KASHMIR VALLEYS 29 



can be incomprehensible if only he talks loud enough, 

 and by dint of shoutings and some " sign language " we 

 arrived at a mutual understanding. My diet had been 

 varied once or twice by fish caught in primitive fashion 

 by wading in the water, a small net in the right hand. 

 Deceived by the stillness of the fisherman, fish would 

 make for the entrance kept open by fine bamboos, and 

 then with swift movement of the left hand the unwary 

 victim was hustled into the trap ! The fish were neither 

 large nor particularly well flavoured, but a change from 

 skinny murgi (fowl) was pleasant, and I also enjoyed 

 the " singhara " water nuts, dug up in vast quantities 

 from the bottom of the Wular, where they sink when 

 ripe. They are shelled, roasted, and eaten with ghi 

 (clarified butter) and salt, and have rather the taste of 

 chestnuts, and are most nourishing. Some more days 

 of pleasant loitering, and then I decided to attempt the 

 climb to the great Tragbal Pass, the main thoroughfare 

 by which the distant Fort of Gilgit is reached, some one 

 hundred and ninety-five miles from Bandipura, usually 

 divided into fourteen marches. Regularly every year 

 as the pass becomes open, troops go up to relieve the 

 garrison there, and unprotected parties can travel on 

 the road with no fear of murder or pillage. There is 

 an alternative route over the Zogi La, which has the 

 advantage of being free of snow for a longer period of 

 the year, but it is not so direct, and the road is really 

 difficult in parts. It is only from April to September 

 that these passes afford at all an easy passage. Even 

 then they are liable to sudden tremendous snow- 

 storms. In the winter months they are crossed by dak 

 runners and coolies, but are far from safe. 



I had been told that it was too early to cross the 



