The early morning sun struck full on his untrodden snows, making it hard
to realise that eighty-five miles of air separated me from that clear-cut
peak. Soon, very soon, a light cloud clung to his eastern face, and within
ten minutes the whole vision had faded into an up-piled tower of seething
clouds.
Later in the season, as the air grew clearer, Jane and I made almost daily
pilgrimages to the point, only a few minutes' walk from our hut, whence,
framed by a foreground of columnar pines, Nanga Parbat could generally be
seen for a time in the morning.
_Tuesday, August_ 1.--Society in Gulmarg is particularly cheery, as indeed
might be expected where two or three hundred English men and women are
gathered together to amuse themselves and lay in a fresh store of health
and energy before returning to the routine of duty in the plains.
There have been many picnics lately, the little glades or margs, which are
frequent in the forest slopes, being ideal places of rendezvous for
merrymakers on horse or foot. Picnics of all sorts and sizes, from the
little impromptu gatherings of half-a-dozen congenial young souls (always
an even number, please), who ride off into the romantic shades to nibble
biscuits and make tea, to the dainty repasts provided by a hospitable lady,
whose official hut overlooks the Ferozepore Nullah, and who, in turn,
overlooks her cook, to the great gratification of her guests.
How small a thing will upset the best-laid plans of hospitality! It is
said that a most carefully planned picnic, where all the little tables,
set for two, were discreetly screened apart among the bushes, was entirely
ruined by a piratical damsel undertaking a cutting-out expedition for the
capture of the hostess' best young man.
Pages:
175
176
177
178
179
180
181
182
183
184
185
186
187
188
189
190
191
192
193
194
195
196
197
198
199