242 TRAVEL, ADVENTURE, AND SPORT. 



of the Kashmiri language ; but he had also published 

 letters complaining of the carelessness of the Govern- 

 ment in regard to a visitation of cholera which had 

 carried off large numbers of the people, and pointing 

 out that sanitary measures might save the lives of 

 thousands every year from small-pox and other dis- 

 eases. The Srinagar rumour was that his servants 

 had been offered so much to poison him within 

 the Kashmir territory, and so much more if they 

 would do so after he got beyond. Unfortunately 

 Dr Elmslie also died rather suddenly shortly after 

 he had got beyond the Kashmir borders, and, it 

 seems, also of heart disease. Mr Hayward had pub- 

 lished letters in the Indian papers complaining of 

 the conduct of the Kashmir troops in Gilgit, and on 

 the borders of Yassin, and he somewhat injudiciously 

 returned to that part of the world. .But I do not 

 attach any importance to the gossip of Eastern cities 

 or of any cities, for that matter ; and there has 

 appeared no ground to suppose that his death was 

 planned by Kashmir officials, but what befell him 

 was very sad. He was on his way to the Pamir 

 Steppe, and somewhere about Yassin was in the 

 territory of a chief who camped two hundred armed 

 men in a wood near his tent. The next day's journey 

 would have taken Hayward beyond this chief's border ; 

 and, suspecting mischief, he sat up all night writing 

 with revolver in hand. Unfortunately, however, in 

 the grey of the morning, he lay down to take half an 



