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CHAPTER IX. 



FROM KASHMIR TO KUSSOWLTE. 1850-1851. 



Early iu June Hodsoii quitted Amritsar to join 

 Sir Henry Lawrence on the road to Kashmir. By 

 the 10th they had reached the summit of the first 

 high ridge southward of the snowy range, and were 

 only about sixty miles from the valley itself. "To 

 me," he writes, "travelling is life, and in a country 

 where one has no home, no local attractions, and no 

 special sympathies, it is the greatest comfort in the 

 world. I get terribly ennuye if I am in one place 

 for three months at a time ; yet I think I should be 

 just as tame as ever in England, quite domestic 

 again." 



The travellers were resting in the Kashmir valley, 

 the beauty of which enraptured Hodson, who had 

 only seen it before in its winter dress. "Nothing 

 can exceed the luxuriant beauty of the vegetation, 

 the plane-trees and walnuts especially, except the 

 squalor, dirt, and poverty of the wretched Kashmir- 

 ians. The king is avaricious, and is old. The 

 disease grows on him, and he won't look beyond 

 his money-bags. There is a capitation tax on 

 every individual practising any labour, trade, pro- 

 fession, or employment, collected daily. Fancy the 



H 



