A Holiday in the Happy Valley with Pen and Pencil Part 30

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.

In all communities where the men are invertebrate the women become the real heads of the family, doing not only most of the actual work, but also taking the dominant position in affairs generally. This I have observed strikingly in the case of the three "slackest" male races I know--the Fantis of the Gold Coast, the Kashmiri, and the crofters of the West Highlands.

Opinion is divided on the question of female loveliness in Kashmir.

Marco Polo (who probably only got his ideas of "Kesmur" from hearsay) echoed the prevalent opinion by saying, "The women although dark are very comely" (ch. xxvii.). Bernier is enthusiastic: "Les femmes surtout y sont tres-belles," and hints at their popularity among the Moguls.

Moorcroft, Vigne, and others swelled the laudatory chorus until Forster, "having been prepossessed with an opinion of their charms, suffered a sensible disappointment," and even was so rude as to criticise the ladies'

legs, which he considered thick!

Lawrence saw "thousands of women in the villages, and could not remember, save one or two exceptions, ever seeing a really beautiful face;" but the heaviest blow was dealt them by Jacquemont, who, as a gay Frenchman, should have been an excellent judge: "Je n'avais jamais vu auparavant d'aussi affreuses sorcieres!"

APPENDIX III

I had hoped to have given, through the kindness of Colonel Ward, a full list of the birds of Kashmir. Up to the time of going to press, however, the complete list has not been made out. A very large proportion, however, has been published in the _Journal of the Bombay Nat. Hist. Society_. I would refer those desirous of a knowledge of the birds of Kashmir to the above Journal for 23rd April and 20th Sept. 1906, and 15th Feb. 1907. Also to Hume and Henderson's _Lah.o.r.e to Yarkand_, and to Le Mesurier's _Game, Sh.o.r.e, and Water Birds of India_, to which I am indebted for the following:--

"In Kashmir, out of 116 genera of land birds, 34 have a wide range, 32 are characteristic of the Palar Arctic, 29 of the Indian, and 21 of the Himalo-Chinese sub-region. Only one species is peculiar to Kashmir, a very normal bullfinch (pyrula)."

The flora, which is most interesting, has yet (as far as I know) to be treated independently of the neighbouring regions. Royle is scientific but antiquated, and I know of no better list than that given by Lawrence in his _Valley of Kashmir_.

APPENDIX IV

It may interest any one intending a trip to Kashmir to see a note of reasonable expenses as incurred by two people during a nine-month absence from England. Therefore I append a precis of ours.

It is to be remembered that a saving might be effected in many particulars by any one knowing something of the country. We had to buy our experience.

Fully 10 or 12 could be saved in wages, as at first we had a fighting tail like "Ta Phairson" of "four-and-twenty men and five-and-thirty pipers"--and pipers have to be paid! We also hired tents when we did not really require them. Against these outgoings, however, it should be borne in mind that, thanks to the kindness of friends, we paid a merely nominal rent for a "State" hut at Gulmarg. At Abbotabad, Jaipur, and Udaipur, also, we had no hotel bills to meet.