much matter. The value of this butler was equalled by that of a very bright, intelligent, little Kunait boy about fifteen, called Nurdass, whom I picked up at Shaso, close to the Chinese frontier, and who, as he spoke Tibetan and Hindústhani, as well as his native Kunáwari, served me as interpreter on great part of my journey, besides being useful in a hundred different ways. These were the two gems of my small entourage. A Kunáwar Múnshi called Phúleyram, who went with me from Kotgarh as far as Kashmir, was chiefly of use in getting my tent and bed put up. The only other regular attendant I had was an Afghan cook called Chota Khan, or the "Little Chief,”-a man of great size and weight, of rather bullying propensities, though. very useful on a journey, who kept everybody except myself in awe, and who was afraid of nothing except of crossing a jhúla or twig bridge. Whenever a young lamb or ancient ram was brought to us for sale, the way in which Chota Khan bellowed out thunders of abuse (chiefly with an eye to the satisfaction of his own capacious stomach) was exceedingly useful, and really frightened the astonished lambadars. It was a great pleasure to everybody when we came to a jhúla, because then the giant died, the hero broke down utterly, and had to be silent for the rest of the day,-until in the evening, among his pots and pans, and after cutting the throat of a sheep in orthodox Mohammedan fashion, with an exclamation which sounded much more like a curse than a blessing, he became himself again. All the other people I required, whether coolies, guides, or yakmen, were had from village to village. At Simla I engaged eight jhanpanwallahs to carry me in a dandi; but after five days this agreement was ended by mutual consent, and I depended entirely on people taken from stage to stage, and on glúnts and yaks.

Thus may it be understood with what appliances of

travel I started from Simla in the commencement of June; but it was not until after the experience of a few days' journey, and I got to Kotgarh, that I managed to bring things into order, and was able to cut down the twenty-eight coolies with which I started to about twelve (or double that number of boys and women at half-pay), exclusive of those I might or might not need for my own carriage.

CHAPTER X.

SIMLA TO THE SUTLEJ.

THE GREAT HINDÚSTHAN AND TIBET ROAD-FATAL ACCIDENTSFEELINGS ON GOING OVER A PRECIPICE-THE DANDI-BUMPING DIVISIONS OF THE ROAD-VIEW FROM NARKANDA-KOTGARH AND ITS MISSION COLONEL MOORE THE GLOOMY SUTLEJ VALLEY.

THE cut bridle-path, which has been dignified by the name of "The Great Hindústhan and Tibet Road," that leads along the sides of the hills from Simla to the Narkanda Ghaut, and from Narkanda up the valley of the Sutlej to Chini and Pangay, is by no means so exasperating as the native paths of the inner Himálaya. It does not require one to dismount every five minutes; and though it does go down into some terrific gorges, at the bottom of which there is quite a tropical climate in summer, yet, on the whole, it is pretty level, and never compels one (as the other roads too often and too sadly do) to go up a mile of perpendicular height in the morning, only to go down a mile of perpendicular depth in the afternoon. Its wooden bridges can be traversed on horseback; it is not much exposed to falling rocks; it is free from avalanches, either of snow or granite; and it never compels one to endure the almost infuriating misery of having every now and then to cross miles of rugged blocks of stone, across which no ragged rascal that ever lived could possibly run.

Nevertheless, the cut road, running as it often does without any parapet, or with none to speak of, and only seven or eight feet broad, across the face of enormous precipices and nearly precipitous slopes, is even more dangerous for equestrians than are the rude native paths. Almost every year some fatal accident happens upon it, and the wonder only is, that people who set any value upon their lives are so foolhardy as to ride upon it at all. A gentleman of the Forest Department, resident at Nachar, remarked to me that it was strange that, though he had been a cavalry officer, he never mounted a horse in the course of his mountain journeys; but it struck me, though he might not have reasoned out the matter, it was just because he had been a cavalry officer, and knew the nature of horses, that he never rode on such paths as he had to traverse in Kunáwar. No animal is so easily startled as a horse, or so readily becomes restive: it will shy at an oyster-shell, though doing so may dash it to pieces over a precipice; and one can easily guess what danger its rider incurs on a narrow parapetless road above a precipice where there are monkeys and falling rocks to startle it, and where there are obstinate hillmen who will salaam the rider, say what he may, and who take the inner side of the road, in order to prop their burdens against the rock, and to have a good look at him as he passes.

One of the saddest of the accidents which have thus happened was that which befell a very young lady, a daughter of the Rev. Mr Rebsch, the missionary at Kotgarh. She was riding across the tremendous Rogi cliffs, and, though a wooden railing has since been put at the place, there was nothing between her and the precipice, when her pony shied and carried her over to instant death. In another case, the victim, a Mr Leith, was on his marriage trip, and his newly-married wife was close beside him, and had just exchanged horses

with him, when, in trying to cure his steed of a habit it had of rubbing against the rock wall, it backed towards the precipice, and its hind feet getting over, both horse and rider were dashed to pieces. This happened between Serahan and Taranda, near the spot where the road gave way under Sir Alexander Lawrence, a nephew of Lord Lawrence, the then Governor-General. Sir Alexander was riding a heavy Australian horse, and the part of the road which gave way was wooden planking, supported out from the face of the precipice by iron stanchions. I made my coolies throw over a large log of wood where he went down; and, as it struck the rocks in its fall, it sent out showers of white splinters, so that the solid wood was reduced to half its original size before it reached a resting-place. In the case of the wife of General Brind, that lady was quietly making a sketch on horseback, from the road between Theog and Muttiana, and her syce was holding the horse, when it was startled by some falling stones, and all three went over and were destroyed. Not very long after I went up this lethal road, a Calcutta judge, of one of the subordinate courts, went over it and was killed in the presence of some ladies with whom he was riding, owing simply to his horse becoming restive. An eyewitness of another of these frightful accidents told me that when the horse's hind foot got off the road, it struggled for about half a minute in that position, and the rider had plenty of time to dismount safely, and might easily have done so, but a species of paralysis seemed to come over him; his face turned deadly white, and he sat on the horse without making the least effort to save himself, until they both went over backwards. The sufferer is usually a little too late in attempting to dismount. Theoretically, it may seem easy enough to disengage one's self from a horse when it is struggling on the brink of a precipice; but let my