The active figures of the propellent Mangis, and the quiet ones of their
ladies at the helm, completed a picture to be recalled with a sigh when we
are parted by thousands of miles from this entrancing valley.
Sopor we had understood to be but an uninteresting place, but we were,
perhaps, inclined to regard things Kashmirian through somewhat rosy
spectacles. Anyhow, we rather liked Sopor. Mooring close alongside a
remarkably picturesque building standing in the midst of a smooth green
lawn, which was once, I believe, a dak bungalow, we halted to make
arrangements for the hire of coolies and ponies to take us inland, and I
went off to the post-office for letters and to make inquiries as to the
probable depth of water in the river Pohru.
Our skipper, Juma, affirmed that there was no water to speak of; but Juma
probably--nay, certainly--prefers the _otium_ of a sojourn at Sopor to the
toil of punting up the Pohru.
The postmaster declared that there was lots of water, but qualified his
optimism by saying that it was falling fast. So we arranged for our land
transport of ponies for ourselves, and a dandy for Hesketh, to meet us one
march up the river at Nopura, while we ourselves set forward in our boats
to Dubgam, three or four miles down the Jhelum, where the Pohru joins it.
At the entrance are large stores of timber, principally deodar, which is
floated down from the Lolab, stored at Dubgam, and sent thence down
country and otherwhere for sale.
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