I say, is of a thrifty race, yet that is
the least of his attributes. No black man possesses
more personal and national pride, more true dig-
nity, fearless bearing, honorable and faithful in-
stincts, and cheeriness of temperament. In New
Zealand he is on a level with the white man and
feels it : there is no fawning, no bowing and scraping
in his attitude towards the colonizers of his coun-
try, and all his dealings are marked with straight-
forward manliness. Mentally he is keen, physically
superb. I know of no more stirring a sight than the
Haka war-dance, in which the most powerful men
of a village, stripped to the waist to give better play

THE GREAT WAIRAKEI GEYSER

HOT SPRINGS OF NEW ZEALAND 105

to their great muscular arms and bodies, form in
even ranks, and taunted with cowardice in panto-
mime by their women, commence muttering in deep
voices and waving their arms and twisting their
bodies in fierce unison, as though writhing under
the bitter insults : the taunting continues, the mut-
tering, growing louder and more ominous, becomes a
roar : slowly they work themselves up to a tremen-
dous pitch of excitement, bellowing more and more
threateningly, swaying and twisting with greater
and greater fierceness, till the onlooker becomes
positively terrified in spite of himself. Then sud-
denly with a last grand shout, they break their
ranks and dash headlong to meet the imaginary foe.
The women are no less dignified and proud of
bearing than the men, and exhibit a grace of move-
ment and litheness of body unknown in any but
South Sea races. Were it not for the tatooing of the
lips and chin after marriage, many of them would
be extraordinarily beautiful ; their speech, as is that
of the men as well, is delightful to hear, as it totally
lacks the harsh guttural tones of the Arab and
Hindu, and their language is full of folk-lore, handed
down from age to age, every landmark and custom
having its own particular myth. Some of their cus-
toms are very amusing, and one can scarcely repress
a smile to see the women saluting their friends in

106 SPORT AND TRAVEL

the street by the usual rubbing of noses. They
carry their babies strung up on their backs as do our
Indian squaws their papooses, and indeed, in the
Maori, one is constantly reminded of the American
Indian.

On Rotorua Lake, once a year, high carnival is
held. From all the villages of the surrounding coun-
try come the Maoris with their babies, tents, and
pots and pans, and they camp on the shores of the
lake and make merry after the fashion of all nations
and all ages. There is foot-racing on the beach,
yacht-racing on the lake, and horse-racing on the
track behind the town ; but what delights the Maori
heart above all else is the great race between the
representative war-canoes of the various villages
which takes place on the last day and as the crown-
ing event of the celebration. It is a fine sight to see
these great canoes, manned by forty or fifty men,
paddled swiftly across the lake for the honor of their
respective towns. The captain of the crew stands
in the centre, to give the stroke, and the men, all in
uniform, keep the pace with a dash and snap worthy
of tried athletes, and great is the rejoicing over the
winners. Then there is the "Ha Kahaka Tama-
hine," which being interpreted means "The Chase
for a Maori Bride." The selection of the young
maiden, or wahin6, for this event is no easy task,

MAORI WAR CANOE

THE "HA KAHAKA TAMAHINE

HOT SPRINGS OF NEW ZEALAND 107

for she must be the most beautiful of all the girls in
the surrounding country, and beautiful Maori girls
are the rule, not the exception. The lucky maiden
is put in the bow of a small, very swift canoe, and
her brother or some other relative takes his place in
the stern to paddle her through the chase which en-
sues. As they appear on the course before the crowds
who throng the beach, a tremendous cheer goes up,
and it is not difficult to see that this happy little
wahine is popular as well as lovely. Hardly have
they taken their place near the starting-post when
the canoes of the chasers themselves shoot out to
their respective stations, each very fast and light,
and each paddled by five or six men with a vacant
place in their midst for the bride, in case she is cap-
tured before reaching the finish line. At the signal,
the bride's canoe dashes away down the course, fol-
lowed a minute later by her pursuers. The object
of the chase, as is soon evident, is to overtake the
maiden, lift her from her own craft into one of the
places left vacant for her in the canoes of the other
contestants, and carry her over the course to the fin-
ish line. Once captured by a competing crew, that
crew at once becomes the object of pursuit for the
others, who in turn try to overtake and capture the
bride. The crew which finally succeeds in carrying
her across the finish line are proclaimed the winners ;

io8 SPORT AND TRAVEL

but whether or not the lady chooses her husband
from the winning boat is a delicate question, which
does not, I think, enter into the conditions of the
race itself. At any rate, the bride is landed on the
beach and has to run a gauntlet of deafening ap-
plause from enthusiastic thousands.

Our stay at Rotorua must, like all good things,
come to an end at last. Rising very early one morn-
ing, we take a regretful leave of the mist-wrapped
lake and the steaming terraces and hillsides, whose
beauties and horrors alike have been a source of such
keen enjoyment; the whip cracks, the rickety old
stage-coach groans on its springs, and we are whirled
off over the lava-roughened hills, past Waimungu,
past old Tarawera, and so down through the fern-
clad jungles to Wairakei, Lake Taupo, and the Wan-
ganui River, where new scenes of undreamed-of
beauty await us in this imperial wonderland.

By this time no traces whatever of the fever re-
mained, and my shoulder was beginning to ache for
the feeling of a gun again. I had not the slightest idea
as to the whereabouts of either Perry or Wheeler :
only one letter, from Perry, had reached me since
taking leave of them in December, saying that he
had lost Wheeler somewhere in the Philippines, his
own plans being apparently quite vague. However,
I guessed that by now he would have followed his

HOT SPRINGS OF NEW ZEALAND 109

original intention of going into India after gaur and
buffalo, and I determined to look for him forthwith.
From Wellington I sailed by the steamer Mokoia
to Sydney. It was through the kindness and cheery
hospitality of my good friends the P.'s, which I shall
not soon forget, that I was enabled during the ten
days of my delightful stay in New South Wales to
see Katoomba and the Jenolan Caves in the Blue
Mountains. At length, having formed golden opin-
ions of Australians in general and my hosts in par-
ticular, I boarded the since ill-fated Australia, and
on March 18 sailed down the beautiful harbor of
Sydney, bound again for the East, with "the sights
and the sounds and the stinks of her."

CHAPTER VI

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR

[F there had been previously any ques-
tion as to where our next shooting
expedition was to be made, all doubt
was quickly dispelled on my reaching
Calcutta and finding Perry worn pretty much to a
shadow from a protracted and severe siege of fever.
He, poor man, after his Borneo shooting, during
which several timbadou heads had fallen to his gun,
had been taken ill in the middle of the Bengal jun-
gle, where he was after gaur and buffalo, with no
help at hand other than his servant and beaters,
and on receiving a message telling him of my arri-
val, had somehow dragged himself to the railroad
and had turned up in Calcutta a few days later in
a deplorable state of weakness.

Of course, under these circumstances it would
have been folly to think of reentering the jun-
gle. We had previously considered a trip up the
Irriwaddy in Burma, but even had Perry's health
permitted, I should have been loath, by returning
to a malarial country, to court a perfectly sure

THE "ORPHAN," KONIMBLA VALLEY

THE "THREE SISTERS," KONIMBLA VALLEY

New South Wales, Australia

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR in

recurrence of my own previous illness ; and as for
Wheeler, he was apparently lost somewhere in the
Philippines, so that, much as we should miss him
on whatever expedition we should undertake, our
plans had to be made regardless of his. There was
but one country now where the pursuit of health
and sport could be carried on simultaneously, and
that we both agreed was Kashmir.

Those few days of preparations I shall not soon
forget. The hot weather was at its height, and being
occupied with the thousand and one things which
a sportsman has to think of, buy, arrange, and pack,
when contemplating a long expedition with no base
of supplies, I was on foot, despite the heat, from
early morning till late at night. Perry eventually
joined me from Darjeeling, where both of us had
first passed ten days in order to pull him round a bit,
and then we left that heat-parched city for better
climes.

The journey to Rawal Pindi, where one leaves the
railroad to cross the mountains into Kashmir, occu-
pied three nights and three days, — fiery, swelter-
ing days they were, with the thermometer at 107
in our compartment, the air enveloping us like a
steaming blanket, and the burning dust of the plains
irritating us beyond imagination. But fortunately
we had a large compartment to ourselves, in which

H2 SPORT AND TRAVEL

we could make ourselves comfortable in what cos-
tume we pleased, so that somehow or other the hours
passed. There are no dining-cars on Indian trains,
but tea and soda are served through the windows at
various stations, and an ice-box is carried in every
wagon, besides which the train stops for the regular
meals. An attempt is made to cool the compartment
by an arrangement known in Hindustanee as the
tatti, which, on one's pressing a bolt, allows iced
water to trickle down the windows from a reservoir
above; but this makes too little difference in the
temperature of the compartment materially to les-
sen one's discomfort. Each traveller carries his own
bedding, which is made up by his " boy," who travels
sitting up, day and night, in a tiny compartment
opening from his master's. I pitied him, poor fel-
low, for ours was none too large for comfort in that
breathless heat. The journey was broken by a few
days' visit to Simla, the summer capital of India,
immortalized by Kipling, whence once again we
descended to the plains and continued westward.
On the morning after our arrival at Rawal Pindi
our baggage was loaded in ekkas — curious two-
wheeled carts — which make the journey to Srina-
gar (pronounced Sirinugger), the capital of Kash-
mir, in six days, as against the three days occupied
by the speedier tonga or passenger vehicle. There

THOMAS

THE TONGA

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR 113

was already a good deal of weight to our outfit, with-
out counting the extra provisions and thick clothes
which we were to pick up in Srinagar, — about
twelve maunds or a thousand pounds, comprising
four large boxes of provisions, tents, camp and
kitchen utensils, guns, ammunition, and clothes.
All our finer provisions, such as tea, coffee, tinned
fruits, jams, etc., had been brought from Calcutta;
for, excellent as are the Kashmiri merchants for
fitting out sportsmen, we did not like to run risks
as to the quality of things so precious. Four ekkas
were therefore required to convey our luggage.

The distance from Rawal Pindi to Srinagar is one
hundred and ninety-eight miles. By tonga this is
accomplished, as I have said, in three days; the
wagons are driven at a furious rate of speed by pairs
of horses which are changed approximately every
ten miles, the system of harnessing being so arranged
that the change is effected almost instantaneously ;
and with a delay of but a few seconds at the end of
each stage one is off again, dashing helter-skelter
up the splendid post-road that leads through the
mountains into Kashmir. The driving is very fa-
tiguing, for the tonga, which in point of thorough
discomfort surpasses all other vehicles, seems to be
utterly devoid of springs or apologies for springs;
and what with the continual bumping over the

114 SPORT AND TRAVEL

ground, the hardness of the seat, and the offensive-
ness of the dust, one is generally more dead than
alive at the end of a day.

Our first day was not so bad, for we covered only
sixty-four miles, passing the night at the pleasing
little Dak Bungalow at Kohalla, where a good din-
ner was served by the khitmagar, and bedsteads
supplied for one to throw one's blankets on. But on
the second day the number of miles accomplished
was ninety-one, which meant almost continuous
travelling from five in the morning till ten at night,
and it was two weary sahibs who threw themselves
down that night on their blankets at Baramulla.

But what a revelation awaited us in the morning.
Ye gods, but it was worth all the heat and the dust
and the tired bones a thousand times over for one
glimpse and one smell of it. At our backs was the
rugged mountain pass through which we had come
in the night, and before us a beautiful green plain,
as smooth and fresh as any lawn, stretched from
both banks of the winding Jhelum River far away
for miles and miles to the base of snow-mountains,
which in a panorama of dazzling whiteness formed
a majestic setting to this splendid picture. It seemed
almost too good to be true, this wonderful transition
from the burning dust-laden air of Calcutta to this
clear, crisp, soul-filling atmosphere. We revelled in

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR 115

the pure delight of it, and felt at once capable of
starting off for a twenty-mile tramp across country,
though heaven knew it was to be many days before
our limbs were to get into trim for the hard work
ahead. Never before had we been in the supreme
physical condition of those months, with every
muscle at its highest possible efficiency and every
nerve under the perfect control so necessary for ne-
gotiating some ticklish climb or so indispensable for
a long, steady shot. Those were days which it is plea-
sant to look back upon, and remember what it was
to be not simply in good, but in absolutely perfect
health, — the wonderful morning awakenings with
the tired muscles of the previous evening made over
anew, the icy bucket-bath, the cup of steaming cof-
fee, the all-day tramp or stalk across vast ranges,
and then the satisfaction of the return to camp, the
evening spent in front of the roaring pine-log fire,
and finally the long ten-hour sleep in preparation
for another glorious day.

A hot breakfast was prepared and served by the
chowkidar of the rest-house at Baramulla, and then,
climbing once more into the tonga, we dashed off
down the long poplar-lined road which leads to the
capital of Kashmir.

It is a gay sight that greets the traveller as he rat-
tles over the bridge into Srinagar — that delightful

ii6 SPORT AND TRAVEL

Venice of the north, with its canals, its bridges, its
old rickety houses jutting out over the river, and be-
hind them its great lawns and chenar groves. Mer-
chants are paddling up and down in their doongas
displaying or delivering their wares; barges and
ponderous house-boats are making for the country ;
English residents are skimming by in their light
kishties their Kashmiri crews, in bright uniforms,
moving together in perfect stroke. The sun seems to
be always shining, the water sparkling, the natives
laughing. Everything is bright, merry, and full of
life.

The chief thing that strikes one about Srinagar is
the extreme greenness of the grass and foliage. The
whole place, outside of the dirty quarter of the ba-
zaars, is like a great smooth lawn, interspersed with
houses and roads, and shaded by immense chenar
and poplar trees. There is something thoroughly
refreshing about it, especially after one has been see-
ing the burnt, hungry soil of the plains ; and the air
has a bracing effect of its own, which reminds one of
October mornings at home. The city is much like
Venice in the way it is built, being intersected with
canals which run off from the Grand Canal — the
Jhelum River — in the centre. On this are all the
countless shops of the shawl-merchants, silversmiths,
wood-carvers, and the many other trades for which

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR 117

Kashmir is noted. In the centre of the city, on this
" Grand Canal," stands the Maharajah's palace, a
very grand affair, but not beautiful from the point
of view of European architecture. It was gayly dec-
orated when we arrived in honor of the return of the
Maharajah from his summer home, and the follow-
ing day we saw him come, with the whole popula-
tion of the city out to greet him. His reception was
most enthusiastic, and the countless craft gathered
in front of the palace for the occasion made a gay
picture.

Europeans may not own land in Kashmir, for,
though under British influence, the Maharajah's
dominions are his own and very jealously he guards
them ; so most of the Englishmen who spend their
leaves of absence up here, with their wives and fam-
ilies, live on the side canals, in large comfortable
house-boats, or doongas, moving about as they
please, towing their kitchens behind. These canals
are beautiful spots to live on, for they are clean,
well-shaded, and with smooth, green banks. It is
indeed a delightful way to spend the summer.

We were rather amused by the manner in which
our custom was secured by a certain firm of mer-
chants. Perry and I were endeavoring to flee from
a mob of some fifty cannibals in the shape of mer-
chants, cooks, shikaris, servants, etc., all thrusting

n8 SPORT AND TRAVEL

their recommendations in our faces and squabbling
for their prey, when a spic-and-span dog-cart dashed
up, an Indian gentleman, neatly and well dressed,
descended, salaamed, and in the best of English
asked permission to rescue us from the crowd. Of
course we got in without delay, and were driven in
style to his house, where we were served with a good
Kashmir breakfast in a sunny little room overlook-
ing the Jhelum, and then were shown through his
shawl-parlors. It was neatly done, and resulted in
Mr. Bahar Shah's securing the greater part of our
custom during our stay in Srinagar.

What a week of purchases that was ! I should like
to see the man, quite needless to add the woman,
who could pass through the shops of those mer-
chants, with their embroideries and silks and push-
mina shawls, and come out unscathed. Nor was this
all, by any means. There were thick suits of home-
spun puttoo to be bought, pushmina blankets of
silk and ibex hair, luisy and scarfs, caps, gloves, chap-
lis, stockings, colored glasses; and then kiltas for
the provisions, and folding-beds, and a thousand
other things which would be needed during the three
months of mountain-work ahead. With all this,
there were the shikaris to choose, and a dozen or so
naukar or servant-coolies to weed out of the hun-
dreds who besieged us daily at the hotel with their

PERRY CHOOSING SHIKARIS

THE AUTHOR WITH SHIKARIS, CHOTA-SHIKARIS,
AND TIFFIN-COOLIES

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR 119

chits or recommendations, more than half of which
had doubtless carefully been written by some public
scribe in the bazaars.

We got through with it somehow — partly with
the help of Major W., the kindly secretary of the
Kashmir Game Association, and partly by the sim-
ple process of elimination from those hordes of good,
bad, and indifferent men. If you could have seen
our room at the hotel on the last day, when not
only dozens of disappointed shikaris besieged us,
but tailors, shoemakers, grocers, and peddlers of all
descriptions turned up to deliver their wares and
receive payment, with a policeman stationed at our
door to prevent riot and bloodshed, you would have
had an insight into the labors of a sportsman's pre-
parations, of which this was the culmination.

At length, on the evening of May n, everything
was in final readiness for a start. From the hotel our
supplies, guns, and baggage had been transferred to
two doongas lying beside the bank of one of the
beautiful shaded canals with which Srinagar is in-
tersected ; and after taking a glad leave of the horde
of merchants, coolies, and disappointed shikaris
clamoring up to the last minute for custom or em-
ployment, we headed toward the Sind Valley, the
road into Baltistan.

In order to explain briefly the route which we had

120 SPORT AND TRAVEL

planned to follow, I must now say a few words about
the topography of Kashmir, and the kinds of game
the pursuit of which had led us into this magnificent
country. To begin with, there are two great divi-
sions of Kashmir territory which chiefly attract
the sportsman : namely, Ladak and Baltistan, the
former of which occupies roughly an easterly, and
the latter a northerly, position in relation to the
Valley of Kashmir itself, and both cut off from it by
some of the highest chains of all the Himalayas. Of
these two provinces, Ladak undoubtedly offers the
greater variety of game, possessing not only the ibex,
sharpu, and red bear of Baltistan, but also the Tibe-
tan antelope and gazelle, the burhel, and above all,
the ovis ammon, that great wild sheep resembling
the Rocky Mountain big-horn, and surpassed in
size of body and length and weight of horn only by
the famous ovis poll of the Russian Pamirs. In Bal-
tistan, on the other hand, one finds by far the biggest
ibex in the world, and, besides the red bear and
sharpu or urial, one runs the chance of shooting a
markhor, the largest and most magnificent of all the
goat tribe, which in itself is a trophy making well
worth while any amount of trouble taken in its pur-
suit. Now to attempt to shoot through both of these
countries in three months, the amount of time at our
disposal, would have been quite impracticable, and

SCENE ]

UNAGAR

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR 121

indeed, impossible, on account of the great distances
which separate the haunts of the different kinds of
game which inhabit them. As it was, having chosen
Baltistan as our field, and keeping in view as tro-
phies only the ibex, markhor, sharpu, and red bear,
we were almost incessantly on the march, and dur-
ing the three months of our expedition covered well
over six hundred miles on foot of actual travelling,
exclusive of the great amount of ground covered in
searching for and stalking the various kinds of game
when once arrived in their respective countries.

Upon leaving Srinagar it was therefore necessary
first to cross the big range of mountains which divide
the Valley of Kashmir from Baltistan, which is best
effected by means of the Zogi La Pass, approached
through the Sind Valley, an arm running from the
main Kashmir plateau ; and thither accordingly our
first steps were bent.

These doongas, in which we were to cover the
distance to the head of the valley, are the Kashmir
travelling boats; they are long and narrow, with
straw mattings at the sides to keep out the wind and
rain, and are towed along the canal by boatmen, or
manzis, one of whom with his family lives in the
stern of each boat, his sons helping him by paddling
in the bow, and his wife by steering in the stern. Be-
hind these comes a kitchen boat, carrying one's shi-

122 SPORT AND TRAVEL

karis, provisions, and temporary cooking-stove. As
a rule it is hard to persuade the men to travel during
the night, but we had impressed the shikaris with
the fact that we wished to push on now without
more delay than was absolutely necessary and that
we expected them to make good bundobust (arrange-
ments) for speedy progress ; so that a considerable
distance was accomplished during the night.

Awaking after a rather cold night and a hard one,
for it was our first on a wooden floor, we found the
men still towing and the sky threatening rain. The
canal was winding through low country, where great
herds of cattle grazed in all directions, toward the
mountains at the head of the valley, where the Sind
River comes in. About noon we reached our first
halting-place, a village composed of a few little huts,
called Gandarbal, and here we were obliged to spend
the night, sending ahead a letter to the tehsildar of
the district to have forty coolies ready the next day
to take our outfit over the Zogi La Pass.

The route northward is divided into stages of
from twelve to fifteen miles each, as a coolie can
travel with his load only this distance in one day.
New coolies can usually be secured from the village
at the end of each of these stages, or marches as
they are called ; but in the crossing of the Zogi La
Pass there are no villages large enough to supply

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR 123

such coolies, and accordingly permanent ones have
to be engaged for the five days' trip.

In the afternoon it began to rain, making things
very damp and cheerless. We spent the rest of the
day sorting out the provisions, and putting a little
of each article into one box, so that if we should have
to race for a nullah, we could leave the heavy stuff
to follow and ourselves hurry ahead. The shooting
in Kashmir is done in nullahs or nalas, the Hindu-
stanee word for " valley," a single sportsman being
allowed by etiquette to hold any one nullah exclu-
sively from the moment he pitches his tent within
its limits; but as the valleys in Kashmir vary in
length from a few hundred yards up to many miles,
it is difficult sometimes to say just how large a val-
ley constitutes a nullah and may be held by one gun ;
and this is not seldom the cause of dispute between
ardent sportsmen, as we were later to discover. Ac-
cordingly, when the snow-passes first open in the
spring, there is much racing for good nullahs ; and
since we were already late in entering we were quite
prepared to challenge any sportsman who from now
on should attempt to pass us.

On the 1 3th we were up early and found a damp,
chilly morning. Eighteen ponies and some ten coo-
lies were ready on the bank, and after loading all the
baggage, we started, giving the two body-servants

124 SPORT AND TRAVEL

and the cook a pony each, as they had to do the hard
work, while the shikaris and I walked. It was ludi-
crous to see old Thomas, my Cingalee servant, on
horseback, his face shining with delight, as he had
never been on one before. Thomas came from Co-
lombo, and seemed nearly eighty years old. Several
people had prophesied that he would not live through
the trip, but he was such an excellent servant that
I had decided to take the risk. He had shed his skirt
for the regulation puttoo suit which we had given to
each of our men, and had placed a turban above his
gray "Psyche knot" with its tortoise-shell comb,
and no one would ever have recognized in this trans-
formed individual the former sarong-clad Cingalee.
Thomas's efficiency as an interpreter, however, was
soon found to be nil : he spoke broken English well,
but his Hindustanee proved to be so weak that we
ourselves soon learned enough of the language to
dispense with his assistance. Our only other inter-
preter, a Simla boy named Paul, was caught stealing
from our supplies when he had been on the road less
than a week, and we were obliged to discharge him
on the spot, from which moment we were left entirely
on our own resources for communicating with the
shikaris, who of course spoke not a word of English.
At the end of three months we were able to speak
Hindustanee fluently and readily, though it was

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR 125

not the kind I should have cared to address to a
professor of languages.

I may say that in point of size the personnel of our
outfit, as I looked back and saw the cavalcade form-
ing in single file behind us, fairly took my breath
away. Kadera But and Salia Melik, our two ven-
erable chief shikaris, headed on horseback what
might have been called their respective companies ;
Sidka and Lussoo, the chota or assistant shikaris,
acted as their lieutenants ; the seven or eight naukar
or servant-coolies, who, unlike the relays of vil-
lagers, were to serve as permanent camp-servants,
performed the duties of non-commissioned officers ;
while under their able guidance, and the persuasion
of several stout sticks, our horde of forty-odd vil-
lagers composed the rank and file of this imposing
if diminutive army. The two tiffin-coolies, following
close at our heels with cameras and lunch-baskets,
were certainly entitled to the regard usually accorded
to color-bearers; and as for the commissariat, to
leave nothing to be desired in this military showing,
the cook and Thomas ably represented that indis-
pensable department.

The road led between rice-fields, and was muddy
from recent rains, but no such petty annoyance
could prevent our enjoying the surrounding scene :
ahead lay the entrance to the Sind Valley, flanked

126 SPORT AND TRAVEL

on one side by towering snow-mountains, on the
other by deodar-clad hills, and at their base were
many little native huts with grass-grown roofs,while
blue and white irises dotted the river-bank in pro-
fusion. At noon we reached the village of Kangan,
the end of the first march, but as the coolies did not
arrive till afternoon, it was impossible to push on
farther. A spot was chosen on the smooth lawn
beside the village for the tents to be pitched when
they should arrive, and after lunch, or tiffin (each
sportsman has a tiffin-coolie, who accompanies him
with lunch, camera, dry socks, and such other things
as may be needed on the march while separated
from the main baggage) , we lay down on the porch
of a native house, and, rather wearied from our first
walk, were quickly asleep.

I found the native chaplis splendid foot-gear, and
had no trouble from the usual blisters. They are
composed of a leathern sandal, with hob-nail soles,
worn over a sort of leather moccasin, and with a
thick woollen sock underneath, so that the foot is
allowed plenty of play, and does not chafe as with
boots. The puttoo suits, too, were warm and com-
fortable, as well as our sheepskin-lined coats, camp-
boots, and sleeping-bags, and soon proved their
advantage in the bitterly cold weather we were
to encounter.

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR 127

The coolies filed in at about three o'clock, and the
tents were quickly pitched. Ours was a large one,
with plenty of room for our two folding bedsteads
and two boxes between to serve as writing and
dinner tables. I had made out a written list of the
articles of clothing, etc., in each of the canvas bags,
and could thus lay my hand on anything in a mo-
ment, without having to search through and unpack
them continually. When one has so much stuff, this
is an excellent scheme. These bags were placed at
the foot of our beds, and racks made for the guns
underneath, so that everything was neat and or-
derly. My only other article of personal baggage,
besides the two canvas sacks, camera, and guns,
was a small square English box which served to keep
my diaries, films, letter-paper, and other things of
that kind, dry and clean. It loaded on a coolie's
back very nearly as well as the sacks, and from
start to finish of the trip I was delighted that I had
brought it.

In the morning our trail led up the valley, still
following the course of the Sind River, now rocky
and turbulent, and of a beautiful opalescent color
from the snow and glacial streams which supplied it.
The middle of the day was excessively hot, a great
change from the frosty early morning air, but we
rested an hour for tiffin under a great chenar tree

128 SPORT AND TRAVEL

beside a brook, and in the afternoon pushed on to
Goond, the end of the stage. Here as before the
tents were pitched on a grassy plateau overlooking
a deep cleft in the valley, which had already nar-
rowed perceptibly: ahead were snow-mountains,
and behind, our last view of the Valley of Kash-
mir, framed in a vista of blossoming apricot trees,
meadow -land, forest, and river.

But two more stages were to bring us into sur-
roundings as desolate and wintry as the present
landscape was warm and beautiful. For a short way
the route led up the valley over a pretty road, with
fruit trees all in blossom and new snow-mountains
continually appearing. Then suddenly the flanking
hills closed in, the rocky sides of steep mountains
rose on each side, the snow falling in small glaciers
to their very foot, and the river swirled wildly
through a narrow channel, the entrance to the Sona-
marg Gorge. Fully ten miles brought us once more
out into the open, but here no pleasing valley ap-
peared ; only a vast field of snow extending straight
away for miles, inclosed between grand and jagged
peaks, and near its other end a group of rude little
huts, the village of Sonamarg. A dirty hovel, bear-
ing over its door the unconvincing sign, " Telegraph
Office," was to us, weary and with soaked chaplis, as
luxurious a hostelry as I remember ever having run

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR 129

across ; and glad enough we were to rest by the open
fire and watch the coolies appear from far down the
valley, like a long column of ants in the snow.

Four of the men each carried a great load of rice-
straw, and on rising before sunrise on the following
morning its use was discovered. It is first plaited
into rope and then formed into a sort of sandal called
a "grass-shoe," and always used for snow -walking
in Kashmir. They are worn over two socks, one of
puttoo, the other padded, each having the big toe
divided, as in a mitten, for the straw rope which
binds on the shoe to pass through ; and they are
unequalled for warmth and comfort, besides which
they do not slip. Our coolies weaved the shoes while
resting en route, and as one pair lasts but a day or
less, a great amount of the straw has to be carried.
Above the sock woollen putties are wound around
the leg to the knee, effectually keeping out the
snow.

Baltal, directly beneath the Zogi La Pass, we
reached after a march of ten miles, the trail all
across snow or mud where the snow was melting,
colored glasses being most necessary to protect the
eyes from the glare. There was no village at Baltal
— only a low windowless hovel called a ' ' rest-house. ' '
This was ironical, for it was hardly fit to house cattle
in, although they had recently been inhabiting the

130 SPORT AND TRAVEL

room we were to use. It lay on the edge of a deep
ravine, with great stretches of snow, leafless trees,
and high, jagged mountains rising before it, — a
dreary and desolate scene after the beautiful valley
we had just left. In front of the house was a sort
of floorless verandah, where the remains of several
camp-fires showed that travelling coolies had re-
cently been there ; and as we entered the room — I
should call it a shed — we were blinded by a stifling
cloud of smoke which evidently came through from
one of the adjoining sheds, already occupied by
natives. Within, it was pitch-dark, except for the
smoky glimmer that came through the low door-
way.

Clearly it was impossible to sleep there ; hence, as
the tents could not be pitched conveniently in the
snow, we decided to have our beds placed outside
and endure the cold rather than the smoke and filth.
We then spread our luis (rugs) in the dirt in front
of the house, and had lunch from the baskets, with a
pipe afterwards to cheer things up a bit, as a cold
rain was driving in. Meanwhile the shikaris had re-
moved our grass-shoes and socks, which were soaked,
and, as usual, washed our feet off with a rag which
looked suspiciously like the dish-cloth. Knowing the
habits of the Kashmiri, we watched the further
movements of the rag; and, sure enough, before the

A BALTI VILLAGE, SHOWING STONE HUTS

A BALTI NATIVE DANCE

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR 131

tea was poured into the cups, they were carefully
wiped out by the selfsame useful cloth. There is
nothing like true economy.

We were up at 4.30, to attack the pass before the
sun should soften the snow. A cold drizzle made
things very damp and cheerless, but a hot breakfast
accomplishes wonders, and we were off at 5.30, in
good spirits, on what was to be the hardest stage of
the journey. The first part of the way was fairly
steep, the trail winding up through a cleft in the
mountains, but the snow was still hard and climb-
ing not difficult. Strange to say, although we were
eleven thousand three hundred feet above the sea,
breathing came quite naturally, and we were able to
keep up a good pace, which seemed to stagger the
shikaris, as they lagged far behind. After two hours
of climbing a long snow-slope, we reached what was
apparently the top of the pass, and from here the
going was level or slightly down-hill. The rain had
changed to snow, which was much pleasanter ; and
though during the last four hours it came down
thick and fast, we were quite warm from the exer-
cise. It was well toward dark when the welcome vil-
lage of Matayun appeared ahead in the distance.
The sun had come out toward the end of the stage,
softening the snow, which caused us to sink in knee-
deep at every step, and burning our faces fiercely

132 SPORT AND TRAVEL

with the glare ; rest was doubly welcome with the
knowledge that the Zogi La was behind.

A few straggling buildings, built of stones in the
shape of hollow squares, with courtyards inside and
flat roofs, composed the village of Matayun. None
of these had windows, and the filth within, where
several natives lived, was enough to disgust the
most hardened. We had some food on the top of one
of these buildings, in the teeth of a bitterly cold
wind which had sprung up toward the end of the
march, and then repaired to the usual " rest-house,"
where a fire had been prepared. This one was much
less objectionable than the one at Baltal, for al-
though it had no windows of any kind, and the floor
was as usual of mud, it was cut off from the native
quarters, so that their unwelcome odors must first
pass through open air to reach us, and when we
" sniffed the tainted gale" it had somewhat mel-
lowed. Moreover, the smoke from the fire at least
made a commendable attempt to get part of itself
up the chimney, which at Baltal it had not even
thought of trying — chiefly because there had been
no chimney.

The following day brought us down below the
snow-line, the trail leaving the gorge in which we
had been since Sonamarg, and broadening out into
a wide brown plain, with the few scattered huts of

THE JOURNEY INTO KASHMIR 133

Dras at its foot, the Dras River flowing through it
and superb snow-mountains all around. Since from
here on we could secure fresh coolies at the beginning
of each stage, we paid off the thirty-seven who had
taken our outfit over the Zogi La — eighty cents
apiece, with eight cents present, or baksheesh, for
the full trip of five days. On figuring up our entire
service expenses, I found that for the forty-eight
men, two thirds of whom would be dispensed with
on reaching our home camp, my share amounted to
$2.70 a day. Let one consider that a first-class guide
in the Maine woods, at home, is paid at the rate of
$5.00 a day.

The remainder of the journey to our first shooting
grounds was to be much less wearisome, since from
now on the road led down into the valleys of Baltis-
tan, bringing us among a new people and continually
unfolding sights and scenes of the greatest interest.

CHAPTER VII

IBEX-SHOOTING IN THE MOUNTAINS OF BALTISTAN

[NE can hardly imagine a wilder and
more mountainous country than Bal-
tistan. Down in the little green vil-
lages which lie at intervals along the
rivers, you realize simply that in that particular
spot you are shut in on all sides by giant masses of
rock and snow, which start from the very river-bank
and rise either gradually or in perpendicular pre-
cipices to tremendous heights above. But as you
climb, hoping perhaps that each successive ridge
will reveal some broad plain or valley below, only
innumerable other peaks and ridges, rising and still
rising, meet your view, till finally, on mastering
some commanding eminence, you see before you the
stuff that Baltistan is made of, — mountains, moun-
tains, mountains, nothing else, — chain after chain
of them, extending in splendid confusion, snow-
capped and barren of vegetation, off to a horizon
of serried peaks and towering ridges.

Such a scene as this is worth much labor to behold,
and causes you to realize, if you have never realized

A HALT I HOY COOLIE

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 135

before, that as a physical entity you are after all but
a minute atom in the plan of creation. Other trains
of philosophical thought might be called up in such
surroundings, did not the much more practical if
prosaic truth occur to you that you are aiming at a
spot some hundreds of miles across those mountains,
and that in order to reach it that splendid but all too
prominent landscape has to be crossed. It is only by
plugging at it little by little, stage by stage, that it
ever is crossed. There are moments of discourage-
ment, of course. Sometimes the trail will lead you
two thousand feet straight up into the air and two
thousand feet straight down to river-level again, and
all the sweat of that honest toil may have advanced
you just half a mile on your way. But as every half-
mile is put behind your back, the satisfaction of
having overcome difficulties gives you just so much
encouragement for the labor which lies ahead. This
was the sort of work which from now on was to at-
tend our journey.

Fortunately, however, it is not all barren rock
and sand that marks the trail. The Balti villages lie
along the rocky ravines like oases in this desert
of mountains ; and as they depend for cultivation
entirely on furrow-irrigation, each one, of course,
clusters about some mountain stream which often
shoots in a mighty waterfall from a precipice behind.

136 SPORT AND TRAVEL

The wheat is grown in little terraces, banked one
above the other, beginning at the river-edge and ex-
tending to some distance up the mountain-side. If
one comes upon a village from the river-level, one
sees only the stone walls which bank up the terraces ;
but if one looks down from a high cliff, as is often the
case before descending, a mass of the most brilliant
green, intersected with the irregular lines of the
walls, lies spread out below. Every village, too, is an
orchard of apricot and mulberry trees, which adds
immeasurably to the pleasing effect; and very re-
freshing it is, after tramping for hours through bar-
ren ravines and over hot, stony cliffs, to drop down
into one of these villages, nearly drown one's self in
the icy stream, and then lie back at ease on a cool
lawn shaded by the fruit trees, to watch the tents
being pitched and supper prepared.

The natives in these villages used to crowd around
our camp and watch us in the processes of dressing,
washing, and eating, with insatiable curiosity, and
this was often so embarrassing that we were obliged
to have them forcibly driven away. They are a
strange-looking race, these Baltis, with their heads
shaven on top and at the back, but at the sides their
black hair growing long and falling in unkempt
locks, generally interwoven with bright yellow flow-
ers. Their dress consists of a single tunic of the

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 137

roughest homespun puttoo, a coarse material re-
sembling sackcloth in texture. Their houses in the
smaller villages are often mere caves in the ground,
with a hole leading straight down for entrance, or
else low huts of stone seldom higher than a man's
height, with flat mud roofs, windowless, and with
but a single opening in the roof for the smoke of
their fires to pass through. The men seem to be of
two distinct types: one class have Mongolian fea-
tures and are of Tibetan origin; the other have
Tartar blood and are allied to the Dards. Some of
them, especially the older men, have a very wild
appearance. The women seldom show themselves
and always hide behind rocks or run up the hillsides
when they see white men approaching. The men,
however, with all their rough exterior, are always
courteous, and seldom pass without the customary
raising of the hand and "Salaam, Sahib," to which
the white man answers, " Salaam," that is, " Peace."
At the end of our second stage from Dras, on turn-
ing suddenly into a narrow and wild ravine of the
Dras River, we came upon a little cleared space on
the very edge of a precipice, where a Balti polo game
was in full swing ; and for the interest of beholding
one of the greatest of games played on its native
heath, and by the very people who centuries ago in-
vented it, we stopped to watch. Some eight or ten

138 SPORT AND TRAVEL

natives, in their long puttoo coats, were tearing up
and down the field on shaggy little ponies, with rude,
short mallets, and chasing a rough-hewn ball. A
small crowd of Baltis watched the game from a
large rock which formed a sort of grand-stand, while
a flute and drum supplied weird native music for
the occasion ; and as we took our seats on the rock,
the players, seeing their audience increased by two
weary but appreciative sahibs, went at it with re-
doubled energy, and gave as fine an exhibition of
polo as the primitive quality of field, sticks, and
ball would allow — a strange scene to find in such a
wilderness. The game finished, a native dance was
performed for our further amusement, and we were
then ceremoniously escorted by the lumbardar, who
was captain of one of the teams, to the serai or
rest-house of the village, where the usual gifts of
nuts and dried apricots were brought us. The ripe
apricot is too small to make a good fruit, but dried
and pressed into balls of a dozen or so each, they
form what is known as kobani — an indigestible but
very delicious sweetmeat. These offerings of dried
fruit and nuts from the lumbardars were never
omitted in the villages through which we passed;
perhaps they knew it meant baksheesh to many
times the worth of their gifts, but we accepted and
paid for them cheerfully.

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 139

At the end of a long march of thirty-one miles the
following day, — four hours in the morning over a
bad trail of difficult climbs and steep descents, and
seventeen miles in the afternoon to Tarkutti, — we
came upon our first rope-bridge across the Indus.
The ingenuity in the making of such a bridge with
no material but twisted twigs, strong enough to hold
the weight of any number of coolies with their loads,
and long enough to be swung from cliff to cliff across
this great river, is a source of wonder. Yet there it
swings, with three strands of twisted twigs, one for
each hand to grasp, one to guide the feet, sagging
gracefully from the tops of the mighty cliffs that
flank the river, occasionally swaying slightly in the
wind, but firm and safe as a bridge of rock and iron.
The sensation when one has felt one's way to its
centre and stands looking down at the torrent swirl-
ing a hundred feet below is, to say the least, a
strange one. I was glad enough to creep across un-
incumbered ; to have had to lug the heavy loads our
coolies carried would have been a handicap which I
should as gracefully as possible have declined.

A twenty-six mile march on the following day
brought us to Parkutta — a village rather larger
than the others through which we had passed ; and
as we entered it an amusing scene greeted us. Under
an enormous chenar tree in the centre of the town,

140 SPORT AND TRAVEL

and completely shut off from the outside world by
the dense foliage of the trees, was a little round
cleared space, where, apparently, all the villagers
were gathered in a circle, five or six deep, and with
shouting, clapping, and the usual discordant Balti
music, were beating time for six men dancing in the
centre. These, with waving riding-whips, singing
and laughing, careered madly around in the space
cleared for them. I soon discovered from the Rajah
of the district, who lives here, that they were the
victorious team of the afternoon's polo match, cele-
brating their victory ; and not only had the men
turned out to cheer them, but the housetops near
by were crowded with women and children, all show-
ing their enthusiasm in the most vociferous manner.
Indeed, it was not unlike a college football triumph
at home, and away out here in the heart of Asia it
seemed most strange and picturesque.

As we dismounted, there was at once a respect-
ful silence, and the Rajah, coming out of the circle
and salaaming, led us under a tree, where a shawl
and chair were at once brought. He then offered us
cigarettes, which we felt out of courtesy bound to
accept, though they were exceedingly vile, and or-
dered the festivities to proceed. After the main dance
was finished, each of the players danced alone, re-
tiring in turn as he finished and salaaming to us.

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 141

The music was afforded by six tomtoms, three flutes,
and a big horn, which as usual created the most pain-
ful discords imaginable, and the natives howled in
unison.

It then occurred to us that we were ravenously
hungry, having had nothing to eat for eight hours ;
and as the luggage was still some distance back on
the road, we intimated to the Rajah that anything
eatable would be most acceptable. Tea was at once
brought in an enormous samovar, — a kettle heated
by coals in a chamber inside, — and wheat-cakes,
which we gratefully received, and did not stand on
much ceremony about falling to. The inner man
having been temporarily satisfied, we repaired to
our camp-ground, where the Rajah sat with us till
our tents were pitched, smoking from a water-pipe
held by a kneeling servant, and would not go even
when we were most anxious to take our evening tub
before dinner, though he looked at us in an appeal-
ing sort of way as if he too were quite ready to leave.
Finally an interpreter came from the Rajah's house
and whispered that His Highness had been awaiting
our gracious permission to leave during the last half-
hour. We gave it without delay, and are now wiser
on points of Balti etiquette.

On the following morning the Rajah again ap-
peared, no longer in his bright green riding-suit,

I42 SPORT AND TRAVEL

English tan boots, and brilliant golf-stockings, but
in white robes, and red slippers which turned up at
the ends like the bow of a gondola. Having no
extra knives, we were at a loss to know what sort of
a present to give him, but at last tried ten shot-car-
tridges, which he received with the most evident
delight, and we took leave at once.

As we proceeded down through the valleys we
were, it seemed, moving gradually from winter to
spring and from spring to full-blown summer — as
mellow and fragrant a summer as ever made life
doubly worth living. The wheat was higher in the
fields, the apricot blossoms had given place to full-
formed fruit, the birds were of the most brilliantly
colored plumage and seemed to fill everything with
their song. Every village was a little paradise in it-
self. And though the midday was as warm as could
be without making our marches uncomfortable, the
nights and early mornings were always crisp and
delicious.

Thus far we had had little or no trouble with our
men. The shikaris and chota-shikaris who, as our
slight knowledge of Hindustanee improved, we were
coming to know better, seemed like hard-working
men, efficient in camp and always respectful. That
they would cheat us in small ways over the money
for supplies, etc., we had foreseen before starting,

IBEX HEAD

THE 44-INCH HEAD

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 143

for the Kashmiri is a pilferer first, last, and all the
time ; but I was fortunate in having Thomas as a
servant, whom I could trust with my last cent, and
as there was more or less jealousy between himself
and the Kashmiris, he was distinctly a stumbling-
block in their path. Now it happened that we had
long suspected the cook of making small inroads
on our tea, sugar, and rice supplies : these are great
delicacies to the Kashmiri palate, for their ordinary
fare consists simply of coarse flour, cooked and
formed into cakes known as chupatties.

Not wishing to have to discharge our only cook,
however, we had wisely contented ourselves with
telling Thomas to keep an eye open and not let the
supplies disappear in toto. Moreover, Rule i of the
Indian cook-book says, " Do not discharge your cook
because he is dishonest : they are all dishonest, and
he may be a good cook." But alas for our broad-
minded intentions, Thomas's eye seemed to be open
day and night, watching for his chance to score on
the ill-fated cook, and a dramatic scene in camp
one evening resulted in the unavoidable breaking
of Rule i.

We were startled just before dinner by a cry of
triumph from Thomas, and running out of the tent,
found him pointing one finger like an accusing angel
at the cook, while with the other hand he beckoned

144 SPORT AND TRAVEL

us to approach and behold the guilty exposed. As
the novel would put it, the villain stood with guilt
written on every line of his countenance, but as
Thomas looked away for a moment, I saw the vil-
lain make a quick pass and hide something under the
rock which formed the stove. We then approached,
determined to see justice done, and told Thomas to
prove his accusation. Thomas, with a self-confident
smile, stated that the cook had just hidden in his
pocket half the rice which was to be used for our
pudding and which he, Thomas, had measured out
to the cook from the locked rice-kilta a moment be-
fore. We coldly told him to show us the rice, and
piece by piece Thomas undressed the unresisting
cook, carefully examining each garment, till the de-
fendant stood as Heaven first made him, apparently
acquitted.

Poor Thomas was flustered : he thought he had
made an embarrassing mistake which would forever
lower him in our estimation and in that of the shi-
karis, and the tears began to come. I thought the
old man had had enough, though his discomfiture
was most amusing, and stepping forward, I pointed
carelessly to the stone. Thomas swooped on it like
an eagle and gave a battle-shout of triumph, which
must have been heard by half the village, as he un-
earthed the stolen rice. We had a hard time to keep

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 145

our faces calm and severe as became our position as
judges in this impromptu tribunal. The result was
that on searching the cook's bedding a large quan-
tity of stolen provisions was found, and there was
nothing for it but to have the shikaris give him a
beating and to discharge him on the spot, which
meant for him at least a lonely two-hundred-mile
tramp back to civilization. Fortunately one of the
coolies was found to be an excellent cook, and all
ended well ; there was no further attempt at steal-
ing during the trip, for which we had Thomas to
thank, and thenceforth he moved in an exclusive
circle, several heavens above that of the others.

At last, after sixteen days of marching, in which
time we had accomplished two hundred and sev-
enty-six miles, we found ourselves at the mouth of
the valley of the Basha River, the entrance to the
nullah in which our first shooting was to be found.
And now came the question as to what consti-
tutes a "nullah" which one sportsman can hold
exclusively while camped therein ; for a letter was
brought us on the night before entering, from a
sahib who claimed that he was already within its
limits, and that he thus had the right to the whole
valley.

To describe the situation briefly, the valley of the
Basha is some twelve miles long, being divided by

146 SPORT AND TRAVEL

narrow necks into practically three distinct sections ;
and as one of these sections offered ample shooting
ground for one or even two men, it seemed absurd
that one gun could claim the whole valley. Accord-
ingly, after some courteous correspondence with the
other man, we sent a coolie runner to the nearest
telegraph office, some forty miles distant, with a mes-
sage to the secretary of the Game Association in
Srinagar, requesting him to decide the question, and
we meanwhile moved camp to the upper section of
the valley, some eight or ten miles away from the
other sportsman's camp, fully determined to con-
sider it our own, believing the right to be on our side.
We ourselves then split camp, each to take a side of
the upper section, as we had resolved to shoot sep-
arately.

This third section was a beautiful spot. On the
right were broad, steep hillsides, covered with low
furze-bushes which afforded the ibex their feeding-
grounds ; and these slopes rose steeply to the crags
and snow above, being cleft in two places by small
nullahs with rocky bottoms and small streams. On
the other side towered vast mountains, whose sides
seemed almost too steep and too snowy to offer good
feeding-grounds, though we had marked down sev-
eral big herds there. But the real magnificence of
the valley lay in the scene at its head, where a huge

SEARCHING FOR IBEX

IBEX COUNTRY

The ground in this picture is all of ice, formed by a glacier

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 147

single mountain, covered entirely with snow, rose
quite alone; and, lit up in the early morning sun-
light, when the rest of the nullah was still in shadow,
the effect was superb.

Ibex-stalking is not easy, for the habits of the ani-
mals are all conducive to their safety, and their
senses of sight, smell, and hearing are very acute.
Before sunrise they graze down to the lower slopes,
but as the sun grows hot they ascend again to the
snow, where they sleep in inaccessible positions dur-
ing the day, always with one or more females posted
as sentinels. Toward four o'clock in the afternoon
they again graze downward till dark. The whole
success of a stalk depends, of course, on getting be-
hind a ridge to leeward of the herd and having them
graze to within range, or else on following them care-
fully from ridge to ridge as they move off. If they
remain out in the flat ground, approach is absolutely
impossible. The game laws of Kashmir allow six
ibex to each gun.

It was a great pleasure to feel a gun in one's hands
again ; a two weeks' march to one's shooting-grounds
whets one's keenness for the sport as nothing else
can do. Kadera and Sidka were moving about camp
before the first appearance of dawn ; I awoke to the
welcome sound of a crackling fire and dressed at
once, my teeth chattering in the cold morning air.

148 SPORT AND TRAVEL

A cup of steaming coffee, and we started single file
for the head of the nullah, where, during the past
few days, several herds had been marked down. As
we entered the upper section, the big mountain at
its head was beginning to glow ; the hillsides on the
right were emerging from shadow, and gradually we
could make out several dark spots about half-way
up to the first ridge. They were the big herd of ibex
which for two days past we had been watching
eagerly from a distance, hoping vainly to see them
move into a position where stalking would be pos-
sible. Now I saw at once that they were headed
straight up toward the ridge which topped the first
spur of the mountain ; behind this there was a de-
clivity; if they should disappear behind it, a suc-
cessful stalk might be made, for the wind was to-
ward us.

With the greatest caution we crept along the base
of the mountain, crouched painfully, but not daring
to let ourselves be seen for a moment. A single
glimpse of us would send the whole herd dashing
off in a panic to their mountain retreats. When im-
mediately below them, we halted and without a
whisper or motion waited and watched. They were
maddeningly slow in their ascent to the ridge. This
formidable mountain-side which they were taking
so deliberately and easily now would, I knew, have

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 149

to be covered by us at top speed when once the last
of the herd had disappeared; and the prospect
made me doubly impatient to be off.

A full hour of shivering in the gully had passed.
Then the leader of the herd reached the top. He
stood for a moment outlined against the sky, his
great ridged horns curving gracefully over his back,
— I could see that they were over forty inches, —
looked steadily over the ridge for several minutes to
make sure that all was safe ahead, then turned to
call his herd and disappeared. Without moving from
my crouched position, I carefully removed all un-
necessary clothing, shed my fur gloves, and slipped
a cartridge into each barrel of the .450 cordite Hol-
land and Holland express. There might be no time
for loading at the top. Kadera held the 30-40 Win-
chester, whose magazine was full, and started to fol-
low my example of slipping a cartridge into the bar-
rel, but I motioned him to stop. Put anything into
the hands of an excited Kashmiri but a loaded gun.
One by one the rest of the herd stood outlined on the
ridge and dropped out of sight, but the stragglers
were slow, and without the fur coat my joints were
already stiffening with cold. I moved slightly to
ease my position — there was a scurry above us, and
the straggling cows dashed over the ridge. Had
I spoiled the stalk? If so, there would be ample

150 SPORT AND TRAVEL

opportunity for remorse afterwards ; now my only
object was to get up to the ridge in the least possible
time, and we started.

In the first five minutes of dashing up a mountain-
side, no matter in how good condition is the hunter,
his breath leaves him utterly, his throat seems pulled
together as if by a strangling rope, and his chest feels
like caving in. He tells himself that he cannot pos-
sibly do it, that he must slow up or choke, and the
surer he is that he has taken his last step, the harder
he goes at it. The second five minutes are easier;
his muscles limber up, his throat loosens, his breath
comes more regularly ; in the third five minutes he
has no desire to stop. But this is just where a rest
is necessary, for there is no use in coming on the
game with the heart pounding like a trip-hammer.
He must stop and imagine himself anywhere but
about to reach in the next minute the point on which
the whole success of his stalk depends. If he can do
this, he will have almost immediate control of nerves
and muscles.

I waited, then crept to the ridge and peered over.
Two hundred and fifty yards away, filing slowly up
a shale cleft in the mountain and totally unaware
of our presence, were the whole herd, broadside on.
With the telescope it was easy to pick out several
fine heads, but they were shifting like the bits of

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 151

glass in a kaleidoscope, and at that distance we
could hardly choose among them. It was fairly
safe, though, to pick out any dark-colored buck. I
rested the express carefully on the ridge, sighted,
and fired. The buck I had aimed at stopped short,
shot through the hind-quarters; the second barrel
sent him dashing off down the shale. The herd had
split up and were dashing off in every direction,
some tearing down the slope, starting small ava-
lanches of shale and rocks in their flight, others
making for the cliffs and scrambling up as only a
goat can climb. I was sitting astride the ridge now.
Kadera and Sidka had gone completely crazy with
excitement; they were pounding me on the back
and shouting: " Bara wallah, bara wallah, Sahib!
Maro !" (Big one, big one, Sahib ! Shoot !)

Needless to say their exhortations made shooting
for the moment a physical impossibility, nor were
they conducive to perfect coolness on my part. I
seemed to see a regular kaleidoscope of "bara wal-
lahs" in every direction. Then I managed to calm
Kadera slightly, and taking the Winchester from
him, held it on a buck who was trying to scale what
appeared to be a perfectly sheer precipice to the left.
He would have got up it, too, if I had waited a mo-
ment longer, but the first shot brought him tum-
bling, and he fell sheer twenty yards quite dead.

152 SPORT AND TRAVEL

Another was still in sight far up the cliff, scram-
bling, slipping, leaping. I took the express and
fired again, but it was a hard shot. The second
barrel caught him amidships as he reached the
level, and he made off, badly wounded.

The result of this first shot was not all that could
be desired, since of my three animals only one lay
dead, and it was impossible to say how far the
others might go before they dropped. Following a
newly wounded ibex through the mountains is use-
less, for he will quickly distance the hunter and
make for some inaccessible cliff before resting ; but
if allowed to go unwatched, the chances are in favor
of his soon lying down in a place whither he may
later be tracked. Accordingly we skinned the dead
one, reaching the body by a difficult descent over
the slipping shale, and finding his horns to measure
but thirty inches, the minimum size a sportsman
should shoot, returned in a rather unsatisfactory
frame of mind to camp.

But the first discouragement was not to last.
With a local guide, the wounded animals were
tracked before daylight on the following morning,
and before long both were found quite dead, the
heads measuring respectively forty and thirty-nine
inches, which quickly cleared away all doubts as to
the success of the first stalk, and put me in the best

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 153

of spirits. A long, busy day in camp followed, for
the heads and skins had to be cleaned and salted,
and if I had known then what was in store for the
morrow, I should not have begrudged the repose
which this afforded.

Yet the first excitement of the hunt makes one
keen for more. News had already come from Perry
in the other section that his first stalk had brought
him two heads, and made me more eager than ever
to secure my six. In such a country as we had come
upon, this depended more on activity and accurate
shooting than on the mere hunting about for herds.
They were everywhere; the question was only to
stalk successfully. So delays were irksome.

The 1st of June dawned as all days in that won-
derful country seem to dawn, in a flood of sunlight,
cloudless and crisply cold. But before the great
mountain at the valley's head had received the first
tints of morning we were crouched behind a spur of
the glacier and searching with the glasses the sur-
rounding heights. It was but a few moments before
a large herd was found far across, on the steep
mountain-side which rose to the north, and though
a full half-mile of serried glacier lay between, it
seemed advisable to undertake the work and make
our second stalk in country as yet undisturbed by
firing.

154 SPORT AND TRAVEL

The crossing was rather more than I had bar-
gained for ; again and again an impossible crevasse,
or an ice-covered slope which led to the edge of some
ugly break in the glacier, necessitated a retracing
of our steps and a new start, and only at the end of
two hours did we reach the farther side, weary and
dripping.

A steep ascent of the mountain-side followed, and
once at the top, a sheltering tree afforded a few
moments' rest, where we could observe the game
unnoticed. The heads that appeared on that open
mountain-slope were larger than any we had yet
run across. The larger bucks were all of the dark-
est brown, their horns curving magnificently over
their backs and their beards hanging long and
shaggy. Before we had watched ten minutes the
whole herd moved off behind a ridge, but as usual
a solitary female was left posted, and the slight-
est movement from behind our tree would have
spoiled it all.

The longed-for moment came after an impatient
wait, the female slowly moving behind the ridge,
leaving a clear but hazardous slope for us to cross in
order to get within range. It was surprising to me
how we kept from slipping, but something on the
plan of a hundred-yard dash and a rather studied
nonchalance respecting the precipice just below

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 155

brought us to the ridge without a stumble, and we
dropped over.

The next five minutes made all the weary miles and
days of travelling worth while many times over. My
first impression was that we had somehow fallen in
the very midst of a perfectly tame herd of the largest
ibex on record, for the animals appeared so thunder-
struck at seeing us quietly and suddenly drop in
among them that for a moment they remained per-
fectly motionless. Then of course there was a scurry,
and the sport began.

My first buck dropped before he had covered
ten yards, and a careful shot from a knee-rest
brought down another that had gone but a short
distance farther — two forty-inch heads. I was now
allowed but one more by law, and was unwilling to
fire at any ordinary-sized head ; several bucks were
still in sight, but they were scattered and were tear-
ing up the mountain-side at a rapid pace.

Kadera, however, had stopped my hand after the
first two successful shots, and pointed to a ridge far
above, from behind which in a moment dashed a
magnificent animal with horns very much larger
than any I had yet noticed. As I found afterwards,
he had been crouched behind a rock when we had
first come upon the herd, and it was for this reason
I had not aimed at him once. Though still not too

156 SPORT AND TRAVEL

late, the mark was a small one. Some six shots
ploughed up the sand about him ; then he stumbled,
but regained his feet, and was immediately lost to
sight behind a ridge.

The account of how that superb animal was
tracked by his blood-trail far into the mountains,
how his horns were found to measure fully forty-
four inches from base to tip, and how we returned
at dusk across the glacier to camp, worn out by the
hardest of stalks, but happy in the realization of
complete success, would be, I fear, of less interest in
the recounting than was the experience itself. To
complete the satisfaction, a telegram was found
awaiting us at camp from the secretary of the Game
Association at Srinagar, stating that the Basha Nul-
lah could rightly hold more than one gun, and that
we were justified in having claimed our share of the
valley. Perry, in the other section of the nullah,
soon afterwards secured not only his six ibex heads
but three fine red bear as well.

That night Kadera came to my tent and cheer-
fully informed me that he had promised Buddha,
in the event of my complete success, a sacrifice of
two fat sheep. After a few moments of embar-
rassing silence following my assent, I was further in-
formed, still cheerfully, though perhaps a trifle less
confidently, that the promise had been made in

TAKEN FROM THE CENTRE OF THE ROPE BRIDLE

IBEX-SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN 157

my behalf. I had wondered who was to pay for
them!

So the sacrificial fire was built, the sheep killed,
and far into the night the shikaris and coolies feasted
in the moonlight, squatting in a circle about my
tent.

CHAPTER VIII

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING IN BALTISTAN

|HE beginning of our long march to the
markhor country was marked by an
episode which was as amusing as it was
unexpected, and which I must truth-
fully aver at the outset came about through circum-
stances over which we had no control. A perfectly
innocent remark to the shikaris began it all, and
from the moment of that remark the ball was started
and kept rolling, while we looked on aghast and help-
less at the extraordinary and unprecedented turn
of events.

It had to do with the arrival in Kashmir of
Wheeler, who, to our great delight, had sent us
word of his approach and had asked us to meet him
in a certain nullah not far away on a certain day ;
and our innocent remark to the shikaris was merely
to the effect that he was coming. To be perfectly
truthful, I must, however, state, that in our an-
nouncement to the shikaris of our friend's arrival,
wishing to secure their particular interest in the cor-
dial welcome which we, after our long separation,

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 159

of course wished to give him, Perry did go to the
extent of saying that he, Wheeler, was a "Bara
Sahib," meaning a big or important man. Wishing
still further to impress the shikaris, I added, " Yes,
indeed, a bara Rajah Sahib," and Perry, I believe,
warming to the subject and making a gesture signi-
fying immeasurable greatness, continued, " Cer-
tainly, a bara, bara, Maharajah Sahib."

But exactly what degree of greatness this volu-
ble description conveyed to the shikaris, I cannot
say, nor, as I have once before remarked, should I
care to submit even my most concise and carefully
thought-out efforts in Hindustanee to a professor of
languages for analysis. At any rate, feeling confi-
dent that the men were duly impressed and would
now take as much interest as we in the meeting
which was to occur on the following day, we retired
to our tent and to that peaceful slumber which only
the truly innocent can enjoy.

Imagine our utter astonishment, on going out of
the tent for our bath on the following morning, to
find the camp-ground so crowded with natives that
hardly a square foot of space remained unoccupied
between the tents and the surrounding woods. They
squatted in rows, extending up the hillside and
down toward the river below, hundreds and hun-
dreds of them it seemed, all in holiday attire, with

i6o SPORT AND TRAVEL

yellow flowers woven into their hair and hanging
about their tunics, and all silently and respectfully
awaiting our appearance. Perry and I gazed at the
array in dumb astonishment, and the Baltis quietly
gazed back. Even then I do not think we realized
what were to be the far-reaching results of our
guileless words of the previous evening ; but we were
not left long in doubt, for Kadera and Salia, coming
up and salaaming, informed us that these few un-
worthy people had come to do honor to the Bara
Maharajah Sahib. Indeed, if the size of that gath-
ering was a criterion, he was to be fitly received.

But this was not all. If the over-night transfor-
mation of our quiet and unpopulated camp-ground
was the work of some genius of the Arabian Nights,
he had still further wonders in reserve ; for at that
moment a splendid jet-black stallion appeared at
the end of the clearing, upon which was seated a
magnificent personage clad in long flowing robes of
white linen, with red slippers and flower- wreathed
cap. Was this perhaps Aladdin, or the good genius
himself, who had appeared in guise appropriate to
the surrounding scene and was about to ring up the
curtain on some marvellous entertainment? The
shikaris soon enlightened us. Helping him dismount
and leading him to the tent, where he salaamed be-
fore us, they introduced him as the Rajah of Shigar,

THE BARA MAHARAJAH SAHIB AND HIS STAFF

THE RAJAH OF SHIGAR AND HIS SUITE

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 161

who was to accompany us to the Field of the Cloth
of Gold, to join us in doing honor to the Bara Maha-
rajah Sahib. Indeed, the ball was now thoroughly
rolling, and as the possibilities of the affair dawned
upon us, having solemnly welcomed the Rajah, we
took refuge in the tent in order not to lose caste by
a public exhibition of our unseemly but irrepressible
mirth. Furthermore, Perry and I felt that the oc-
casion demanded something more ceremonious than
the dingy old gray-flannel shirts we were wearing ;
so drawing forth from the carefully-packed corners
of our boxes two precious immaculate white starched
collars, — our only two, — we put them on. We
possessed no ties, but that was unimportant. Then,
fastening boutonnieres of wild roses to the lapels of
our puttoo coats, we emerged to await events.

Camp was struck, and for a while all was confu-
sion in the process of getting under way. Two other
splendid chargers, beautifully decked out with sil-
ver and gold trappings, now appeared, and these
the Rajah placed at our disposal for the ride to the
Bara Maharajah Sahib's camp-ground; and while
the ponies were being packed, we took our position
at the head of the gathering, the Rajah stationing
himself beside us, and the Baltis quickly falling into
line in the rear of his bodyguard. Our shikaris and
coolies then took their places, the brass band, which

162 SPORT AND TRAVEL

the Rajah had brought with him, struck up a fright-
ful native march, and off we moved down the valley,
as imposing an army as ever went out to 'welcome
a foreign monarch.

If the cavalcade had been effective at the outset,
it was infinitely more so by the time we reached the
top of the mountain above the Bara Maharajah
Sahib's camp and began filing slowly downwards
toward the plain. For from every village through
which we had passed, and we had wended our way
through a goodly number of them, the Rajah had
ordered the inhabitants into line behind us, so that
the escort had swelled to monstrous proportions, and
as each separate village had contributed its brass
band, the noise, when all of them broke at the same
moment into discordant keys, was positively over-
powering.

Far down in the valley a small blue speck stood
beside what looked like a couple of white handker-
chiefs and levelled a pair of field-glasses in our di-
rection: it was the Bara Maharajah Sahib beside
his tents, examining in consternation and incom-
prehension the formidable array on the mountain-
side. Slowly we zigzagged down the mountain-trail,
like a monstrous serpent, with the bands braying
frightfully and the Baltis hurrying forward in their
eagerness to see the foreign potentate ; and all this

< £

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 163

time the Bara Maharajah Sahib kept his glasses
levelled at us, in total ignorance of the meaning of
this extraordinary spectacle. We could see him more
clearly now. He wore a navy-blue flannel shirt, with
a handkerchief tied about his neck, a slouch hat,
and a three-weeks* beard — a combination thor-
oughly appropriate to the surroundings, even for a
Bara Maharajah Sahib.

At last the level was reached. Perry and I dis-
mounted, deferentially approached the camp-ground
on foot, and humbly salaamed before the royal pre-
sence, though we wanted badly enough to run up
and wring his dear old hand off. Wheeler, preserving
an ominous silence, replied to the Rajah's deep and
respectful salute with what was probably the most
frigid and soulless bow I have ever witnessed. We
seated the Rajah and the Bara Maharajah Sahib
on two soap-boxes facing one another, summoned
a Hindustanee-Balti interpreter, and prompted our
friend to make remarks appropriate to the occasion.

The conversation was somewhat stilted, the only
important sentiment expressed being that the Ra-
jah was pleased to see his distinguished visitor in
his, the Rajah's, country, while the Bara Maharajah
Sahib was veiy pleased to be there, Wheeler punc-
tuating his remarks with surprisingly irrelevant
and irreverent asides, in which the words " height

i64 SPORT AND TRAVEL

of idiocy" and "depraved sense of humor" seemed
to predominate.

I will not weary the reader with too long an ac-
count of the further proceedings attendant upon
this historic meeting, contenting myself with stating
that, the Rajah having heaped upon his guest in-
numerable gifts, including valuable Kashmir shawls,
cups, plates, and pipes made of the stone of the coun-
try, sheep, chickens, fruit, nuts, sweetmeats, and
countless other things, and Wheeler having searched
his tent for an appropriate return present (the in-
terpreter had confidentially informed him that he,
being the greater potentate, must give the greater
present), and having turned over to the Rajah every
article, of no matter what description, which could
possibly be spared from his outfit, the whole multi-
tude sat down to feast ; and not until two days later
did the ceremonies connected with that memorable
conference come to an end.

But though we left the Bara Maharajah Sahib,
whose steps were turned towards the ibex grounds
whence we had just come, and though the Rajah
went home and the Baltis returned to their various
villages, the matter of the meeting did not end there.
Its results were farther-reaching than even we or
the shikaris had ever expected. For during his en-
tire six-months' journey through Baltistan, in every

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 165

town through which he passed, our friend's fame
had gone before him ; he was often met by deputa-
tions of the most prominent citizens of the villages,
and in spite of his protests was escorted in state to
their village-greens, feasted, feted, and covered with
gifts, while polo games and dances were played and
performed in his honor, and all was done to make
his way smooth and agreeable.

An Englishman, meeting us later, asked if we
had heard anything about a foreign prince who
was travelling in Baltistan. We had not. Even the
Bara Maharajah Sahib eventually came to a more
charitable view of the matter ; for, though his mod-
est nature had suffered a severe shock, the material
benefits which resulted were too important to be
left out of consideration, and as he wrote us later,
" You did a good job after all."

The account of our march to the markhor coun-
try, and our subsequent sport there, can best and
most briefly be told by summarizing from the diary
which I was in the habit of scribbling daily and send-
ing home every few weeks when we came within
a few days' running distance of a post-office, and
could send off a coolie to post letters and bring such
mail as had been forwarded according to our instruc-
tions. These mail-days were red-letter ones in camp,
and very strange it was to read of events which had

166 SPORT AND TRAVEL

happened months before in a world as far apart and
as different from ours as two worlds well could be.

A long, hot, dusty tramp from Wheeler's camp-
ground brought us to Skardu, a large town com-
posed of several villages lying amidst a broad ex-
panse of wheat-fields and orchards, where we found
three other sportsmen camped, two of them sick
and unable to push on. A day was spent here pre-
paring our twelve ibex-heads, which were then sent
off to Srinagar on the backs of four coolies, to be
cleaned and salted pending our return ; and on the
following morning a start was made down the Indus
toward the Haramosh country. We crossed to the
right bank on a flimsy raft buoyed up by inflated
sheepskins, as the left bank was said to be bad going.

I should not have cared to try the left bank if it
was worse than the right. Our trail was never on a
level. Frequently it rose two thousand feet straight
up and then dropped immediately again to the In-
dus, which, after leaving the plain of Skardu, rushes
wildly through a narrow gorge all the way to Ha-
ramosh. One march of eight miles occupied five
hours. Often the road dwindled to a ledge a few
inches broad around some precipice, being pieced
out by wooden ladders to make progress possible
for the coolies with their heavy loads. The weather
had changed greatly since a month before, and the

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 167

apricots and delicious mulberries were ripe in the
villages through which we passed. It was a great
pleasure after coming down from the Basha Nullah
to discard our fur sleeping-bags at night and to
tramp coatless in the daytime. Yet the work was
long and tedious, up and down fatiguing ascents and
descents through the most barren sort of country,
except where the villages afforded rest, shade, and
delicious fruit and water for parched mouths. Sel-
dom more than one stage a day was accomplished,
which meant but from eight to twelve miles, and
glad enough we were to come to the end of them.

At Rondu we had tiffin under a wide-spreading
chenar tree in the centre of the village, curiously
watched as usual by the women and children of the
town from their housetops, and then proceeded to
a beautiful camp-ground in a little village called
Harpu, where we were entertained, as often, by
native music and dancing. We passed Tulu, Hilbu,
and Subsar, and on the 26th of June, at a place
called Bulchu, feeling ill, I decided to take a day
of rest. Perry I asked to continue to his markhor
nullah, for we were to shoot separately and I did
not know how long my indisposition, due to indi-
gestion brought on by fatigue, might delay him.

The 28th was a long day of descent from the high
land on which we had been, almost to the Indus,

168 SPORT AND TRAVEL

my camp being pitched in a wooded ravine away
from any village; and on the 29th we ascended
to Balochi, again half-way up the mountain-side,
where another day of rest was imperative, though
any delay, with the prospect of good shooting ahead,
was annoying and irksome. There were only three
hens in this town, but I managed to collect two
dozen eggs in fairly good condition, which evidently
had been stored up as they had been laid, and with
a sheep for mutton and a cow-yak to supply us
with milk, we proceeded on the 1st of July to my
markhor shooting-ground in the Mishkin Nullah,
descending to my camp-ground in a snowstorm so
thick that, until we reached the clearing chosen by
Kadera, one could see barely a rod in any direction.
It cleared away as suddenly as it had come, dis-
closing such a view as seldom falls to the lot of man
to behold. The tent was pitched in a field of pur-
ple and white flowers, from which on three sides
the confines of the nullah rose abruptly, but whose
fourth side opened out to the mouth of the valley,
where a range of superb snow-mountains rose in the
distance — the Haramosh range, 24,285 feet high.
Sitting with my pipe by the camp-fire that evening,
with the ten days* work behind, and watching the
afterglow on those magnificent peaks and the shad-
ows creeping up in the valley below, I experienced

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 169

a sense of enjoyment which only those who have
had Nature to themselves, unmarred by the disfig-
urement of railroads and summer hotels, can truly
appreciate.

At dawn on the 2d we were scouring the sides of
the nullah for markhor, and at eight o'clock a fine
big animal was, by the aid of the telescope, found
across a small wooded cleft, lying on top of a big
boulder, quietly chewing his cud, his magnificent
horns curving in spirals over his back. A markhor,
like an ibex, is a species of goat, generally of a light
grayish color, with a long black beard and horns
curving outwards in spirals, usually in two and a
half twists. He is a larger animal than the ibex,
much scarcer, and considered a far finer trophy.
The law allows but two to each sportsman.

We stalked at once, which was not difficult, as
the hillside was thickly wooded with beech and
birch growth, which concealed our movements,
and thus it was only a question of moving silently.
Reaching a ridge about one hundred and fifty yards
above the animal, which had descended from its
rock and was grazing in the bushes, I soon caught
sight of its horns in the thicket, and fired where the
body appeared to be. There had been some ques-
tion in my mind as to whether to use the 30-40 Win-
chester or the cordite-powder express, but as I had

170 SPORT AND TRAVEL

done more accurate shooting with the smaller gun
and had more confidence in its trajectory, it had
seemed to me best to use the former. I was sorry
afterwards, for though the first shot hit the animal,
he was off at once, whereas the express would doubt-
less have dropped him immediately. However, it
was not long before his body was found, stone dead,
on a ledge to which descent was made with great
difficulty, and his superb head, scalp, and skin were
brought back to camp in good condition.

The next two days were spent in cleaning the skin
and head, and in continually searching the surround-
ing country with the glasses for further signs of
game. It was on the morning of the 5th that the
telescope revealed a fine big markhor perched high
on a rock, not far from where the first had been
shot, his horns standing out clearly against the
sky-line. I hurriedly dressed, said good-by to Perry,
who had come over from his neighboring nullah for
a visit, and was soon at the top of the ridge. The
markhor, two in number, had meanwhile crossed
the next nullah and were feeding half-way up its
opposite side. We slipped down among the woods
until nearly opposite them, but they were then upon
the point of disappearing and it was necessary to
take a very long shot, so long that it was impossible
for me to see their horns to decide which was the

A "ROAD" IN BALTISTAN

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 171

bigger head ; but markhor were none so plentiful
that one could afford to let a chance go by on this
account, and I fired. The Winchester, which I had
used on account of the distance, planted a shot
within two feet of the foremost animal and he was
at once out of sight around a ledge. The second
markhor, at the report, followed the other, but was
just far enough behind to enable me to load and fire
again before he disappeared. I should not have had
another chance. That was the most satisfactory
shot the little rifle has ever fired, for it hit the mark-
hor square in spite of the distance. But those goats
seem to be able to get away with any amount of lead,
and though on coming up I found plenty of blood,
the animal was nowhere to be seen. However, his
blood-trail made tracking a comparatively simple
matter, and before long he was found stone dead in
an almost inaccessible place on a cliff, where ropes
had to be used, and his body was recovered with
great difficulty.

Thus my ibex and markhor bags were filled, the
heads of the latter both measuring approximately
forty-three inches, a good average size ; they were
quite different in shape, one set of horns extending
spirally upwards, and the other almost horizontally
out before the upward curve. The scalps were al-
most white, with splendid black beards; the skins

172 SPORT AND TRAVEL

cream-color. Perry, I learned by a letter which he
sent me by a coolie-runner, had already secured his
first head.

We were now obliged to remain for some days
doing nothing, as Kadera, not believing that I should
get my two markhor in such a short time, had sent
the pack-coolies back to their village, Hilbu, and
they had to be sent for, with a delay of three days.
But I enjoyed this rest, for my camp, as I have said
before, was in a beautiful spot looking out towards
the Haramosh range, whose grand snow-peaks took
on the most superb colors in the setting sun and af-
terwards by moonlight, so that the evenings spent
there beside the camp-fire quite made up for any
ennui during the day. Besides, I had fortunately
brought a few good books along, and was able to
employ my time to advantage, reading being quite
impossible when on the march or hunting, owing to
one's excessive fatigue at the end of the day.

It was furthermore exceedingly amusing to me to
watch the shikaris and their ways, their character
being a study of continual interest. They are, of
course, thieves first, last, and all the time, looking
upon the sportsman as a moneyed sponge to be
squeezed as dry as their ingenuity can manage.
Fortunately for me, I had Thomas as a counteract-
ing element: he hated them and they him, and it

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 173

was his delight to guard my interests against their
dishonesty ; so I let him hold the bank and pay for
all supplies, for which he gave me regularly a neat
account, and I knew that I was paying minimum
prices.

The Kashmiri is, moreover, utterly childish in his
jealously. Our respective staffs split up into two
separate groups, ate separately, and were scarcely
on speaking terms ; and several times Kadera came
to me and accused Salia, Perry's shikari, of stealing,
though with no evidence to back up his assertions.
Whenever Kadera showed me game, his first remark
was always as to how much better he had done it
than could Salia ; and when Perry and I met after
our ibex and bear shooting, it was ludicrous to see
how Kadera refused to look at Perry's big bearskin,
while Salia visibly turned up his nose and sauntered
away when my 44-inch ibex-head was displayed.
As a matter of fact, while amusing us, this jealousy
was an excellent thing, for it made the competition
between our respective staffs exceedingly keen.

In his emotion the Kashmiri further shows his
childish character. One day, when I was down with
a touch of fever and for a short time uncomfortably
ill, Kadera, who was squatting in my tent, suddenly
burst into tears and sobbed disgracefully, while the
tears poured down his face ; and the scene was ended

174 SPORT AND TRAVEL

only by my ordering him back to his quarters. On
the whole, I believe, that in spite of their dishon-
esty and petty meanness, they have a certain amount
of affection for their huzurs (highnesses), as they
call us, and certainly much pride in our respective
shooting accuracy and trophies ; and I am sure they
do their best for us if only for their own credit. One
day when we were practising at a small target at
two hundred yards' range, and Perry was peppering
all around it, I took a single shot with the 30-40
Winchester, putting the bullet squarely in the bull's
eye, quite by luck at so long a range, and then, not
wishing to jeopardize at once my suddenly acquired
reputation, sauntered away as if nothing unusual
had occurred. You should have seen Kadera. His
chest-measurement visibly increased, and he walked
on air for a week, not deigning to look at Salia or
any other members of Perry's party.

Kadera, by the way, is one of those whose fea-
tures will not bear too close a scrutiny, lest they tell
of advancing years, and such a disclosure would be
of great harm to him in his profession. His face is
deeply lined, and he has no teeth left, which renders
his enunciation difficult to grasp; and on steep
ascents after game he is soon left painfully gasping
in the rear ; but as his head is always carefully tur-
baned, and as his beard is stained a beautiful bright

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 175

vermilion, no sign of a white hair gives away his
carefully guarded secret. One day, alas ! however,
a slight mishap to the worthy Kadera confirmed
all my suspicions. We were scrambling up a steep
mountain-side after game, when suddenly his foot-
ing gave way : he slipped, rolled a few feet toward
the precipice below, and came firmly and suddenly
to rest in the branches of an intervening bush. Quick
as a flash his hand went up to his turban, but alas !
it had jerked off in his rapid descent and lay several
yards up the slope. One glance at his bare head,
white as the snow of the peak above us, doubly ir-
idescent in its contrast to the vermilion of his huge
beard, was sufficient. I quickly looked the other
way and allowed the old man to recover his turban
with what equanimity he could, after the double
shock to his limbs and his feelings.

Sidka, my chota, or assistant shikari, on the con-
trary, was young, keen as a greyhound, athletic as
a young Greek. As this was his apprenticeship in
the shikari business, he well knew what a good re-
commendation at the end of the trip would mean.
Besides taking excellent care of my clothes in camp,
washing and mending them, making my bed at
night, and keeping the tent in order, he was invalu-
able on the march and in stalking, his duty being
to carry my extra gun and keep always at my heels.

176 SPORT AND TRAVEL

He was, too, the only member of the outfit who had
not been ill at one time or another: Kadera had
suffered from severe boils, Salia from rheumatism,
Thomas from colds, the coolies from fever; but
Sidka seemed always well, always keen and always
cheery, a characteristic of which only those who
have camped in the wilds know the true value.
. The coolies finally arrived, and we started on once
more, headed now for the sharpu or urial country,
of which I was anxious to secure one or two speci-
mens before proceeding to the black bear country
in the Valley of Kashmir itself. I had not supposed
that the climbing could become much worse than it
had been before, but in this I was mistaken. The
trail ran along the faces of cliffs, so narrow in some
places that it seemed impossible to stick on, some-
times down in the bottom of a ravine, then up again
to the crest of a mountain, whence the great ranges
of half Baltistan stretched out before us, and whence
we could look over even into Tibet. One gets ac-
customed to dizzy places, as to all things, with prac-
tice, but when one is clinging to the perpendicular
face of a precipice, practically with one's teeth and
nails, trying to find where to move next, while out of
the corner of his eye he sees beneath him a straight
drop of some two thousand feet, and at the same
time is morally certain that the three-inch ledge to

SHAR
Kadera, Sidk

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 177

which he clings is giving way, the sensation is —
unusual.

The night after leaving the Mishkin Nullah I for-
tunately met Wheeler, who, having finished his
ibex-shooting, was bound for the markhor country.
It was indeed a lucky coincidence that I should have
run across him on that particular night, for my
coolies had been unable to cross a certain stream
which I had forded with great difficulty up to my
waist in water, and which later had become swollen
by the melting snows of midday, and as I was con-
siderably in advance of them, and as there was no
means of refording the same stream, I should, had I
not met Wheeler, have been obliged to spend the
night on the opposite bank, within speaking dis-
tance of my outfit, but without food, shelter, or dry
clothes. This proved to be my last meeting with
Wheeler, nor did I see him again until two years
later, when in prosaic surroundings we told one an-
other of our subsequent wanderings and reminisced
a trifle sadly on our shooting-days. He filled his bag
in Kashmir and had some good shooting on the
Indian plains before returning home.

The day after leaving Wheeler we marched to
Balochi, where I had previously been ill, and on the
following morning left the Indus trail and struck in
a long distance, toward the mountain-pass which

178 SPORT AND TRAVEL

leads over into the Astore district, camping the sec-
ond night in a deep ravine with rose-bushes in full
blossom around the tent, a mountain-stream rush-
ing past, and the great cliffs towering straight above,
thousands of feet in height, from the top of which a
waterfall shot into the gorge below with a stupen-
dous roar. My larder, alas ! was by this time in a
sadly depleted state, the supply of coffee, oatmeal,
vegetables, baking-powder, jam, and sugar having
become exhausted. There were no chickens in these
villages, and consequently no eggs; no yaks, and
therefore no milk except goat's milk, which I abom-
inated. My only hope of deliverance from compara-
tive starvation lay in the fact that I had foreseen
this unfortunate dearth of supplies and sent a coolie-
runner to Srinagar for more. Sheep, however, were
always procurable, and at the modest price of two
rupees (sixty-seven cents) per head. Consequently
my daily menu was approximately as follows : —

Breakfast: Flour porridge, potatoes, mutton.

Tiffin: Potatoes, mutton.

Dinner: Mutton broth, potatoes, mutton.

This diet, as can be imagined, though healthful,
was hardly satisfactory ; and though its monotony
was occasionally relieved by my shooting a pigeon,
I often felt that I should like to see potatoes and
mutton, like the Hunter of the Snark, "softly and

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 179

suddenly vanish away/' giving place, if necessary,
to pate de foie gras, wedding-cake and Welsh rab-
bit. The many happy hours Perry and I have spent,
on our long, thirsty marches, carefully planning
out the menus for prospective feasts on our return
to civilization, come back to me with extraordinary
distinctness.

The 1 3th I spent in camp on account of a severe
rain, but started on in the afternoon and accom-
plished some six miles up toward the pass. On the
1 4th we crossed the pass itself, up a long snow-
field, and then down into the Ditchil Nullah, all in a
snowstorm, which later turned to rain ; and a very
unpleasant two hours I spent on reaching my camp-
ground, waiting for the coolies to arrive with the
tent and dry clothes. The I5th we marched some
eight miles down the Ditchil Nullah, which leads to
the Astore Valley, where I was greatly impressed
with the many different kinds of wild flowers which
dotted the fields with all the colors of the rainbow.
The scenery had changed suddenly from wild bare
mountains and snow to a beautiful valley, with
woods, fields and a mountain-stream, — a most
pleasant relief from our previous surroundings. The
1 6th was an especially hard day, for besides a long,
difficult, and fatiguing march over the mountain
from Ditchil down to the Astore River, I went on

i8o SPORT AND TRAVEL

two separate sharpu stalks, in a pouring rain all
day, and did not reach a suitable camp-ground till
dark, pretty well exhausted.

We came on a herd of sharpu half-way down the
mountain, and if my chota shikari had been at my
heels, as he always should be, with the guns, I should
have had a good two hundred yards shot at a big
head. But by an unlucky chance he happened for
once to be lagging behind, and by the time he came
up, the herd had got well out of range. We stalked
them to the top of the mountain again, over some
nasty cliffs, till a precipice stopped us just out of
range, and we were obliged to leave them watching
us at a safe distance. Descending a short distance,
and then seeing two more sharpu on the top of the
spur, we climbed again, but in vain. All this work
had occupied three hours ; and at four o'clock, hav-
ing had nothing to eat since seven in the morning,
I was quite able to appreciate my tiffin of a cold
sausage and some cold tea, eaten in the pouring rain.

Sharpu, by the way, are quite red, small, and ap-
pear to be all legs, judging from the way they get
over the ground. They are a species of sheep, with
the usual curved horns.

At dark, it being impracticable to pitch the tents
in the wet, I took refuge in a cattle-shed, where the
account of the day was written by the feeble light

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 181

of a flickering candle ; and as it was there that the
night was spent, it bears description. The walls were
of rough stones, about five feet high, so that one
could not stand upright. The roof was of logs and
thatch, through which in places the rain dripped
merrily. There was no window, chimney, or even a
hole through which the smoke could escape, except
the door, which was about three feet high. Conse-
quently, after suffocating for an hour by a fire in
order to attempt getting dry, a manifest impossi-
bility, I had to order the fire removed, and the smoke
then slightly abated. The floor was of earth, hay,
and manure. I finished dinner, which the faithful
Thomas, never too tired to cook, had prepared in
an adjoining shed, and having waited till my candle
had flickered its last, fell asleep to the soothing pat-
ter and splash of the rain without and within.

The next day we reached Astore, a fairly large
town, containing a fort high up on a bluff overlook-
ing the Astore River, thickly grown with tall, slen-
der poplar trees. Here for the first time in two
months I slept in a comfortable dak bungalow and
very glad I was to have an opportunity to dry out
my kit, which with the rains of the previous days
had become thoroughly soaked.

I had an amusing call on the tehsildar in this
place, the tehsil being a division of the state and the

1 82 SPORT AND TRAVEL

tehsildar its head official. We had sent to the bank
in Srinagar, where we had left a deposit, for five hun-
dred rupees, and they came to Astore in notes torn
in halves, the first set of halves in one packet and
the other set in a second, to prevent theft. It was
in order to have these notes changed into smaller
silver, for use in paying the coolies, that I went to
the tehsildar. He was sitting at his desk in a dingy,
ill-lighted little office, such as are all the official
dwellings in that part of the world, — a fat, pom-
pous-looking heathen, with a decidedly disagreeable
face. He was barely civil to me, but I took a chair,
explained to him in Hindustanee my errand, and
told him that I was an American. His face bright-
ened at once, and from that moment he could not
.do enough for me, asked if I would not have a ci-
garette,— which proved to be a six-inch jet-black
cigar of titanic strength, — insisted on giving me
a glass of " wine," — poor rum on nearer acquaint-
ance, — and set before me native cakes, almonds,
raisins, and various other sweetmeats, the acme of
native hospitality.

That evening, by a happy coincidence, Perry ar-
rived, en route to his sharpu nullah, and we enjoyed
a pleasant evening together, seated in chairs, eating
from a table, and looking out of a window, for the
first time since leaving Srinagar in April. He had

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 183

secured a forty-eight and one half inch markhor-
head and was quite naturally in high spirits. The
next morning we started for our respective shooting
grounds.

The road from Astore to Srinagar can fairly be
called a "road." It is well built for military pur-
poses, for it leads to Gilgit, where is stationed the
British garrison near the frontier, and very differ-
ent it is from the previous trails over which we had
come, which were called " roads," I feel sure, out of
sarcasm. This one is actually six feet broad in
places and smooth as a bicycle path. Accordingly
the pack-coolies, excepting the five naukar, or ser-
vant-coolies, who were permanent, were now dis-
pensed with, paid off, and sent back to their villages,
and for the first time in the trip, except for the first
day's march, the outfit was carried by seven pack-
ponies. I allowed Thomas a pony on account of his
age, and Kadera had ordered his own, but person-
ally, being in splendid condition, I walked. The
distance from Astore to Bandipur, whence one takes
the canal-boat to Srinagar, is about one hundred
and twenty miles, two high mountain-passes inter-
vening before one reaches the Kashmir Valley.

We camped on the iyth some eight miles above
Astore, at what my shikari asserted was the mouth
of the nullah which, according to my arrangement

1 84 SPORT AND TRAVEL

with Perry, I was to occupy. Either Perry's shikari
did not understand this arrangement, or wilfully
cheated us, for during the night he took Perry, un-
known to us, past us and some four miles up into my
nullah. I believe the trick was intentional on Salia's
part, for both shikaris had recently heard of three
red bear having been seen in this particular nullah
and were eager to have us bag them. As Perry had
already shot three red bear, he had been quite willing
to let me take this nullah, for I had as yet not seen
one ; but as he was unaware of the lay of the land,
he had no idea at the time that Salia was cheating
us, and was very angry afterwards. At any rate, on
awaking in the morning and seeing the other camp
far up the nullah, it seemed better not to waste time
in controversy, so I moved on up the Astore Valley.
Kadera threatened to kill Salia on sight, but as we
did not meet again until our return to civilization,
bloodshed was fortunately avoided.

We were up at four on the i8th, and hunted all
day among the mountain-tops, seeing plenty of
bear-tracks, but only some female sharpu, and did
not return to camp till dark. But that was a day
which I shall never forget, for I saw for the first
time what is said to be the grandest snow-mountain
in the world — Nunga Parbat or Diyamir, 26,629
feet high. Dr. Neve, in his book on Kashmir, says

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 185

of it: " Nanga Parbat is the culminating point of
the Kashmir ranges and is in many respects the
grandest mountain in the world. As none of the
mountains around it exceed 17,000 feet, it is seen
unobstructedly from all sides. . . . From the usual
passes into Astore, 16,000 feet vertical is seen. It is
seen from the Murree hills over one hundred miles
away. The outline and grouping of this mass, rising
glistening white, with pinnacle of ice and dome of
snow, above the dark lower ranges, just as some
huge marble cathedral rises above all meaner build-
ings, is a sight never to be forgotten."

Indeed I can vouch for this. We came on it sud-
denly around the shoulder of a mountain, and as I
saw its top, towering above the clouds which ob-
scured the rest of it, I believed at first that there was
some optical illusion, so straight upwards did one
have to look to see the peak. The white clouds hung
about it all day, but at evening they cleared, reveal-
ing it entire. Beside it, the Matterhorn would re-
semble a pigmy. Our camp that night was almost at
its base, and I breakfasted before daylight on the
I9th with the moonlight showing the mountain to
its best advantage, incomprehensible in its magni-
tude and splendor.

That day I had a stalk to delight the soul. We
left camp before sunrise and soon sighted a herd of

186 SPORT AND TRAVEL

sharpu on the very top of the mountain-spur. Two
solid hours of work ensued before we were within
range. Then, slipping down behind a tree, I had
plenty of time, unobserved, to pick out my animal
with the glasses. The best among them was small,
but I was quite willing to take a small head, by
which to remember such a splendid stalk, and I
killed him with one shot. The more I used the
30-40, the more confidence I had in its perfect
accuracy ; it is good to have such a gun, for with it
one has no nervousness before firing, a thing fatal to
good shooting.

The noon hours were spent in a spot on the
mountain-top overlooking the valleys of three differ-
ent rivers, Nunga Parbat rising to the right in all
its majesty, surrounded by a complete panorama of
snow-peaks ; the valleys spread out very far below,
dotted with little villages, patches of woods along
the river-banks, and pasture land, just as in the
Alps — but how much grander the scene ! That
night my camp, which had been moved by the
coolies, was beside one of these villages, Chugam by
name, and it occurred to me that if, instead of the
group of dirty little log huts, a fine mansion stood in
the midst of those smooth lawns, wide-spreading
walnut trees, and rose-bushes, what a perfect coun-
try estate it would have made. The natives, the

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 187

Dards, go about with the most beautiful white, yel-
low, and red roses stuck in their soiled caps, -
flowers which at home would cost a pretty penny, —
and often one of them would come to my tent with a
big bunch of them, for which I would throw him the
outrageously high baksheesh of two annas (four
cents) , there being no smaller coin in my money-bag.
I was called at daylight on the 2Oth, to find a dis-
mal rain without, and the shikaris protesting that
the game would not "be around" on such a day.
But knowing the habits of game and the inclinations
of the Kashmiri, I was soon climbing the mountain.
It took two hours of hard work to reach the top,
where we searched the neighboring ridges with the
glasses, but found nothing. The shikaris then sug-
gested that I sit down in my wet clothes and wait all
day for the evening shooting ; but having no desire
to contract pneumonia, rheumatism, or other similar
ills, I told Kadera that he could remain if he wished,
that I was going back to camp, and would return in
the afternoon. So I descended, slept from nine till
two, and climbing again, reached the top at four.
This bit of energy seemed completely to stagger the
shikaris, who had had no idea that I would return,
and had doubtless passed the dismal hours cheered
up by the prospect of being able to say to me on
their reaching camp in the evening, "We told you

1 88 SPORT AND TRAVEL

so !" But the work was to no purpose, for we saw no
game.

On the 2 ist I moved from Chugam Nullah to a
nullah some ten miles away, whose name I could not
gather from the shikaris' pronunciation, though it
sounded like " Zine." Here we camped in a pretty
grove of trees beside the Kamri River, very swift and
of a beautiful green, quite unlike the usual dirty
brown of these snow-fed streams. The rain still
poured, and after tiffin I had changed into com-
fortable dry clothes and was sitting on the floor of
my tent, congratulating myself that the day's work
was over and that I could conscientiously indulge
in an afternoon's rest, when a coolie bolted into
camp with the news that a herd of sharpu were on
the mountain above camp. We ascended at a pace
which left nothing to be desired, only to see the whole
herd disappear as we came within range. A second,
later alarm brought me out and up the mountain
again ; but I soon found that what had been taken
for a sharpu was a stray calf from one of the vil-
lages below. By supper-time I would not have left
camp again to shoot the biggest sharpu head in crea-
tion, my intentions and energies being by that time
wholly and unreservedly concentrated on the deli-
cious meal which Thomas well knew would be
required after such a disheartening day's work.

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 189

The next two days were very dismal ones, for
a steady downpour kept me in camp, the clouds
hanging low on the mountain, rendering stalking
impossible, and I sat on the ground in my wigwam
(Perry now having the big tent), wishing heartily
that it would dry up and not waste my valuable time
and temper. Then I had two splendid days of hunt-
ing, unsuccessful, but none the less delightful. On
one of them I was on my feet for ten and a half
hours, with but half an hour's halt for tiffin, and in-
deed it seemed to me that night that we had crossed
most of the mountain-ranges in Kashmir. The rain
had evidently driven all the game away, and not
wishing to waste more valuable time from my black
bear shooting, and on an unimportant animal, I
broke camp on the 26th for my hundred-mile march
to Bandipur, where I was to take boat to the bear
country. This march occupied just four days.

After the barren and rugged country over which
we had come, and the almost impossible trails we
had labored over, to get down to a smooth road,
surrounded by fields of grass and flowers, was most
gratifying. The first day we pushed on from day-
light till dark, following the course of the Kamri
River, and all the way getting the grandest views
of Nunga Parbat, as it loomed up above all else
behind us. That night my camp was just at the foot

190 SPORT AND TRAVEL

of the Kamri Pass, which I crossed on the following
morning, 13,400 feet high ; and though I had no dif-
ficulty myself, the ponies became stuck in the snow
and were badly delayed. We tiffined at Kamri, a
village of fields spread out on the side of the slope
down from the pass, and in the afternoon followed
the course of the Kishengunga River to Gurais.

Gurais is in a little valley of its own, shut in by
fine limestone cliffs, the village itself being con-
structed of two-story log huts, — now no longer the
miserable windowless low stone hovels of the Baltis,
— and its broad pastures make a pretty picture.
Kadera wished me to camp in the graveyard, it
being the only available space near the village ; but
this seemed inappropriate, and I selected a spot
which, though it necessitated Kadera's walking a
little farther to see his friends in the village, pos-
sessed attractions for me which the graveyard
totally lacked.

A delightful march on the following day, through
a deep wooded gorge opening into a forest of great
pines, brought us to a bungalow on the Burzil River
known as Gorai. I met two other sahibs just before
reaching it, and enjoyed a pleasant hour's chat with
them at their tiffin by the roadside, which one ap-
preciates when one has seen so few white men for so
long a time. On the 2Qth the road led over the last

MARKHOR AND SHARPU SHOOTING 191

mountain-chain before descending to the valley
proper of Kashmir; the Tragbal Pass, 11,800 feet
high, but here no snow. From its top we looked
down into the great valley which we had left on the
1 3th day of May, extending as far as the eye could
see, a splendid view ; and then descended through
thick forest to Bandipur.

During the previous three months we had passed
through the temperature of every season of the year.
The first week, up to the Zogi La Pass, was the deli-
cious climate of early autumn, crisp and clear; on
the Zogi La, winter in all its severity; in our ibex
nullah the weather was that of November at night
and of September in the day ; coming down into the
Shigar Valley, and again into Astore, we revelled
in the fragrance of May and June. Now, suddenly,
we found ourselves in summer — not the fearful
summer of Calcutta, but the balmy delicious sum-
mer of the North Shore or the Maine woods at
home. My camp was in a field shaded by a monster
chenar tree ; the trees about were laden with fruit,
the whole surrounding country bright with the thou-
sands of varieties of wild flowers for which Kashmir
is famous, and their scent filled the air ; brilliantly
colored birds sang continually, and all the space
between the hills and the broad valley below was
a prosperous picture of thatched bungalows sur-

192 SPORT AND TRAVEL

rounded by their fields of wheat and rice. Summer,
luxurious full-blooded summer, filled the world with
all her riches. Indeed it was with great satisfaction
that in such surroundings I began the last phase of
my Kashmir shooting, the hunt for black bear.

CHAPTER IX

BLACK BEAR HONKING IN THE VALLEY OF KASHMIR

LTHOUGH it had not been my inten-
tion to look for bear around Bandipur,
it was here that an event occurred
which convinced me that game was
plentiful and made me sanguine of early success.
Kadera came into the tent toward sundown to in-
form me that two large black bears had recently
been seen in the hills directly behind the village, and
suggested that we tramp back a few miles on the
chance of running across one. We accordingly set
out with a gam wallah, or local guide, who led us up
into the hills to the foot of a long slope covered with
low furze-bush, where we crouched for a couple of
hours. Toward dark my eye was caught by a large
object moving across the open hilltop some three
.hundred yards from our position. Its enormous size
made me believe at first that it must be a stray bul-
lock, and the fact that the shikaris, usually so quick
to sight game, remained motionless, almost kept
me from calling attention to it. Yet bullocks are
seldom black, and there was something about the

194 SPORT AND TRAVEL

gait of this object which convinced me that it was
quite another animal. It was barely distinguishable
in the twilight, moving slowly through the bushes
across the hillside. I touched Kadera on the shoul-
der and pointed ; the result was startling : Kadera
dropped on his stomach as if shot, while the gam
wallah did likewise, causing me to realize that the
fast-disappearing object above was one of the largest
black bears I probably ever should have the fortune
to run across. As we were about to stalk, a peasant
came toward us in hot haste from the other direc-
tion, and explained in some excitement that a bul-
lock had been killed within the hour not far from
where we were, and that a bear was still at the car-
cass. As it was now much too dark successfully to
stalk the other, we quickly shed all unnecessary
garments and prepared to follow our new guide
through a terrible tangle of underbrush. We were
on our hands and knees most of the way, and as we
approached the spot indicated by the peasant, our
efforts to move silently were exceedingly trying. By
the time we reached it, a full moon was shining
through the undergrowth, making every stump ex-
hibit such remarkably bear-like characteristics that
more than one of them was in imminent danger of
being shot, until nearer inspection proved it con-
clusively to be a genuine stump. The bear, how-

CAMP NEAR HAXDIPUR

CAMP IN THE HEAR COUNTRY

BLACK BEAR HONKING 195

ever, must have heard our approach, for he was not
with the body of the bullock, nor did he venture
back to reward our long night's silent vigil.

Unfortunately there were no nullahs in this region
large enough to beat ; and since Kadera assured me
that at the head of the Kashmir Valley we should
find several bears for every one we gave up here, I
agreed on the following morning to start along.

Kashmir was no longer the green and fertile val-
ley I had left in May. News had come to me while
in Baltistan of a terrible flood which had completely
inundated the country, wrecking houses, destroying
farms, and resulting even in much loss of human life.
Now below us extended a vast lake as far as one
could see, with only an occasional tree or housetop
to mark where cultivated farms and dwellings for-
merly had stood. Doongas conveyed the tents and
provisions across the flooded valley, where pack-
ponies were secured for the remaining distance to
the base of the hills. Here, on the second day from
Bandipur, camp was made in a grove of chenars, a
river within stone's throw on one side, and thick
woods rising close on the other.

The country through which we passed on this
ride showed Kashmir at her loveliest and best. One
felt as if one were continuously crossing the well-
kept grounds of a huge private estate, and at any

196 SPORT AND TRAVEL

moment might come upon the towers and chimneys
of some lordly mansion. There was no road. One
passed over the greenest of grass, smooth and fresh
as any lawn, extending as far as one could see, ex-
cept where groves of wide-spreading chenar trees
cast their shade like oaks on a country park. Roses
— not our wild ones, but such roses as at home are
brought to flower only under hothouse panes —
and wild flowers of all colors and species grew along
our way and filled the air with fragrance. In the
midst of such surroundings, to come upon the dirty
little hovels of a native village, with the fresh lawn
extending to its very doors and the chenar trees
surrounding it, seemed indeed incongruous. I spent
the night with pillow and blanket out under a clear
sky, till toward morning a sharp rain drove me to
seek shelter in the house of the headman of the
village. Here my bed was a handful of straw scat-
tered on a baked-mud floor, with stuffy atmosphere
and smells indescribable, — a radical and unwelcome
change.

The beaters arrived at camp the following morn-
ing. They began to come in twos and threes, then in
fives and sixes, and finally in dozens, so that by the
time breakfast was over the entire male population
of some three villages was grouped about my tent.
With the help of the shikaris, fifty of these were

BLACK BEAR HONKING 197

selected, and each given a slip of paper bearing my
signature; for, when they should come for their
wages at the end of the day, I did not wish to have
the friends and relatives of the beaters, as well as
the beaters themselves, turning up for payment.

The din these fifty souls succeed in making as they
move in a long line up the centre and two sides of
a wooded nullah, shrieking, howling, cat-calling,
setting off fire-crackers, and beating tom-toms, is
enough to drive any self-respecting bear out of his
seven senses. An army of battle-shouting dervishes
could hardly create a greater uproar, nor is it at all
surprising that the bear should find a pressing en-
gagement elsewhere at the earliest possible moment
after finding his nullah thus rudely invaded. If he
turns down the nullah, he encounters the invading
army ; if he tries to escape by the sides, he is met and
driven back by beaters already posted. Therefore
he does the most natural thing in the world by flee-
ing up the centre of the nullah directly away from
the oncoming din. At the top of the cleft stands the
sportsman. The thickness of the undergrowth prob-
ably prevents the sportsman's seeing the bear or the
bear seeing him until they actually meet. Hence
the excitement.

I regret to say that in spite of Kadera's assertion
that bears would be so thick in this country as prac-

198 SPORT AND TRAVEL

tically to necessitate our looking carefully where we
walked lest we stumble over them, — a statement
which I took with several grains of salt, as one does
the enthusiasm of every Kashmiri shikari, — it was
not until the evening of the second day, after we had
unsuccessfully honked nine different nullahs, and I
was beginning to consider bear-beating a snare and
a delusion, that our first sport came.

The bear appeared on the scene of action so sud-
denly as completely to take my breath away. The
beaters had been moving listlessly up a cleft, thickly
wooded both with trees and underbrush ; this was
to be the last honk of the day, and two days' un-
successful searching had so plainly reacted on the
spirits of the men as to change the dervish battle-
shout into the mournful muttering of an Arab fu-
neral procession. The line of beaters had almost
reached me, my shikari with a last disgusted look
had turned to go, when, all at once, the beaters who
had been posted on the side of the nullah above
where I was standing set up a tremendous shouting :
" Bhalu, Sahib ! bhalu ! " (Bear, Sahib, bear !)

Now it is one thing to have a bear driven up to
you from below, with plenty of warning that he is
coming and time to choose an advantageous spot
from which to shoot ; it is quite another thing to find
suddenly that the bear has somehow got above you,

Si

X «

s 1

§
§ I

BLACK BEAR HONKING 199

is being driven directly down upon you with all the
impetus a steep hillside gives, and with the thick
undergrowth extending to your very feet. I had
barely time to wheel around when the bear came
down the hillside, aimed directly at the little clear-
ing in which I was standing. A moment's glimpse
of his back in the jungle did not afford me time to
shoot. He disappeared in the undergrowth, but was
still coming toward me, as I could tell by the short
yelps of excitement which he uttered, like a fright-
ened dog, as the beaters closed in. Immediately, as
he emerged from the bushes, he was met by the con-
tents of both barrels of my .450 cordite-powder ex-
press, which, aimed and fired so suddenly from my
hip at the close range of less than two yards, seemed
to have missed him altogether, though the report
turned him and sent him lumbering down on the
beaters below.

There followed an exciting ten minutes. As the
natives closed in, the bear went frantically around
in a circle, trying to break through the line. I ran
down to the foot of the hillside, where an occasional
view of his back in the underbrush showed me that
he had not escaped, though I dared not fire lest I
hit a beater. The fifty coolies were yelling like so
many demons, the shikaris were out of their heads
with excitement, and the bear, who was doubtless

200 SPORT AND TRAVEL

the most excited of all, continued his circular course
inside the line of beaters, as regularly as a planet
on its accustomed orb.

I was now afraid that unless I should stop him,
he might escape through the line ; and working up
a little nearer, I fired several shots, each of which I
afterwards found took effect. The bear was now
thoroughly maddened, and suddenly changing his
course came lumbering down the nullah directly
toward me. The shikaris shouted to look out, while
the beaters redoubled their cries and added to the
confusion and my fear of shooting wild by follow-
ing the animal down hill. The thick underbrush
annoyed me greatly, for though I could catch an
occasional glimpse of his back, it was almost impos-
sible when I saw him to fire quickly enough, and I
knew that in a moment he would be on me. He was
within four yards when a final shot sent him on his
back, and brought him rolling almost to my feet,
quite dead.

My faith in the .450 express was distinctly dimin-
ished when eleven holes were found in his skin. He
was shot through and through, five shots at least
having passed completely through and out of his
body. I had used lead-nosed steel bullets, and the
only explanation was that every shot had merely
gone through the soft parts, missing any large bone

BLACK BEAR HONKING 201

or vital spot of the body ; and indeed with the hin-
drance of the thick brush his death was due more
to luck than to marksmanship. The last shot, which
finished him, had struck the shoulder fair.

It was not until several days later that the second
bear came in. We started early from camp and
moved all day from one nullah to another, covering
a great stretch of ground ; but save in one case, where
two bears broke through the line and got away be-
fore I could shoot, no game appeared. At five in the
evening, we turned toward camp, I regretting heart-
ily that my last day of hunting in Kashmir was over,
for I had decided in any case to break camp the fol-
lowing morning.

But the shikaris suggested honking one more
small patch of jungle not far from the camp-ground.
The coolies came down through it listlessly, they also
being discouraged, and I had no hope whatsoever of
success. Then suddenly there came from one corner
of the line that sudden yell, so welcome to a sports-
man's ears, " Bhalu, bhalu ! bara wallah !" — (Bear,
bear ! big one ! ) The beaters, managed by Sidka, ar-
ranged the honk splendidly, forming at once a com-
plete chain and then closing in. The bear attacked
several of them, and finally went so savagely for
Sidka that he was warded off only by repeated
blows from the shikari's iron-tipped staff. This I saw

202 SPORT AND TRAVEL

later covered with blood to some inches from the
point.

The sport was too much hidden by the thick
jungle to be clearly observed. From my position on
the hillside I could hear the beaters' cries, and from
their excited tones I knew that the bear was giving
them all that they could look after. Occasional
glimpses of them through the growth made me feel
decidedly out of the game, and since the bear was
so slow in coming up to me, the evident alternative
was to go down to him. I met him in a little clear-
ing at the foot of the slope, ruffled and very angry
from his fight with the beaters. But he was given
no time to decide whether to attack or flee. A shot
behind the shoulder accomplished what was neces-
sary, and put him out of action for the coup de
grace. The beaters arrived one by one, breathless
and perspiring, but all triumphant at the result of
their efforts.

We had a triumphal procession on the return to
camp : first came the two tom-toms, banging away
like a regimental drum-corps ; then the bear, slung
on a pole supported on the backs of two coolies;
thirdly, .the sportsman, trying modestly to repress
an irrepressible grin ; fourthly, the shikaris ; and last
but by no means least, the fifty honkers, all discuss-
ing the event at once, like so many crows. As we

BLACK BEAR HONKING 203

passed through the village of Kaipora, the women
and children — we had exhausted the place of men
— turned out en masse to see the bear, and the occa-
sion was all that could be desired.

CHAPTER X

KASHMIR TO CHINA

ROM our camp at Kaipora the outfit
was carried by pack-ponies down again
into the valley to Sopor, and thence by
doongas through the pretty canals back
to Srinagar, where the ravages of the flood were
painfully visible in all directions. The hotel on my
arrival was still an island, to gain access to which
one was obliged to wade knee-deep in water; and
here a damp and dismal sight met one's view : the
lower floor had been entirely submerged and its
furniture ruined, and as the flood had been flush with
the second story, arriving guests had been obliged
to disembark at the second-floor windows. Perry
and I had had remarkable luck with our baggage
and city clothes, for by chance they had been placed
in the attic, whereas the greater part of the trunks
in the hotel had been left below in the storeroom,
and as the flood had come up with extreme rapidity,
there had been no time to remove them. Some
sportsmen who, like ourselves, had been for several
months in the mountains, returned while we were

KASHMIR TO CHINA 205

there, and finding the contents of their baggage com-
pletely ruined, indulged in an expression of their
feelings, compared to which the flood itself must
have been a mere trifle.

Perry fortunately arrived while I was there, for
having already secured three red bear, he was will-
ing to give up his black bear shooting in order to
accompany me to the plains. The hotel was crowded
with sportsmen entering or leaving Kashmir, chiefly
British army officers on leave of absence from their
posts down below ; and though we sat down to table
thirteen in number on the thirteenth day of the
month, the tales of good sport in the highlands went
none the less merrily forward.

For five days we were busy shopping, buying
shawls, embroideries, and many other things of
native manufacture for presents at home. For the
former we dealt mainly with Bahar Shah, though
purchasing various shawls from Sammad Shah and
Mahmed Jan as well ; Lussoo supplied our brass
ware, Jubbar Khan our carved wood. The sign of
"Suffering Moses," famous for decades, still swings
from a little shop on the River Jhelum, within
which Mr. Sufdermogul continues to carry on the
successful trade which some English tourist's hap-
pily inspired suggestion for a sign first brought to
his now well-known door.

206 SPORT AND TRAVEL

One morning Bahar Shah entertained us at a
Kashmir breakfast, and on the following day Lus-
soo, the brass-work man, gave us a Persian tiffin,
the most noteworthy characteristic of which we
discovered just in time to avert fatal consequences,
— namely, that the succession of courses was to
continue until we gave word to stop. After that
they began to serve the sweets, which proved to be
quite the most important and voluminous section of
the whole menu.

During this time we kept a small kishti, very light
and fast, with four paddlers, which enabled us to
move from place to place over the river and its ad-
jacent canals with great and delightful rapidity.

Old Sultana, the taxidermist, proved most satis-
factory in his curing of our ibex and markhor heads
and skins, which had been previously sent him ; but
I unfortunately permitted him also to mount the
heads of the bear skins, to be used as rugs, which he
did so badly that they later had to be taken down
and set up a second time in America. The former
were taken with us and shipped from Calcutta for
mounting by Mr. Rowland Ward in London, and
we received them in America some six months later,
mounted as only Mr. Ward knows how to mount the
game of India.

It was indeed with great regret that we finally left

BURMESE WORSHIPPERS
Notice the " whackin' white cheroot

KASHMIR TO CHINA 207

Srinagar. There was, however, no time for further
delay; Perry had his black buck shooting on the
plains still before him, with but a few weeks remain-
ing before his final return to America via Suez ; for
my part, there was the long journey across India,
then a visit to Burma, and the voyage around the
Malay Peninsula to China, where prospects of tiger-
shooting attracted me strongly, and finally the jour-
ney home by Japan, all to be concentrated into the
few months which remained at my disposal.

All the tongas in Srinagar having previously been
engaged for Lord Kitchener's arrival, we were
obliged instead to take a landau, which, though
more comfortable, is a much heavier and slower
vehicle. The livery-man, however, had promised
for a hundred rupees to get us to Rawal Pindi in
three days ; so on the I5th of August, at four o'clock
in the morning, having finally paid off our shikaris
and coolies with good presents, at which old Kadera
got down on his knees and touched our feet, saying
he was our servant forever, we started on the long
one hundred and ninety-eight mile drive.

The first night was spent at the Chakothi dak
bungalow, and the second at Kohalla, where we pre-
viously had stopped on our way in. The third day
was about as varied and interesting a one as I have
ever experienced. We were aroused at 2.30 A. M., for

208 SPORT AND TRAVEL

the road was said to be slightly up hill and hard
on the horses; but this we soon discovered to be
merely an excuse to blind us to the fact that all the
good horses had already been engaged for Lord K.,
and that we had been furnished with animals which
ought long since to have been turned out to pass
their few remaining days in some peaceful pasture.
After painfully laboring for an hour, they stopped
and refused to budge farther. The time until sun-
rise we spent tugging at the wheels and throwing
sand at our poor steeds, but to no purpose ; so finally
Perry and I walked ahead some five miles to procure
other conveyance. During the day we had our lug-
gage in some four or five different kinds of vehicles,
at one time having actually harnessed a pair of bul-
locks to the landau ; but this method of locomotion
proved to be of such dizzy rapidity that we soon had
to abandon it.

Meanwhile we were vainly trying to satisfy our
hunger with the native chuppatties of black flour,
and at dark, as we were by this time far in advance
of the landau, it looked as if we should have to spend
the night dinnerless in some open field. At the
crucial moment our good angel came to the rescue,
for we suddenly espied two comparatively respec-
table-looking horses grazing in a field near by. If
the reader is inclined to combat the assertion that

KASHMIR TO CHINA 209

hunger makes robbers of us all, let him put it to the
test. We took those horses and galloped bareback
at top speed along the road toward Murree, soon
becoming separated in the darkness, but with one
common impulse urging us ahead, careless of rocks,
trees, streams, or bridges, or anything save only
dinner. Somehow we reached Murree. I remember
galloping through the town like Paul Revere on his
midnight ride, startling the groups of natives squat-
ting about their fires by the roadside, turning at top
speed from one dark wooded road into another, till
finally the welcome lights of a hotel, a real civilized
hotel, came into sight.

The manager of the Rowbury pleasantly in-
formed me that the hotel was full, and that not a
room was to be had for love or money ; but I imagine
that my appearance must have aroused his sym-
pathy, for he gave orders that dinner should be
served and a sofa prepared for me in the hall, where
a few minutes before midnight, after twenty-one
hours of work, I threw myself down and fell asleep
without further delay. Perry I found the next
morning at another hotel, he having had much the
same experience as myself, and feeling assured that,
having been thrown from my horse, I was probably
lying in the bushes somewhere on the road. The
horses were duly returned.

210 SPORT AND TRAVEL

Murree, by daylight, proved to be a beautiful hill-
station of fine residences and splendid wooded roads,
prettier even than Simla, if that were possible. We
obtained other conveyance, and that evening
reached Rawal Pindi, where Thomas was awaiting
us with the heavy luggage which he had brought by
ekka from Srinagar. Needless to state we paid but
half of the one hundred rupees charged us for the
landau and the wretched horses which had been
supplied. At one A. M. on the i8th we started in
the Punjaub Express, Perry leaving at Delhi for
his black buck shooting, and I arriving in Calcutta
two days and three nights later, after a journey
which for heat, dust, and general thorough discom-
fort cannot possibly be described.

My stay in Calcutta was rendered most pleasant
by the hospitality of Major and Mrs. C., in com-
mand of Fort William, who kindly asked me to visit
them in their large, comfortable house, Water Gate,
in a corner of the ramparts of the fort, overlooking
the broad road where all Calcutta takes its even-
ing drive, and the Hooghli beyond, with its many
ships from all parts of the world constantly pass-
ing up and down through its muddy waters. The
interior of the old fort, its barracks half concealed
by great trees and its chapel rising in the centre,
surrounded by gardens, lawns, tennis-courts, and

THE KUTHODAW PAGODA, MANDALAY

KASHMIR TO CHINA 211

parade-ground, was of unusual charm and pictur-
esqueness.

When visiting at private houses in India, just as in
the hotels, one's own servant attends to one's wants,
bringing water, arranging clothes, and even serving
one at table. In the newer and more up-to-date
hotels, such as the Taj Mahal in Bombay, which
during my visit was only in the course of construc-
tion, this and other former arrangements have, I
believe, given place to western customs. The pun-
kah-wallah is now no longer a feature of Indian life
in the big cities, for the electric fan has come to
relieve him of his functions. But in former days he
was indispensable in private house and hostelry
alike. He lay outside your bedroom door, always
asleep, save when on your entrance a reminding
prod started him hastily jerking the punkah-cord
to and fro. The punkah, a big swinging curtain sus-
pended over one's bed from the centre of the ceiling,
moved heavily back and forth, and breathing was
rendered possible in the stifling atmosphere. One
awoke at night with a consciousness of unbearable
heat, found that the punkah had stopped, and shied
a boot through the door; the cord and punkah
jerked hysterically for a few moments, then gradu-
ally came again to rest as the wretched Hindu with-
out sank once more into profound and peaceful

212 SPORT AND TRAVEL

slumber, until the boot-process was repeated, and
during the moments of the punkah's action one
managed again to fall asleep.

On August 26 I sailed on the British India
Company's S. S. Gwaliorfor Rangoon, arriving there
four days later after a hot but pleasant voyage. In
contrast to the burnt and barren plains the verdant
jungle-growth of Burma and the spicy tropic smell
strike pleasantly on one's senses. Rangoon, to my
mind, cannot compare in beauty with Colombo,
but it possesses at least the cocoanut palms, banana
trees, and other shady verdure of Ceylon, and here
the gaiety and brightness of eastern life is at its
best. The Burman, if the laziest, is surely the most
cheerful of all races, and one would guess this, if
in no other way, from the brilliant clothes he wears
and from his ever smiling face. His sarong is gen-
erally of bright yellow, green, or pink, and the wo-
men wear silk skirts and scarfs either combining
yellow and green, or all of pink, which contrast
pleasantly with their jet-black hair. The Burmese
girl, unlike the Hindu, does not veil her face with
a shabby head-cloth when you pass, but is quite
willing to let you see her beauty ; and she generally
gives you a smile into the bargain. She is graceful
and usually pretty, and never by any chance, one
might almost say, is she without her enormous cigar

KASHMIR TO CHINA 213

and a parasol. These two accessories are as distinc-
tive of the Burman as is the tortoise-shell comb of
the Cingalee. The "whackin* white cheroot" as a
matter of fact does not in any way resemble a civ-
ilized cigar ; it is approximately a foot long and an
inch in diameter, and is cylindrical in shape, like a
cigarette, being filled with a marvellous assortment
of ingredients, — sugar-cane, sandal-wood, incense-
bearing spices — a little of everything, in fact, with
tobacco distinctly in the minority, — and all con-
fined in a wrapper formed from the teak leaf or the
inner bark of the betel tree, more usually brown
than white. Indeed from its size one is tempted to
inquire what that cigar is doing with the little girl,
instead of vice versa.

While mentioning the gaiety of the native life, I
might incidentally remark that the Burman passes
to the next world in a no less cheerful manner than
he proceeds through this. One has only to see a
Burmese funeral to accept the truth of my asser-
tion. The procession is preceded by some fifty boys,
laughing and shouting ; then comes the coffin, draped
in bright yellow silk and covered with flags of all
colors, and followed by the mourners, men, women,
and children, all in bright yellow, green, and pink,
all singing and laughing, and all smoking their be-
loved cigars. It is to be presumed that the lady or

214 SPORT AND TRAVEL

gentleman who occupies the coffin must wear a
happy and cheerful smile, even though the usually
indispensable cheroot has, through force of circum-
stances, to be omitted.

In Rangoon there are two things which, above
all, interest the traveller: first, the working ele-
phants "a-pilin' teak, in the sludgy, squdgy creek,"
— only in Rangoon one finds them laboring in a
neat and conventional lumber-yard, with no ap-
preciable "squdginess" in evidence; and secondly,
the Shwe Dagon Pagoda. The elephants are good
and conscientious workers; they drag great logs
across the yards with their trunks, logs which from
their size it would seem could be moved only by a
steam-crane, and stack them in piles, observing with
a trained eye the neatness of the rows, and butting
projecting beams into place so as to be flush with
the others. The labor, being purely mechanical,
does not seem to demand a very high degree of in-
telligence, though the clever training of the brutes
must be acknowledged. Where they actually do
show their discernment is when the hour for the
noon-day rest arrives : all work is promptly dropped,
even though a log may be but half-way across the
yard, and off they troop to lunch, oblivious of the
mahout's imprecations and ankus-digs ; returning
faithfully to their task at the appointed time. As

PAVILIONS SURROUNDING THE KUTHODAW PAGODA, MANDALAY

THE Ki: TIIODAW I'AtiODA MANDALAY

ENTRANCE TO THE KUTHODAW PAGODA, MANDALAY

KASHMIR TO CHINA 215

they cannot endure the heat of the day while work-
ing, I believe that their hours extend only from
dawn till nine and from three till dusk in winter;
and that in summer the periods are shorter still.

The Shwe Dagon Pagoda, whose name is com-
pounded of the Burmese word for " golden" and
Dagon, the ancient name of the city of Rangoon,
may rightfully be said to be one of the greatest sights
in the world ; its great gilded tower, surmounted
by the usual ti, or umbrella, surrounded by little
bells which tinkle musically in every breath of wind,
rises three hundred and seventy feet from the ground
and is the first landmark one sees as one ascends the
Irrawaddy to Rangoon ; the vast terrace which lies
about its base is always thronged with thousands
and thousands of worshippers, bringing their offer-
ings of flowers and candles to Buddha from all parts
of the world, and chanting their prayers while pros-
trate before one of his many images, which in smaller
temples and shrines surround the terrace. It is a
somewhat unique sight to see all ages of people,
from old men to young girls, kneeling in front of
one of these enormous and, it must be said, hideous
idols, holding bunches of superb lilies in their clasped
hands while they bow and pray, all the while puff-
ing at their great cheroots, with which not even
religion is allowed to interfere.

2i6 SPORT AND TRAVEL

A few months before my arrival a tiger came on
to the terrace from the jungle, and, frightened by
the worshippers, climbed to one of the ledges half-
way up the pagoda tower. It was shot there by a
British officer and a life-sized model placed on the
spot ; for the people, once the animal was dead, had
turned on the officer whom in their terror they had
summoned to shoot it, and accused him of killing
the good nat, or protecting spirit of the pagoda.

The terrace, which is nine hundred feet in length,
contains hundreds of minor shrines and idols, be-
fore which candles are continually burning and wor-
shippers constantly kneeling in prayer. Their de-
votions do not, however, in any way interfere with
the countless crowds moving at all times about the
terrace, which constitutes the popular promenade
of all Rangoon. The pagoda itself is said to contain,
among other holy relics, eight hairs from the head
of the Buddha, or Gawdama, as he is called in Bur-
mese, once given by him to a Burmese deputation.
In the almost countless years of its existence it has
frequently been regilt, but as the amount of gold-leaf
necessary for this process is alone worth some ten
thousand pounds sterling, to say nothing of the
labor involved, it is not a work which can be under-
taken as often as the pagoda's outward appearance
might seem to justify. A pious Burman will often

KASHMIR TO CHINA 217

erect a new pagoda in order to " acquire merit/1 but
as no such merit is known to accrue from the repair
of an old one, private donations for such a com-
mendable purpose are seldom forthcoming.

There is nothing romantic about the "road to
Mandalay," at least, certainly, not about the rail-
road which we took in preference to the slower
flotilla-steamers, thus avoiding the trip by the old
"road" between the rather desolate banks of the
Irrawaddy ; nor was there, to our minds, much that
was romantic about Mandalay itself. In eastern
cities one expects age above all, and this perhaps ac-
counts for Mandalay's lack of charm. For the capi-
tal of King Mindon Min dates only from 1856, and
is laid out in the regular symmetrical blocks of New
York or the Back Bay of Boston, and the streets
and avenues, or "roads" bear such prosaic names
as " 84th Street" or " B Road." It has an area of
eighteen square miles and impresses one chiefly
with the glare of its unsheltered, dusty, white ex-
panse. There is little shade in the whole great city.
As for its sights, when one has visited King The-
baw's palace, the Fort, and the Kuthodaw Pagoda,
guarded by mighty griffins and surrounded by 729
small pavilions, each containing a slab on which is
a verse of the Buddhist scriptures in Burmese, one
has seen the principal features of the town. Its in-

218 SPORT AND TRAVEL

terest centres more in the story of the ill-fated royal
line, from the coming of good King Mindon Min
through to the final disaster, when Thebaw and his
brilliant wife, Supayawlat, surrendered to the Brit-
ish and were exiled, on November 30, 1885, — a
story which, with its plots and counter-plots, pos-
sesses all the dramatic qualities of an Arabian Nights
tale, and is indeed all that one finds romantic about
Mandalay.

Through a resident to whom we had letters, we
attended one evening the chief form of Burmese en-
tertainment, the Pwe, or drama, about which there
is nothing remarkable, except its duration. It be-
gins in the evening and continues till dawn, and if
ever the quality of a dramatic entertainment was
sacrificed to quantity, it surely is so in the Pwe.
Many of the audience bring their bedding with them
— for the pit is devoid of stalls — andt sleep peace-
fully through those parts of the play which lack
particular interest or dramatic thrill.

On September 4 we set sail from Rangoon by the
British India Company's S. S. Pentakota, stopping
at Penang, passing down through the Malacca
Straits, where on account of the heavy atmosphere
the sunrises and sunsets surpassed in magnificence
anything of the kind that I previously had seen, and
arrived at Singapore five days later, whence on the

KASHMIR TO CHINA 219

1 2th we took the North German Lloyd S. S. Seyd-
litz eastward. On the iyth we threaded our way
through a maze of small wooded islands, where the
dark-ribbed sails of the junks told as nothing else
could that we were now in Chinese waters, and so
entered the beautiful port of Hongkong. Barring
that of Sydney, and possibly of Rio de Janeiro, the
harbor of Hongkong in point of beauty is unrivalled.
One enters what from the town appears to be a lake
of the deepest blue, — for from within the outlets are
invisible, — surrounded closely by imposing hills,
under the highest of which lies the city. There is
none of the congested, smoky appearance of the
usual commercial centre, for there are few docks,
and the vessels lie at anchor in the harbor, where the
breeze continually clears the smoke away. There
being no wharves to obscure the view, one gets from
the Bund, or sea-wall, a lively picture, with the big
liners and merchantmen anchored in the roadstead,
and hundreds of little steam-launches, for the great
number of which Hongkong is noted, racing to and
fro among the shipping. Here on the Bund is the
Hongkong Club, on whose cool veranda one can
recline in comfortable cane-chairs, and watch the
whole great scene of life and color. This club, by the
way, boasts fifteen hundred members, and is second
to none in the East.

220 SPORT AND TRAVEL

A day or two after reaching Hongkong we took
the night boat, the Kinshan, up the river to Canton,
in order to spend a day in that ancient and famous
city of the Celestials. Of the impressions received,
about ninety per cent, I should say, were communi-
cated through the organ of smell, and on these I shall
not dilate more than to remark that so choice and
variegated a selection of odors it had not previously
been my fortune to meet. (Needless to remark I use
the word "fortune" more from the point of view of
the globe-trotter looking for novel experience than
from that of the aesthete.) The remaining portion of
our impressions I shall try to describe, for in the
cities of no other country in the world, I suppose,
will you find more upside-down and remarkable cus-
toms than in China — where the native greeting a
friend in the street shakes his own hand, where your
enemy smiles when he is most angry with you, where
the women restrain the growth of their feet till
walking becomes difficult, and where, indeed, the
customs and manners of one of the oldest civiliza-
tions of the world possess for the visitor the great-
est interest and attraction.

We started from the steamer in the morning, all in
chairs supported by three coolies each, Ah Cum, our
guide, leading, with D., myself, and Thomas follow-
ing in single file — Thomas on the broad grin at the

KASHMIR TO CHINA 221

new sights, and the Chinamen also on the broad grin
at seeing such a rara avis in their country as Thomas,
with his sarong, tortoise-shell comb, and "psyche
knot." I fear he must have been seriously embar-
rassed, for whenever we stopped he was at once
surrounded by an admiring circle, who grinned and
discussed him quite as we should discuss a remark-
able new specimen at the Zoo.

There are no streets in Canton, but the city is
transected by thousands of narrow alley-ways never
more than ten feet wide, and through these a dense
crowd is constantly passing, so that it was all our
chair-coolies could do to make a passage. From the
buildings on both sides innumerable signs, reading
up and down, are suspended like the flies above a
stage, so thick as almost to shut out whatever light
manages to permeate into the narrow space beneath.
The whole great city appears to be composed of
shops, nothing but shops, and most of these deal
in the various articles of Chinese food, so that as
one passes along in his chair one is constantly
brought into unpleasant proximity with extraordi-
nary messes, from the insides of pigs to birds' nests
and skinned rats, displayed on shelves or hung from
hooks at the sides of the alleys. Basketfuls of live
pigs slung on a pole between two coolies are much
in evidence, the Chinamen singing in time to their

222 SPORT AND TRAVEL

step, and the pigs yelling out of time to the song,
which is unpleasant, as the smell is bad enough, but
the noise and smell combined, overpowering.

The art industries are of intense interest and re-
flect great credit on the artistic abilities of the Chi-
nese. The enamelling of silver with kingfishers'
feathers was perhaps the most engrossing to watch ;
but no less interesting was the ivory and wood carv-
ing, the painting on rice-paper, and the embroidering
with silk, — storks, dragons, and goldfish being the
predominant figures in most of this last-named work.
I was exceedingly fortunate in picking up an old
mandarin coat of marvellous workmanship, speci-
mens of which, I believe, are now becoming difficult
to find.

Ah Cum, after reaping a harvest of commissions
on our purchases, then took us to several Confu-
cian and Buddhist temples, the most remarkable of
which was the idol-doctor's temple, where the sick
man draws lots to see what malady he has and how
he got it, and receives the appropriate remedy.
Thus, it is to be presumed, a man suffering from
appendicitis may perhaps learn that he has whoop-
ing cough and be given squills, — and his faith in
the idol will probably cure him of his appendicitis ;
an excellent system indeed.

At noon we came to the pagoda on top of the hill

THE CITY OF HONGKONG FROM THE HARBOR

HONGKONG HARBOR

KASHMIR TO CHINA 223

which overlooks the whole great city, and there tif-
fined, and in the afternoon visited the execution-
ground, one of the municipal courts, the prison, and
the great Examination Hall. Concerning the first, I
had expected to find in the famous " Potter's Field"
of Canton a large open public execution-ground, sur-
rounded by a wall, and great was my surprise when
our guide led us to a little alley-way, no different
from the rest, where the children of the neighbor-
hood were playing on a heap of rubbish in the centre,
in the midst of a conglomeration of earthen pots,
the stores of some potter near by. And this is
the spot where hundreds of criminals are led out to
die by strangling or beheading, or, if less fortunate,
by the Ling Chee, or death by the thousand cuts,
which is now practically abolished. The old exe-
cutioner came out of a house near by, showed us the
heavy sword which he used in his work (it had not
been cleaned), and wanted sixty cents to have his
photograph taken, which we did n't give him. He
was evidently used to tourists.

No execution was set for that day, perhaps for-
tunately for us, for morbid curiosity is a failing of
the race of man. So we proceeded to the prison.
It was not an agreeable place. There was a single
courtyard packed with prisoners, all shackled but
doing no work, a group of jailers playing cards

224 SPORT AND TRAVEL

and smoking at the gate, and in the corners of the
yard those men who had been sentenced to wear the
wooden collar, a great heavy block of wood some
three feet square, locked about the neck, which pre-
vents the wearer from lying down during all the
months that he wears it.

Across the yard was the court of justice, where
the magistrate arrived as we entered. We were able
to stay but for two cases, and saw only one of them
throughout. The accused was led in with a chain
about his neck, and this was thrown upon the
paved floor, where he knelt before the judge. Being
of a different province, the judge could not under-
stand a word of the prisoner's dialect: the inter-
preter did all the talking, while the judge gazed at
us and about the court-room. It appeared that the
charge was of stealing a woman's hairpin in the
street, which the interpreter, who apparently acted
as prosecuting attorney as well, brought out with
many scowls directed at the unfortunate man on
the floor, the prisoner meekly maintaining his inno-
cence. He was finally sentenced to wear the wooden
collar for two months.

I must mention also the great Examination Hall,
where the students of the province come to take
their second degree for the civil service, before
going up to Peking for the third. There are eleven

KASHMIR TO CHINA 225

thousand cells, each but a few feet square. In these
the candidates are confined for three days, during
which time, we were told by Ah Cum, they are re-
quired to write an essay on any subject in the uni-
verse which it pleases the examiners to give them.
Out of the total number, which may extend to the
full eleven thousand, so far as the accommodations
are concerned, only eighty-eight are passed. The
examination takes place every three years, and is
said to require, with the preparation for the first
degree, seventeen years of study. If a candidate is
caught cheating he is promptly taken out and be-
headed— an excellent custom.

In the evening we returned to the steamer, and
once more turned toward Hongkong, glad, I must
say, to leave behind us the smells, the noise, and
above all the oppressing effect of the dirty, ill-lighted
passages, with their hurrying streams of unwashed
brown humanity.

CHAPTER XI

HUNTING THE CAVE-DWELLING TIGER OF CHINA

LONG the coast of China, midway be-
tween Hongkong and Shanghai, there
lies a tract of country quite devoid of
any growth, where the barren hills
which roll back from the sea to the rice-cultivated
country inland are strewn with the gigantic boulders
of some prehistoric glacial moraine ; and it is in the
numberless caves and subterranean passages formed
by these great confused masses of rock that the sole
wild occupant of the country, the Chinese tiger,
finds his lair. Accordingly the sport of tiger-shooting
is here quite a different proposition from that in In-
dia and other tropical countries, where the methods
of shooting are adapted to the jungle, that is, from
the backs of elephants, on foot on a jungle-path,
by driving, beating, or sitting up over a kill. Here
in China the animal must be tracked to his cave ;
and if found in such a position that he cannot be
driven out to the gun, he must be blocked in so that
the sportsman can enter with comparative safety.
Thus, whereas in India the excitement is generally

WATER SCENE NEAR AMOY

CHINESE JUNK

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 227

over in a few seconds, in the cave shooting a sports-
man is frequently kept at the highest tension for
several hours, having located the game, and while
still uncertain as to whether it will charge out be-
fore being successfully blocked.

I had had my fill of the jungle. Rains, flies, and
fever had convinced me that tiger-shooting in the
tropics had its distinct disadvantages, and had made
me wish for a healthful country and a respectable
atmosphere, where one could enjoy living and shoot-
ing at the same time — a paradox in the jungle. I
was unwilling to return without a tiger; glowing
tales were told of this cave district. Here, then, was
the very thing for which I had been waiting.

It was with the keenest anticipation that I finally
found myself rolling down the coast of China to-
ward Amoy on the little Haitan. The old Scotch
engineer told me stories over our pipes and coffee in
the evening, of lighthouse keepers along the shore
watching the tigers play at night on the beaches
below, and of natives carried away from the rice-
fields within shouting distance of their very villages,
which made me feel that at last I was in for some
sport. So, though alone, except for my old Cin-
galese servant, Thomas, who had now shared with
me many adventures, I was not at all loth the next
morning to transfer self, goods, and chattels to the

228 SPORT AND TRAVEL

care of a yellow pirate in a dilapidated junk, and set
sail for the shore.

It was a few days later that I found myself in a
snug little village, Chi Phaw by name, tucked away
at the foot of the hills, with the flooded padi-fields
skirting it on one side, and to the west a pagoda-
crowned mountain, towering like a sentinel above —
far too peaceful a scene to suggest the sport on
which I had come.

As the guest of the village, in that I was to do my
little best in ridding them of a nuisance, I was led up
the central path through a staring and wondering
crowd of peasants, — who were unaccustomed to
seeing white men and had no modesty about show-
ing it, among innumerable black hogs enjoying con-
tinuous and undisturbed slumber along the high-'
way, and past the rude hovels, within which hens,
babies, dogs, and kittens sprawled promiscuously.
We came, at the end of the village, to a remarkable
looking building — a sort of large shed with arched
roof and paved floor, with one side opening to a
courtyard flanked by a ten-foot wall, which, though
ordinarily a temple sacred to the common ancestor
of the village, was now, I learned, to be my habita-
tion for as long as I cared to remain. It proved on
inspection to be a very filthy lodging : much debris
had to be swept from the floor, and several huge

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 229

black spiders driven away, before I could make
up my mind that it was at all habitable. A pile of
straw was then shaken down in a corner for a
bed, and my dressing articles spread on the altar,
after which the seven Chinese hunter-men, who
from now on were to be my escort, presented
themselves.

They stood grinning in a row, their almond-
shaped eyes sloping upwards, their yellow skins
burnt to bronze from work in the rice-fields, and
wrinkled like old parchment. With one exception
they were under five feet — hardly the imposing
individuals I had pictured, who were to walk into
the tiger's den with only their torches to frighten
him and their spears to stop a charge. Their wea-
pons, however, looked sufficiently business-like, for
each carried a sort of trident with three iron prongs
and a heavy wooden shaft. They carried with them
also, in a small basket, an exact representation in
miniature of themselves — a little Chinaman who
held in his hand the typical trident, and in the sand
which filled the basket about him were burning
joss-sticks. This I discovered was their idol, whom
they worshipped fervently and regularly, and never
in our subsequent hunting were they without him ;
for, as they told me, it was he who gave them their
courage to hunt and their strength to fight the tiger.

230 SPORT AND TRAVEL

As they had promised in the event of my success to
take the idol to see a play on their return to Amoy,
it seemed certain that he would grant their prayers
without delay.

My interpreter, a young Chinaman named Lim
Ek Hui, who had learned English at an American
mission school in Foochow, and who proved in-
valuable in communicating their directions, as well
as a most interesting companion in discussing things
Chinese during the long, lonely evenings, then ar-
ranged between us the rate of wages, and this mat-
ter having been satisfactorily decided, we repaired
to our respective suppers — I, to the great delight
of the admiring throng in the courtyard, to knife,
fork, and plate, they to their chow -bowls and chop-
sticks. The ten Chinamen who were to share my
temple then stretched themselves in various posi-
tions about the floor, lit their opium-lamps, and
smoked themselves into oblivion, the interior
quickly becoming filled with the pungent but not
unpleasant odor of the drug. Thomas found a posi-
tion at the other end of the temple, as far removed
as possible from the Chinamen; while I, repairing
to my bale of straw, was quickly asleep amid these
novel surroundings.

At dawn the courtyard was filled with the same
admiring crowd of the night before, — men, wo-

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 231

men, and children, — who watched the processes
of bathing, dressing, and eating breakfast much as
we might observe the Wild Man of Borneo taking
dinner at the dime museum. This was embarrassing,
and became, before many days, extremely irritating,
though it was a rather difficult matter effectually
to drive them away. The hunter- men had procured
long, slender bamboo poles and were winding strips
of cloth about their tips, these latter being dipped
in oil and serving as torches to light up the interior
of the caves which we explored. Then, after chow,
we started out in single file, I following the head
hunter-man, quite ignorant as to where or into
what he would lead me.

Knowing the lay of the land, they had no hesita-
tion in choosing at once the most likely caves to
explore ; a tramp of some four miles brought us up
into the rocky hills, and here at last, with the open-
ings of caves and passages all about us, I felt the
first pleasant realization that game might be near.
The hunter-men soon stopped above a cave which
led directly down into the earth, while one of them
led me a few yards down the hillside to station me
at the mouth of another opening below, Lim trans-
lating that they were to move through the passage
and drive the tiger, if he were there, down to the
exit which I guarded. They quickly oiled their

232 SPORT AND TRAVEL

torches, shed their great umbrella hats, and dropped
one by one out of sight into the hole.

Lim had had scruples about accompanying me
on the hunt, but protests that he was indispensa-
ble and assurances of perfect safety had overruled
them : he was necessary, not only to interpret direc-
tions, but to hold my extra gun and pass it to me,
should the two barrels of the .450 cordite-powder
express prove ineffectual. I had fair confidence in
the stopping power of the express, but in case of
emergency thought it best to take a second gun.
This gun, which was a double-barrelled lo-bore, I
gave to Lim, loaded but uncocked, and stationing
him behind me on a suitable rock a few yards from
the cave opening, awaited results.

Probably few forms of sport afford greater inter-
est than watching the opening of a cave, knowing
that at any moment one or more tigers may charge
out, and aware that if they do, one must shoot both
instantly and accurately. Under such circumstances
an ordinary hole in a hillside becomes a distinctly
fascinating object, as one who has had the expe-
rience must realize. As Perry and Wheeler a year
before in the same spot had seen four tigers break
cover simultaneously, and as two days later Perry
had found and shot a fifth in another cave near by, I
was sanguine of success. But there were to be no

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 233

results from this day's work, nor indeed for many
days to come, for the smoke of the torches appearing
through the fissures in the rock, and the sound of the
spears feeling about near the exit, told that the men
had passed through the passage. We explored sev-
eral other caves before returning to the village, but
to no purpose.

I now decided, and the men agreed with me, that
this wholesale exploration of caves was a poor thing,
since, if a tiger should happen to come to one of
them later, the smell of the torches would prevent
his entering, and he would doubtless at once move
to some other part of the country. The animals are
continually roaming about and may appear in a
certain district at any time, so that there is nothing
to do but wait. Accordingly, in the evening I pur-
chased from a shepherd six small goats and placed
them around the country within a radius of a mile
or so, attaching each before the opening of some
promising cave, and as we returned to camp we
could hear their bleating coming from all directions.
Should a tiger arrive within reach of that sound, I
knew that we should have something to work on.

The next week was a monotonous one. Every
evening we attached the goats, and every morning
at sunrise brought them back untouched to the vil-
lage; these were the only events of the long, hot

234 SPORT AND TRAVEL

days. Occasionally I crossed the hills to the shore
and had a swim, or a sail in some fisherman's junk,
but most of my time was spent under a tree behind
the village, where with a pipe and a book I did my
best to make the days seem shorter.

The village life was that of the peaceful peasants
of any country: at sunrise the men put on their
great pagoda-shaped hats and trudged off to the
rice-fields, where they worked, knee-deep in water,
till dark. The women remained in their huts, spin-
ning, or chatted on the paths, while their babies
made mud-pies and played with the somnolent hogs.
Then, at sunset, when the men returned from work,
my courtyard became the gathering-place for the
evening, for the novelty of watching a white man
eat, smoke, and read did not in any wise seem to
pall upon them.

The hunter-men were next in importance, and
always held an admiring circle about them as they
squatted over their chow. This was a sort of soup,
brewed in a big black kettle, into which any number
of ingredients, from shellfish to sweet potatoes, had
been thrown, and it was eaten with some kind of herb
on the side as a relish. Tiger-hunting is nothing new
to them, as they make it their business, the profession
being handed down in the same family from father
to son. They attack the tiger in his cave, killing

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 235

him with their spears, and selling the meat, bones,
claws, and skin at a high price, as the natives be-
lieve the possession of the claws or the eating of the
meat gives them strength and bravery. The men
are undoubtedly courageous, as, notwithstanding
the fact that some of them are killed from time to
time, they walk into the caves without hesitation ;
and many were the stories they told through my
interpreter, over their opium-pipes in the evenings,
of adventures and hair-breadth escapes.

Bruce and Leyburn are the names most promi-
nently connected with the sport of tiger-shooting
in this district. They were business gentlemen in
Amoy, who, whenever a tiger was located by the
hunter-men, would pick up their guns from beneath
their office-desks, come over post-haste to the cave
wherein the game had been marked down, and
generally return the same night to their homes,
successful. Leyburn is credited with over forty
tigers.

This village, as do all the small towns of the
district, regarded itself as one large family, being
descended from the common ancestor to whose
memory my temple was built ; and so closely do they
adhere to this idea, that intermarriage is forbidden
and a man must choose his wife from elsewhere.
They are a simple, trusting lot and have great faith

236 SPORT AND TRAVEL

in the medicinal powers of the white man. One
morning a woman stalked into my temple on her
diminutive feet, and pulled me by the sleeve to her
house near by. Her husband was lying groaning on
his straw bed and wooden pillow, having fallen out
of a tree and evidently hurt his spine. It was clear
that nothing more could be done than to ease the
pain, so I ordered hot water applied and rubbed
some salve on the injured spot. The next morning
the woman returned and thanked me profusely,
saying that the pain had ceased. Later, I was called
in to see a fever patient and gave him a few grains
of quinine, for which he appeared in person the next
morning to thank me, evidently quite restored to
health, more by the mental than by any physical
good done him.

These were the peaceful surroundings in which I
found myself, and watched the days pass slowly by,
until the first event occurred which told me that
game had arrived at last, and roused all my energies
to bring the hunt to a successful close as speedily as
possible.

Two days earlier I had moved to another near-by
village called Ki-Lai, and was awakened at one or
two o'clock in the morning by the loud barking of a
dog, which was immediately taken up by all the other
dogs in the village. This was unusual, as seldom

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 237

anything disturbed the silence of the town at night ;
and I was vaguely wondering what could be the mat-
ter, when the men in the temple were all on their
feet, some running for their spears, and others to
get my gun out of its case. In a minute we were out
in the village street in the moonlight, where the dogs
were bolting up and down, barking furiously and
evidently much disturbed at something, though the
cause was not apparent. And just then I distinctly
saw, off in the rice-fields, a shadowy form sneaking
away — a dog, perhaps, or a pig, though it looked
like something larger ; and though my first impulse
was to follow, I saw at once that it would be useless.
The barking of the curs soon subsided and we re-
turned to the temple.

In the morning great excitement prevailed in the
courtyard; the whole village had apparently gath-
ered there and were talking and gesticulating vio-
lently. Lim translated that a dog had been taken
away in the night, and that a tiger was undoubtedly
about. The hunter-men had meanwhile gone out to
inspect the goats, and returned with the news that
one had vanished, the rope being parted clean and
the animal having completely disappeared without
a sign of blood. I was on the spot immediately, and
found the report true, with no vestige of any track
to work on. There was nothing to do. To smoke up

238 SPORT AND TRAVEL

the caves by exploring them was clearly inadvisable,
so we returned to wait in patience till nightfall. The
anticipation of sport near at hand made that day
seem endless : the morning blazed wearily till tiffin-
time, and the afternoon hours dragged till evening.
Then, finally, the sun sank, and by seven o'clock I
had the five remaining goats at their posts, and, as
nothing more could be done, prepared to sit up over
the fifth, which was the loudest bleater, in the hope
that the tiger would pick him out for his night's
kill.

We found, some five yards from the goat, a suit-
able rock, which shaded us from the moonlight, and
waited, the animal crying lustily and being an-
swered continually by one of the others which was
within call. The first hour or two of this sitting up
was not bad, but eventually one's eyes became
strained from peering through the moonlight, and,
with the help of a sharpened imagination, pictured
a moving form in every rock and shadow. The goat
had by this time quieted down, the moon had
waned, the hunter-men were fidgeting ; so it seemed
better to give it up, and silently and in single file we
covered the three miles to the village.

But the discouragement of the evening was not to
last. The men had gone out to the goats at sunrise,
and I was awakened on their return by a tremendous

A TYPICAL TKiER CAVE

TIGER CAVES

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 239

clamor: they were all shouting at once, running
about the temple for their spears, and preparing the
torches in a way which looked like business. Lim
himself was so excited that he could hardly translate ;
but I finally quieted him enough to learn the news :
all five remaining goats, including the one by which
I had sat up, had been killed, the country around
was covered with blood-tracks, and only one head
and one body had been found. I vainly endeavored
to repress a war-whoop.

The preparations which ensued were such as
would have convinced an observer that the village
was about to make a sally against a hostile tribe —
the villagers sharpening their knives to cut down the
bushes should the tiger have to be blocked in his
cave ; the hunter-men arranging the torches and get-
ting the oil ; and the sportsman making sure for the
fifteenth time that his gun-barrels were spotless and
his cartridges in pockets quickly accessible.

At eight we were on the spot where I had kept
watch the night before. The string which tied the
goat had been cut off short, and at a distance of ten
yards was the head of the animal, torn roughly from
the body. The men then brought up for my inspec-
tion the body of still another goat, untouched except
for two distinct tooth-marks in the neck, made as
cleanly as though by a vampire. This was excellent

240 SPORT AND TRAVEL

news, for the tiger had clearly killed more than he
could eat, and must have retired for the day to some
cave near by to sleep off his gorge. But actually to
track him to his lair was no easy matter, for the
trails of blood which led in several directions were
quickly lost in the low scrub, and in a few minutes
we had to abandon the idea. To search all the large
caves in the vicinity and to trust to fortune to find
him seemed the only thing to do.

Then followed a scene which, under the circum-
stances, was thoroughly amusing, though at that
time I was too impatient at the delay to appreciate
it. The hunter-men set the idol, which, as I have
said, they invariably carried with them while hunt-
ing, on a rock, and gathering about it they lighted
joss-sticks and proceeded to worship in the usual
manner : clasping their hands, waving the joss-sticks
three times up and down, and then placing them in
the sand before the image. This done, they asked
the idol if the tiger was in a certain cave which
opened within a hundred yards of us, at the same
moment throwing up two pieces of wood, each with
one smooth and one rough side. Should they come
down even, the answer would be affirmative ; if odd,
negative. In spite of the fact that the blood-trails
all seemed to lead in other directions, the answer,
mirabile dictu, was "yes." The men immediately

THE RETURN TO THE

IGE AFTKR TIGER HUNT

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 241

picked up their spears and ran down hill to the cave,
which, like most of them, was formed of immense
boulders, opening by a crevice running straight
downward. Then, stationing me at its mouth, with
warnings to be ready, they entered.

Five minutes passed. A hunter reappeared and
said something which caused the crowd of villagers
who had approached to scramble back up the hill-
side ; Lim's eyes bulged as he whispered excitedly :
"Get ready, master, tiger inside."

The sport was now on in earnest. Bulletins were
announced at regular intervals from below : at first
they could see but one paw of the animal, then
he moved and showed himself in full — " very large
tiger," Lim translated. They were trying to drive
him out; he might charge from any one of three
openings, and I was to watch them all carefully,
for it would be quick shooting. A half hour passed.
Then came up the announcement that he had got
into a small passage and could not be driven out ;
they would block him in, after which I must enter.
The villagers immediately set to work gathering
bushes, which they bound together and threw down
to the opening, while the hunters came to the cave's
mouth and dragged them in. They worked quickly
and quietly, but with a subdued excitement which
kept my interest at highest pitch. My finger was

242 SPORT AND TRAVEL

on the trigger for four hours, nor did I dare take my
eyes from the openings during this entire time, for
the men had cautioned me that, until finally blocked,
the tiger might charge out at any moment.

It was past midday when the seven men emerged
and beckoned me to enter. I slipped down into the
crevice, landing in a sort of small chamber, which
was partially lighted by the torches, though my
eyes, fresh from the sunlight, could not see where it
led. They directed me to one side, and pointed to a
narrow shelf or ledge, from which a hole seemed to
lead straight into the face of the rock; Lim, who
was behind me, translating that I was to crawl into
it until I came to the tiger. This did not sound
reassuring, but knowing that the men were trust-
worthy and would not send me into a risky position,
I scrambled quickly in, dragging the express behind,
as I was too cramped by the smallness of the hole
to carry it with me.

One of the men held his spear ahead in the pas-
sage, though he himself stood behind. I crawled
slowly in for some ten feet ; it was quite dark and I
was ignorant as to where the animal was, or how
the hole ended. Then there was a loud " aughr-r-r"
within a few feet of my face, and I knew by the
sound that the tiger was in another cavern into
which my passage opened. It appeared that the

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 243

latter broke off and turned abruptly downwards. My
eyes were now becoming used to the darkness, and
by the light of the torches which had been thrust
into the tiger's cavern through the chinks in the
rock I could see him in full. He lay on a ledge of
rock, facing me, his green eyes shining and blinking
sleepily in the light, his great striped back moving
up and down as he panted from fright and anger.
His face was not four feet from mine when I had
come to the end of the passage ; but there was little
danger, since he was too much cowed by the light to
charge, and had he done so, my opening was too
small for him to enter. Had he tried to get at me
by tearing away the stones at the mouth of my pas-
sage, he could have been warded off with the barrel
of the express.

I lay full five minutes watching him. At the
end of that time I moved the express slowly into
position, being badly cramped; the tiger snarled
angrily as he saw the barrel approaching, and drew
back restlessly, still roaring. This was not pleasant
to hear. I then fired, without being able to see the
sights, but trusting to hit a vital spot. In the dark-
ness which immediately ensued, — for the torches
had been extinguished by the report, — it was im-
possible to tell what he would do, though he could
be heard roaring and leaping around his cavern.

244 SPORT AND TRAVEL

The hunter-men were in a frenzy of excitement
behind and were calling me loudly to come out,
though, as I was firmly wedged in the passage, this
for the moment was a physical impossibility. I then
fired two more shots, the tiger lay panting, and
was still.

Once in the open, it was evident for the first time
at what high tension my nerves had been kept dur-
ing the four hours of watching. In another hour
we had dragged the tiger up to the mouth of the
cave, which, owing to the big rocks which had to be
replaced before we could get at his cavern, was no
easy matter, photographed him, and then carried
him suspended from a pole to the village, while the
peasants ran alongside, laughing, shouting, and gen-
erally showing their delight.

I skinned the body on a flat rock in the village,
found to my satisfaction that the pelt measured ten
feet six inches from nose to tip of tail, which the
hunter-men said was a record, though I have no
means of verifying this assertion, and then adjourned
to the temple, where a feast of triumph and tiger-
meat was held throughout the evening. Indeed,
within two hours of the shooting the meat was be-
ing sold in the village streets and voraciously eaten
by the peasants.

This ended my tiger-shooting. With the prospect

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 245

of a visit to Japan before returning to America, and
realizing that I might stay for weeks in this region
without having the fortune to find another tiger, it
seemed unwise to remain longer. The following
morning I returned to Amoy, where the skin was
thoroughly coated with alum and rolled up to be
taken to Hongkong. The Englishmen at the club
were so fired with enthusiasm at my luck that they
forthwith began to plan trips for themselves, and I
do not doubt that several eventually went to the
village which I had just left.

Unfortunately it was two days before I could get
away from Amoy. A typhoon came up the coast
and burst on the town with full violence, preceded
by that black silence which seems to me the most
terrifying of natural phenomena. No steamers
would put out, while some twenty ships entered the
harbor for refuge. When finally I did get away, it
was on a little tub called the Thales, whose passen-
ger-list was composed of ninety-three Chinese and
myself, to say nothing of the live stock on board in
the shape of a full complement of fleas, cockroaches,
and rats. Stopping at Swatow, and arriving at Hong-
kong two days later, I had the tiger-skin cured at
the Museum. The claws, which inadvertently had
been left on my hotel window-sill to dry, were all
stolen by the room-boy, except two which I fortu-

246 SPORT AND TRAVEL

nately had placed elsewhere. The skin was well
prepared on my return to America, and now lies
before the fireplace as a pleasant reminder of an
interesting hunt, the head being mounted on the
rug with an expression of such ferocity as to seem
scarcely true to life.

I had planned to leave Hongkong almost imme-
diately, but the hospitality of some old friends in
the Royal Artillery Mess at Kowloon, combined
with many picnics, bathing-parties, tennis after-
noons, and dinners, so far upset my plans that it
was not until the 2ist of October that I finally de-
parted. Taking leave of old Thomas, whom after
his many months of faithful service I was sending
back to Ceylon, I sailed on the Empress of China ;
and moving out of Hongkong's graceful harbor by
the Lyeemoon Pass, where C., of the India, was on
the bluff before his mess, waving flags and setting
off fire-crackers as a parting salute, we turned out
into the China Sea toward Shanghai, Nagasaki,
Kobe, and Yokohama. These splendid "Empress"
ships, with their graceful curving lines, cutter-bows,
pure white hulls, pink water-lines, and yellow fun-
nels, are among the finest in the East, and before
the end of my travels I was to know them well.

Up to Shanghai the sea was very rough and the
air chilly. There would be no more soft sunny skies,

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 247

calm seas with flying-fish racing over them, and glo-
rious sunrises and sunsets turning them to red and
burnished gold, no more Southern Cross, nor tropic
nights of unimagined brilliancy; all these I was
leaving behind with the tropics; and whether the
exhilaration of a brisker atmosphere could make up
for them all, I doubted. At daylight on the 24th
we reached the harbor of Woosung, gay with an
assemblage of four big Pacific mail-steamers ; and
at nine o'clock started in a fast launch to cover the
thirteen miles to Shanghai, which lies well back
from the navigable sea, reaching the Bund at eleven,
and passing the day in that interesting city.

Early on the morning of the 26th we steamed into
the harbor of Nagasaki, the sun just showing above
the little wooded hills which hem it in, and raising
the mist from the dull gray roofs of the town. On
anchoring, we were surrounded by coal-scows, and
began coaling by the method for which Nagasaki is
noted : wooden staging is placed up the vessel's sides,
and standing on this, little Japanese girls pass up
the coal in small baskets with such speed that sev-
eral thousands of tons of coal are loaded in a few
hours. Their dexterity and team-work are indeed
most interesting to watch.

Rowing ashore after breakfast, we took a long
rickshaw ride across the hills, to a tiny fishing vil-

248 SPORT AND TRAVEL

lage called Mogi, on the other side of the island,
where a pleasant spot was found on the shore look-
ing out to the inland sea, and tiffin served al fresco
by two little Japanese girls, the surroundings look-
ing as though they had been taken from a Japanese
screen and enlarged to life-size. The ride back was
through a green valley and over a hill, with many
tea-houses and little gray villages, where the people
laughed as we clattered through, and the children
laughed when we nearly ran over them, and even
the babies laughed in their mothers' arms — alto-
gether a very merry country.

On the following day the ship passed through the
Inland Sea, very beautiful with its high wooded
shores, numberless islands, villages, and fishing-
boats in all directions, stopping the next morning at
Kobe, an uninteresting commercial city, and so on
up the coast to Yokohama.

A month is of course all too short a time to spend
in Japan, especially when one finds there hosts of
friends from home and is naturally tempted from
the conscientious path of sight-seeing. The chrys-
anthemum season in Tokyo was, furthermore, at its
height ; and with the imperial garden-party, the re-
view of troops by the Emperor, the state ball, and
many a dinner and dance aboard the foreign war-
ships in Yokohama harbor, I found the time pass

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 249

as pleasantly, if not so instructively, as if it had been
spent seeing temples in the interior. A week in Mi-
yanoshita, with a trip to Lake Hakone, then down
to Kioto, where Nara and Lake Biwa were visited,
and so through the island to Osaka and Kobe,
whence ship was taken back to Yokohama, com-
prised my travels in that delightful country.

Alas for the traveller, the old Japan, with the
steady progression of a new era, is, in the coast cities
at least, rapidly giving way to western ideas, west-
ern customs, and western architecture ; her gardens
of cherry-blossoms and wistaria, her spotless houses
of straw mats and sliding screens, her bowing, laugh-
ing, gay-kimonoed people remain ; but, mixed with
a prosaic assortment of European hotels, European
stores, and European dress, their peculiar fascina-
tion and picturesqueness necessarily must suffer.
In Tokyo I searched out a Japanese hotel, where I
was smilingly assigned a room by the proprietor.
Leaving one's shoes at the door, one ascends care-
fully polished stairs in straw slippers; but at the
first floor even these must be discarded, for the car-
pet is the cleanest of straw-mattings in double thick-
ness, into which one sinks as in velvet. One's room
is like a cardboard box, built of sliding screens and
bare of furniture, save for a mat to sit on and a little
dressing-table placed on the floor before which one

250 SPORT AND TRAVEL

has to kneel to tie one's tie. The impression one
receives is of absolute spotlessness and freshness —
not an atom of dust anywhere. Apparently there is
no bed or bedding ; but when night conies, the cham-
bermaid enters, prostrates herself before you, and,
pulling aside one of the screens of which the walls
are formed, discloses two great silk comforters and
a pillow stuffed with rice, which are promptly spread
on the floor. A brazier with coals is placed beside it
and you are ready for the night. The Japanese bath,
of all institutions in this immaculate country, is the
most important. But there is only one tank for all,
and one must not expect privacy ; simply a screen
separates it from the hall, and the girl who brings the
towels does not knock. Accordingly, being a philis-
tine to the customs of the country, it was not sur-
prising that the sound of the little lady's approach
at a moment when I was fully expecting privacy
caused me something of a shock. The only effectual
method of concealment seemed to be to retire to the
depths of the tub, which I did without delay, land-
ing in water considerably over 100 degrees Fahren-
heit. The result was successful, for my expressions
were so vociferous and full of energy that the girl
was completely terrified and took to her heels, leav-
ing me to perform my further ablutions in undis-
turbed contentment.

THE HARBOR OF AMOY

SAMPANS

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 251

With the coming of western innovations it is to
be hoped that the inherent politeness of the people,
above all, will suffer no detraction. When you are
presented to a Japanese, he bows to the ground and
continues bowing at every remark you address to
him ; a conversation opens with several compliments
on each side, with accompanying bows. The waiter
bows when he hands you the menu, bows when he
takes your order, and again when he sets the dish
before you ; and when you leave the room the last
glimpse you get gives you the impression that he
has been wound up like a mechanical toy and will
continue bowing until he runs down. When I left
the Japanese hotel at which I was stopping in
Tokyo, not only the proprietor and the clerks, but
all the chambermaids as well, were prostrated
on the threshold; and not with the usual idea of
begging a present but in thanks for the very small
tip I had given — a polite country, indeed.

The imperial chrysanthemum garden-party, for
which our Minister had, among many other cour-
tesies, obtained invitations for us, was an event of
the greatest interest. With a stream of people we
entered the big Osaka Park, where the path wound
through the woods, all turned to brilliant autumnal
colors, past miniature lakes and over bridges, with
little summer-houses here and there, till it opened

252 SPORT AND TRAVEL

on the lawn around which ran the stands containing
the splendid exhibition of imperial chrysanthemums.
The Japanese aim rather at cultivating the whole
plant than the individual flower, the date of the
garden-party being left indefinite until the last mo-
ment, so that the plants may be at their best. It
would be difficult to describe the effects they secure,
and I can only say that finer combinations of shape,
size, and color would be impossible to find, the world
over. One stalk alone bore one thousand seven hun-
dred and fifty blossoms, most of them in full bloom,
while two others had over one thousand. The Em-
peror was absent, but at three o'clock, to the solemn
music of the Japanese hymn, the Empress entered
and walked down the aisle that had been cleared,
the women curtsying and the men bowing to the
very ground.

A day or two before our departure a dance was
held on the U. S. S. Oregon in Yokohama harbor.
The scene at sunset I shall not soon forget: Fuji,
beautiful, solitary old Fuji, stood out against the
red glow in the west, the big British, French, Italian,
Japanese, and American warships vaguely defined
in the harbor's purple haze, while every man on
board faced aft as the flag was lowered to the music
of our national hymn.

At six o'clock on the evening of November 26,

TIGER-HUNTING IN CHINA 253

from the deck of the Empress of India, we watched
the lights of Yokohama twinkle in the rain, and
one by one disappear. Plunging at once into rough
seas, and encountering continual storms, we emerged
at Vancouver thirteen days later, whence, taking
the Canadian Pacific Railway across the continent,
I descended on December 15 from the train, in
Boston.

INDEX

Aden, aspect, 13.

Agra, journey to, 56 ; Mogul rulers

and architecture, 57-65.
Agriculture in Baltistan, 135.
Ahmed, author's cook, 30.
Aitken, Lieut. R. H. M., at relief of

Lucknow, 82.
Akbar the Great, 57 ; character, 58 ;

fort and palace, 58-62 ; tomb, 61.
Amber, Rajputana, excursion to,

54-56.
Amoy, tiger-hunting near, 20, 226-

245 ; typhoon, 245.
Amusements, Maori, 106-108 ;

Balti, 137, 140.

Antelope, Tibetan, in Kashmir, 120.
Apricots of Kashmir, 136, 138.
Arabian Sea, passage, 13.
Arabs, as coal-loaders, 9 ; chant, 10.
Architecture, Mogul mosques and

tombs, 57-65.
Arnold, Lieut. N. H., at relief of

Lucknow, 80.
Art, Canton industries, 222. See

also Architecture.
Astore, Kashmir, trail from Indus,

177, 179-181 ; town and fort, 181;

road to Srinagar, 183.
Australia, steamship, 109.

Bahar Shah, Srinagar merchant,

1 1 8, 205, 206.

Balochi, Kashmir village, 168, 177.
Baltal, Kashmir village, 129.

Baltistan, travel to, from Srinagar,
119, 121-145; as game region,
120; topography and scenery,
134, 168, 172, 178, 179, 184-187;
villages and agriculture, 135, 142;
inhabitants, 136 ; polo, 137 ;
treatment of travellers, 138, 140-
142, 182; food, 138, 141,143,178;
rope-bridges, 139; celebrating a
polo victory, 140; rajahs, 140-
142, 160-164; ibex-stalking, 147-
156 ; reception of supposed great
man, 158-165; trails, 166, 176;
markhor-stalking, 169-172; shar-
pu-stalking, 180, 185, 187-189;
cattle-shed, 180 ; road from As-
tore to Srinagar, 183, 189-191.

Bandipur, Kashmir town, 191.

Banknotes, transportation in Kash-
mir, 182.

Baramulla, Kashmir village, 114.

Barang, 42.

Basha River and valley, 145-147.

Bathing, on board P. and O. steam-
ship, 12; ghats at Bengal, 84;
in Japan, 250.

Bear, red, in Kashmir, 120; stalk-
ing of black, 193-195 ; honking
of black, 196-203.

Beggars at Benares, 89.

Benares, as holy city, 83 ; bathing
ghats, 84; burning ghats, 85;
palaces, 86; streets and filth,
86-90 j beggars, 89 ; hotels, 89.

256

INDEX

Bengal, Bay of, aspect, 17.

Bhalu, 198.

Boar-hunting in Perak, 35.

Bombay, smell, 18; aspect, 48, 51 ;
Towers of Silence, 48, 49; Par-
sees, 49-51.

Brahminism, Benares as holy city,
83-90.

Bridges, rope, of Kashmir, 139.

British India S. S. Co., 212, 218.

British Residents in interior of Ma-
lay Peninsula, 34.

British Straits Settlements, 25.

Bruce, Amoy sportsman, 235.

Buddhism, Benares as holy city,
83; Shwe Dagon Pagoda, 215-
217.

Bullock-cart, travel by, 29.

Bundobust, 122.

Burhel in Kashmir, 1 20.

Burma, Rangoon, 212-217 ! charac-
teristics of inhabitants, 212-214;
Mandalay, 217; drama, 218.

Burzil River, 190.

Calcutta, smell, 18; climate, in;
Fort William, 210.

Campbell, Sir Colon, relief of
Lucknow, 82.

Canning, Fort, at Singapore, 20.

Canton, smells, 220; aspect of
alleys, 221; art industries, 222;
temples, 222 ; execution ground,
223 ; prison, 223 ; court of jus-
tice, 224; Examination Hall,
224.

Capri, steamship, 21.

Cattle-shed in Kashmir, 180.

Cawnpore, memorials, 66 ; siege
and massacre, 67-74 5 present
aspect, 74.

Ceylon, Colombo, 14-17 ; inland
points, 17.

Chakothi, Kashmir village, 207.

Chap Us, 1 1 8, 126.

Chi Phaw, Chinese village, 228.

China, Hongkong, 219, 246; Can-
ton, 220-225; customs, 220 ; civil-
service examination, 224; tiger-
hunting near Amoy, 225-246 ;
village in tiger country, 228, 234,
235; curiosity of natives, 230,
234I g°d °f tiger hunters, 229,
240.

Chinese in Malay Peninsula, 25, 39.

Chits, 119.

Chota-hazri, 52.

Chota-shikaris, 125.

Chow, 231.

Chowkidar, 115.

Chugam, Kashmir village, 186.

Chupatties, 143.

Chusan, steamship, 17.

Cigar, Burmese, 213.

Civil service, examination in China,
224.

Climate, of Suez Canal, 5, 9, n ;
of Red Sea, 1 1 ; of Arabian Sea,
13 ; rain in Malay Peninsula, 23,
32, 38, 44; of India, 52, m; of
Kashmir, 191 ; typhoon at Amoy,

245-

Coaling, at Port Said, 9 ; at Naga-
saki, 247.

Colombo, Ceylon, smell, 14 ; ap-
proach, 14; aspect, 15-17.

Coolies, Kashmir, 122, 125; cost,
133 ; feast after successful hunt,

156, 157-

Court, Canton, 224.
Cum, Chinese guide, 220, 222.
Curtis, W. E., on Taj Mahal, 64.

INDEX

257

Dards and Baltis, 137.

Delafosse, Lieut. H. G., escape

from Cawnpore, 72.
Devil's Porridge Pot, near Rotonia,

99-

Ditchil Nullah, Kashmir, 179.

Doongas, 1 1 6.

Drama, Burmese, 218.

Dras, Kashmir village, 133.

Dress, evening, on P. and O. steam-
ship, 3; Balti, 136; Burmese,
212.

Edward VII., proclaimed Emperor
at Lucknow, 75.

Ekkas, 112.

Elephants, travel by, 33, 36-39;
antics of baby, 36-38 ; leeches,
40; piling teak, 214.

Empress of China, steamship, 246.

Empress of India, steamship, 253.

Etiquette, Balti, 141 ; table, in
Kashmir, 206 ; Japanese polite-
ness, 251.

Execution -ground in Canton, 223.

Federated Malay States, 24. See
also Malay Peninsula.

Fee, W. T., acknowledgment to,
52.

Flood in Kashmir, 195, 204.

Flowers, roses in Kashmir, 178,
187, 196; chrysanthemums in
Japan, 251.

Food, in Baltistan, 138, 141, 143,
178; Kashmir table etiquette,
206.

Funeral, Parsee Towers of Silence,
48, 49; burning ghats of Be-
nares, 85; Burmese, 213.

Furrow-irrigation in Baltistan, 135.

Gajak, 38.

Gam wallah, 193.

Ganges River, at Benares, 83-86.

Gates of Hell, near Rotorua, 100.

Gazelle, in Kashmir, 120.

Geysers of New Zealand, Waimun-
gu, 91-98 ; Whakarewarewa,
10 1 ; eruption caused by soap,
102.

God of Chinese tiger hunters, 229,
240.

Goond, Kashmir village, 128.

Gorai, Kashmir village, 190.

Grady, Sergeant, killed at Cawn-
pore, 72, 73.

Grand Oriental Hotel, Colombo,

17-

Grass-shoe of Kashmir, 129.
Grik, Perak town, 39.
Gurais, Kashmir village, 190.
Gwalior, steamship, 212.

" Ha Kanaka Tamahine," 106-108.
Haitan, steamship, 227.
Haka war dance, 104.
Hamurana Spring, New Zealand,

101.
Haramosh range, Kashmir, 168,

172.

Harpu, Kashmir village, 167.
Havelock, Sir Henry, march to

Cawnpore, 71 ; relief of Luck-
now, 78-82.
Havelock, Lieut. H. M., at relief of

Lucknow, 80.
Heat, of Suez Canal, 5, 9, 1 1 ; of

India, in.

Heavenly Twins, mud springs, 99.
Hilbu, Kashmir village, 167, 172.
Hindu worship, Benares as holy

city, 83-90.

INDEX

Hongkong, aspect of harbor, 219;
club, 219; hospitality, 246.

Hooghli River, 210.

Hot springs at and near Roto ma,
98, 99, 103.

Hotels, Grand Oriental of Colom-
bo, 17 ; Raffles', at Singapore, 19 ;
rest-houses in Malay Peninsula,
30; at Benares, 89; Japanese,
249-251.

House-boats at Srinagar, 117.

Hunting, various plans of author,
20, 21 ; in interior of Malay Pe-
ninsula, 22, 29, 31, 40, 41, 43;
boar, in Perak, 35; tiger, in
Johore, 45 ; outfit and prepara-
tion for, in Kashmir, 113, 117-
119, 126, 127, 129; game in
Kashmir, 120; control of a nul-
lah in Kashmir, 123, 145, 146;
personnel of outfit, 125, 142-145;
ibex-stalking, 147-156; mail
days, 165 ; preparation of speci-
mens, 1 66, 206, 245 ; markhor-
stalking, 169-172; characteris-
tics of Kashmir shikaris, 172-
176, 184, 187, 190; sharpu-stalk-
ing, 180, 185-189; black bear
stalking and honking, 193-203;
Chinese cave-dwelling tigers, 226,
227 ; Chinese tiger hunters, 229,
234; hunting of Chinese tiger,
231-233, 236-245.

ffuzur, 174.

Ibex, in Kashmir, 120; stalking,
147-156.

Ibrahim ben Ishmail, 39.

India, travel from Bombay to Be-
nares, 47-90; climate, 52, in;
Mutiny, 66-82 ; variety in cities,

83; Calcutta, no, in, 210;
travel to Kashmir, 111-115 ; Per*
sonal servants, 211; punkas, 211.
See also Kashmir.

India, steamship, voyage on, 1-17.

Indian Mutiny, siege and massacre
of Cawnpore, 67-74 ; siege of
Lucknow, 76-82.

Indus River, rope-bridge in Kash-
mir, 139; trail, 1 66, 176.

Inglis, Sir J. E. W., at Lucknow,

77-

Inland Sea of Japan, 248.
Isis, P. and O. steamship, 10.
Sstana, 28.
Itimad-ud-Daulah, tomb, 62.

Jacques, Corporal, at relief of

Lucknow, 80.
Jaipore, climate, 52; aspect, 53,

54 ; wall, 55.
James Anthony, author's servant,

56.

Janing, Perak town, 32, 33.
Japan, travel in, 247-252; influence

of western ideas, 249 ; hotel, 249 ;

bathing, 250; politeness, 251;

imperial chrysanthemum garden-
party, 251.
Jehanghir, reign, 57 ; and the

Kohinoor, 61.

Jenolan Caves, Australia, 109.
Jhelum River in Kashmir, 114, 116;

travel on, 119, 121, 122; flood,

195, 204.

Johore, tiger-hunting in, 44.
Jubbar Khan, Srinagar merchant,

205.

Justice, execution-ground at Can-
ton, 223; prison, 223; court,

224.

INDEX

259

Kadera But, author's shikari, 125,
147, 149, 151, 155, 156, 207 ;
character, 173-175, 184.

Kaipora, Kashmir village, 204.

Kampong, 23.

Kamri, river, pass, and village in
Kashmir, 188-190.

Kandy, Ceylon, 17.

Kangan, Kashmir village, 126.

Kashmir, journey between Rawal
Pindi and Srinagar, 113-115,
207-2 io;Srinagar, 115-117, 204-
207 ; preparation for hunting in,
117-119, 125-127, 129, 142-145;
topography and big game, 120;
hunting regulations, 123, 145,
146; coolies, 122; rest-houses,
128, 129, 132; character of in-
habitants, 143, 149, 172-176, 184,
187, 190; transportation of bank-
notes, 182; climate, 191 ; aspect
of main valley, 191, 195; flood,
195, 204 ; black bear hunting,
196-203 ; table etiquette, 206.
See also Baltistan.

Katoomba, Australia, 109.

Kedah, English rule, 24.

Kelantan, English rule, 24.

Khitmagar^ 114.

Ki-Lai, Chinese village, 236.

Kiltas, 1 1 8.

Kishengunga River, 190.

Kishti, 206.

Kitchener, Lord, in Kashmir, 207.

Kling driver, 30.

Kobani, 138.

Kohalla, Kashmir village, 114, 207.

Kohinoor, and Akbar's tomb, 61.

Kowloon, Hongkong, 246.

Krishna worship, 55.

Kuthodaw Pagoda, Mandalay, 217.

Kwala Kangsar, capital of Perak,

27-29.
Kwala Kinering, Perak village, 33.

Ladak, Kashmir, as game region,

120.
Lakes, Rotomahana, 95 ; Rotorua,

100; Taupo, 108.
Lascars as sailors, 3.
Lawrence, Sir Henry, at Lucknow,

death, 77.
Leeches, elephant, as pest to man,

40.

Lenggong, Perak village. 30.
Leyburn, Amoy sportsman, 235.
Lim Ek Hui, interpreter, 230, 232.
Ling Chee, 223.
Lipurian Islands, Stromboli in

eruption, 4.
Lucknow, aspect, 75; celebration

of coronation of Edward VII.,

75; Residency, 76; siege and

first relief, 76-82.
Luis, 1 1 8.
Lumbar dar, 138.
Lussoo, author's shikari, 125.
Lussoo, Srinagar merchant, 205.

Mahmed Jan, Srinagar merchant,
205.

Mail, conveyance by P. and O.
steamships, 10 ; mail days in
Kashmir mountains, 165.

Malacca, part of British Straits
Settlements, 25.

Malaria, author's attack, 44, 45, 51,
98.

Malay Peninsula, hunting in inte-
rior, 22, 31,35, 40, 4*1 43: rain»
23, 32 ; advancement under Eng-
lish control, 23-25, 39 ; character

260

INDEX

of natives, 25-27, 39; travel in
interior, 25-44; British Resi-
dents in interior, 34.

Mandalay, aspect, 217, 218.

Manzis, 121.

Maoris, settlement on hot spring
terrace, 103, character, 104; Ha-
ka war dance, 104 ; women, 105 ;
speech, 105; customs, 105; ca-
noe races, 106-108.

Markhor, in Kashmir, 120; stalk-
ing, 169-172.

Massacre Ghat at Cawnpore, 68-7 1 .

Massilia, P. and O. steamship, 47.

Matayun, Kashmir village, 131, 132.

Medicine, idol-doctor's temple in
Canton, 222; author's practice
on Chinaman, 236.

Mindon Min, King, of Burma, 217,
218.

Mishkin Nullah, Kashmir, 168.

Mogi, Japanese village, 248.

Mogul dynasty of India, architec-
tural works around Agra, 57-65.

Mokoia, steamship, 109.

Moore, Capt. J., at massacre of
Cawnpore, 72.

Mosques, Pearl, at Agra, 61.

Moti Musjid, 61.

Mumtaz-i-Mahal, tomb, 63.

Murphy, escape from Cawnpore,

74-
Murree, Indian town, 209.

Nagasaki, harbor, 247 ; coaling at,

247.

Nalas, 123.
Nana Dhundu Pant, massacre at

Cawnpore, 67-74.
Nanga Parbat, 184, 185.
Nat, 216.

Naukar, 118.

Negri Sembilan, English rule, 24.

Neill, Gen. J. G. S., at relief of
Lucknow, 79; killed, 81.

Nere, Dr. A., on Nanga Parbat, 184.

New South Wales, points of inter-
est, 109.

New Zealand, Waimungu and hot
springs, 91-103 ; journey to, from
Calcutta, 98; character and sports
of Maoris, 103-108.

North German Lloyd Co., oriental
line, 219.

Nullah, hunting regulations in
Kashmir, 123, 145, 146.

Nur Jehan Begam, 57 ; tomb of
father, 62.

Nuwara Eliya, Ceylon, 17.

Oregon, U. S. S., dance on, at Yo-
kohama, 252.

Outram, Sir James, and first relief
of Lucknow, 78-82.

Ovis ammon, 120.

Padang Sambai, Perak, 39, 40.

Pahang, English rule, 24.

Palaces, at Amber, 55 ; Akbar's, at
Agra, 58-61 ; at Benares, 86.

Parkutta, Kashmir village, 139.

Parsees, disposition of dead, 48,
49 ; origin and migration to In-
dia, 49 ; influence, 49.

Paul, author's servant, 124.

Pearl Mosque at Agra, 61.

Penang, part of British Straits Set-
tlements, 25.

Pengkulu, 31, 39.

Peninsula, P. and O. steamship, 90.

Peninsular and Oriental Line,
steamships, I, 10, 47,90; life on

INDEX

261

steamships, 3-17 ; conveyance of
mail, 10.

Pentakota, steamship, 218.

Pepper, cultivation in Malay Pe-
ninsula, 24.

Perak, English rule, 24; railway,
25; capital aud Sultan, 27-29;
travel by bullock-cart, 29; rest-
houses, 30; hunting, 31, 35, 39-
41, 43; travel by elephant, 33,
36-39 ; British Residents in inte-
rior, 34 ; travel by river, 41-44.

Perak River, travel on, 4-44.

Perry, H. P., plans travel with au-
thor, 2, 20, 1 08; tiger-hunting in
China, 20, 232 ; goes to Borneo,
45; hunting in India, 109, no;
fever, 1 10 ; goes to Kashmir, 1 1 1 ;
hunting there, 117; ibex-stalking,
153; and greeting of Wheeler,
159, 163; markhor-stalking, 167,
172; at Astore, 182; return to
Srinagar, 204; returns to Amer-
ica, 207, 209, 210.

Persia, P. and O. steamship, 10.

Pin Seng, Chinese ship, 44.

Pink Terraces of New Zealand, de-
struction, 92.

Politeness of Japanese, 251.

Polo in Baltistan, 137, 140.

Port Said, life at, 5-7 ; quarantine,
8 ; coaling at, 9.

Priest's Water, spring at Rotonia,
98.

Prison at Canton, 223.

Province Wellesley, part of Brit-
ish Straits Settlements, 25.

Punkah, 211.

Pushmina shawls, 118.

Puttoo, 1 1 8, 126.
e, 218.

Quarantine at Port Said, 8.

" Rachel " bath at Rotorua, 98.
Raffles' Hotel, Singapore, 19.
Raft, bamboo, on Perak River, 41 ;

on Indus, 166.
Railways, in Malay Peninsula, 24,

25, 29; in India, 52, 56, in.
Rain in Malay Peninsula, 23, 32,

38. 44-

Rajahs of Baltistan, 140-142, 160-
164.

Rangoon, inhabitants, 212-214; ele-
phants piling teak, 214; Shwe
Dagon Pagoda, 215.

Rapids, shooting on Perak River,
42.

Rawal Pindi, railway journey to,
in; travel between Srinagar
and, 113-115, 207-210.

Red Sea, passage, n.

Residents, British, in interior of
Malay Peninsula, 34.

Rest-houses, in Malay Peninsula,
30; in Kashmir, 128, 129, 132.

Rivers, Perak, 34, 41-44; Ganges,
at Benares, 83-86; Wanganui,
108 ; Jhelum, in Kashmir, 114,
116; Sind, 122, 127, 128; Dras,
133; Indus in Kashmir, 139, 166 ;
Basha, 145; Kamri, 188; Kish-
engunga, 190; Burzil, 190.

Rondu, Kashmir village, 167.

Rope-bridges of Kashmir, 139.

Roses in Kashmir, 178, 187, 196.

Rotomahana, Lake, 95.

Rotorua, New Zealand, 91 ; aspect
of neighborhood, 91, 95, 99-104 ;
hot springs, 98.

Rotorua Lake, 100 ; Hamurana
Spring, 101.

262

INDEX

Rowbury Hotel at Murree, 209.
Rubber plantations in Malay Pe-
ninsula, 24.

Sakai hill tribes, hunters, 40.

Salia Melik, Perry's shikari, 125,
173, 184.

Sammad Shah, Srinagar merchant,
205.

Seladang-hunting in Malay Penin-
sula, 22, 41, 43.

Selangor, English rule, 24.

Sgrai, 138.

Servants, personal, of guests in
India, 211.

Seydlitz, steamship, 219.

Shah Jehan, building of Taj Ma-
hal, 57, 63-65.

Shanghai, 247.

Sharpu, in Kashmir, 120; stalking,
180, 185-189.

Sheep, wild, of Kashmir, 120.

Shikaris, hiring of, 118; author's,
125; character, 142, 172-176,
184, 187, 190; feast after success-
ful hunt, 156, 157.

Shoes, grass, of Kashmir, 1 29.

Shwe Dagon Pagoda, 215-217.

Sidka, author's shikari, 125, 147,

151, 175-

Simla, 112.

Sind River, 122, 127, 128; travel
through valley, 125-132.

Singapore, smell, 18; Raffles' Ho-
tel, 19; inhabitants, aspect, 19;
part of British Straits Settle-
ments, 25.

Siwai Jai Singh and Jaipore, 54.

Skardu, Kashmir village, 166.

Sleeping on deck on P. and O.
steamship, 12.

Smells, of the East, 14; of Sin*
gapore, 18 ; of Canton, 220.

Sonamarg, Kashmir village, 128.

Sonamarg Gorge, Kashmir, 128.

Sopor, Kashmir village, 204.

Spices, cultivation in Malay Penin-
sula, 24.

Srinagar, pronunciation, 112; travel
between Rawal Pindi and, 112-
115, 207-210; aspect, 115-117;
house-boats, 117; outfitting at,
117-119; flood, 204; shopping
at, 205; boats, 206.

Steamships, various, i, 10, 17, 21,
47,90, 109, 212, 218, 219, 227,
245, 246, 253 ; life on P. and O.,
1-17 ; " Empress " ships, 246.

Stromboli in eruption, 4.

Subsar, Kashmir village, 167.

Suez Canal, life at Port Said, 1-7 ;
and the desert, 7 ; quarantine, 8 ;
coaling, 9; passage, n.

Sufdermogul, Srinagar merchant,
205.

" Suffering Moses " sign at Srina-
gar, 205.

Sullivan, escape from Cawnpore,
74-

Sultan of Perak, 28.

Sultana, Srinagar taxidermist, 206,

Sultana of Perak, unintentional
presentation to, 28.

Supayawlat, Queen, of Burma, 218.

Taiping, Perak town, 25.
Taj Mahal, conception and erec-
tion, 58, 63 ; beauty, 64, 65.
Tamil laborers in Malay Peninsula,

25-

Tarawera volcano, 91, 95 ; eruption
of 1886, 92.

INDEX

263

Tarkutti, Kashmir village, 139.

Tat ft t 112.

Taupo, Lake, 108.

Teak, elephants piling, 214.

Tchsildar, 122, 181.

Temples, at Agra, 61 ; at Benares,
88; Shwe Dagon Pagoda, 215-
217 ; at Canton, 222.

Thales, steamship, 245.

Thebaw, King, 218.

Thomas, author's Cingalee servant,
in Kashmir, 124, 143-145, 172,
181, 210; in China, 220, 227,
230, 246.

Thomson, Lieut. Mowbray, escape
from Cawnpore, 72-74.

TV, 215.

Tiffin-coolies, 125.

Tiger, hunting in Malay Peninsula,
23, 31; hunting in Johore, 45;
cave-dwelling, in China, 226;
Chinese hunters, 229, 234 ; hunt-
ing in China, 231-233, 236-244 ;
preparation of skin, 245.

Tikitere, valley of, 99.

Tin mines in Malay Peninsula,
24.

Tokyo, Japanese hotel, 249-251 ;
imperial chrysanthemum garden-
party, 2 51.

Tombs of Mogul rulers, 61-65.

Tonga, travel by, in Kashmir, 112-

"5-

Towers of Silence at Bombay, 48,
49.

Trade, shops in Colombo, 15; in
Srinagar, Ii6-n8, 205; in Can-
ton, 221, 222.

Tragbal Pass, Kashmir, 191.

Travel, from Marseilles to Colom-
bo, life on P. and O. steamship,

1-17 ; conditions of content-
ment, 3 ; from Colombo to Sin-
gapore, 17-20 ; in interior of Ma-
lay Peninsula, by bullock-cart,
elephant, and raft, 25-44 ; across
Northern India, 47-90; Indian
railways, 52, 56, in ; in hot-
spring region of New Zealand,
91-108; from Calcutta to Ra-
wal Pindi, 1 1 1 ; between Rawal
Pindi and Srinagar, by tonga,
112-115, 207-210; by doonga
on Jhelum River, 121, 122; in
mountains of Kashmir, 122-145,
165-169, 176-185, 189-192, 204;
in Burma, 212-218, from Ran-
goon to Hongkong, 218-219;
Canton, 220-225; fr°m Hong-
kong to Yokohama, 246-248 ; in
Japan, 248-252; Yokohama to
Boston, 253.

Trengganu, English rule, 24.

Tulu, Kashmir village, 167.

Typhoon at Amoy, 245.

Tytler, Col. J. F., at relief of Luck-
now, 80.

Vibart, Major Edward, at massacre

of Cawnpore, 69, 72.
Volcanoes, Stromboli in eruption,

4; Tarawera, 91, 92.

Waning 106.

Waikite Geyser, 102.

Waimungu Geyser, origin and first
eruption, 91-93; danger and dis-
aster, 93-95 ; in eruption, 95, 96.

Wairakei, New Zealand, 108.

Wairoa Geyser, 102.

Wanganui River, 108.

Ward, Rowland, taxidermist, 206.

264

INDEX

Well of Knowledge at Benares, 87.

Whakarewarewa, geysers, 101-103;
Maori settlement, 103.

"Wheeler, A. H., plans travel with
author, 2, 20 ; tiger-hunting in
China, 20, 232; in Johore, 45,
46 ; in Philippines, 108, 1 1 1 ; in
Kashmir, 158, 177; reception as
Maharajah, 158-165.

Wheeler, Sir Hugh, at siege of
Cawnpore, 67, 69.

William, Fort, Calcutta, 210.
Willis, Capt. F. A., at relief of

Luck now, 80.
Wilson, Capt. T. F., at Lucknow,

77-
Woosung, China, 247.

Yokohama, harbor, 248, 252.

Zogi La Pass, Kashmir, 121, 131.
Zoroaster, religion, 50.

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