FROM SABATHU TO KASHMIR. 47 



night for some time now writing for Colonel 

 Lawrence." 



In the last week of October Lawrence was en- 

 camped at Thana, at the foot of a pass leading into 

 the peerless valley of Kashmir. Hodson himself 

 was one of the very few English officers who had 

 accompanied him on that memorable march. On 

 the plain below were lying in picturesque confusion 

 and motley garb the combined forces of Jammu and 

 Lahore. " The spare stalwart Sikh, with his grizzled 

 beard and blue turban of the scantiest dimensions, 

 side by side with the huge -limbed Afghan, with 

 voluminous head-gear and many-coloured garments. 

 The proud Brahmin in the same ranks with the 

 fierce ' Children of the Faithful ' ; the little active 

 hillman ; the diminutive, sturdy, platter - faced 

 Gurkha, and the slight-made Hindustani, collected 

 in the same tents, and all alike clothed in a caricature 

 of the British uniform." 



Hodson had seen "a great deal of the native 

 sirdars, or chiefs, especially Tej Singh, who com- 

 manded the Sikh forces in the war, and of the 

 Maharajah, — the former a small, spare, little man, 

 marked with the smallpox, and with a thin scanty 

 beard, but sharp and intelligent, and by his own 

 account a hero." The Maharajah, Gulab Singh, was 

 "a fine, tall, portly man, with a splendid expressive 

 face, and most gentlemanly pleasing manner, and 

 fine -toned voice — altogether the most pleasing 

 Asiatic I have seen, to all appearance the gentlest 

 of the gentle, and the most sincere and truthful 

 character in the world. And in his habits he is 

 certainly exemplary ; but he is the cleverest hypo- 

 crite in the world ; as sharp and acute as possible, 



