"
"Many fowls in a yard defile it, and many Kashmiri in a country ruin it,"
says the proverb. Lawrence goes very fully into the Kashmiri character,
and dwells upon its few good points, giving him credit for great artistic
feeling, quick wit, ready repartee, and freedom from crime against the
person. He considers the last merit, though, to be due to cowardice and
the state of espionage which exists in every village!
I was told (but perhaps by a prejudiced person) of a Kashmiri who, during
the great flood of 1903, he being safely on the shore, saw his brother
being swept down the boiling river, clinging to his rapidly disintegrating
roof. The following painful conversation ensued:--
"Whither sailest thou, oh brother, perched upon the birch bark of thine
ancestral roof?"
"Ah! brother dear. Save me quick! I drown!"
"Truly that can I; but say, what recompense wilt thou give me?"
"All I have in the world, brother--two lovely rupees."
"Tut, tut, little one; thou takest me for a fool. Two rupees, forsooth,
for five perchance I will deign to save thy worthless life."
"Three, then, three, carissimo--'tis all I have--and make haste, for I
feel my timbers parting, and I know not how to swim."
"Farewell, oh, dearest brother! I could not possibly think of taking so
much trouble for three rupees, especially as, now I come to think of it, I
can borrow a singhara pole, and, in due time, will prod for thy corpse in
the Wular! Mind thou wrappest the lucre snugly in thy cummerbund, that it
be not lost--farewell, little brother!"
While the gentlemen of the Happy Valley have been lashed by the tongue and
pen of every traveller, the ladies, on the contrary, have been rather
overrated.
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