lo THE FORESTS OF UPPER INDIA 



for himself a fine two-storied house, with glazed-in 

 verandahs, on a plateau of Aya Pathar, found it a de- 

 lightful residence for the hot weather ; and Naini Tal 

 had become the summer headquarters of the North- West 

 Provinces Government. The Lieutenant-Governor had 

 his residence there, as well as other officials, and it soon 

 attracted the many sufferers from the heat of the plains, 

 and was the resort of retired servants of John Company 

 who preferred to live out their days in the country to 

 which they had got used, and which they loved as their 

 home and the scene of hard and interesting lifelong work 

 among the friends they trusted. 



The difficulties of supplying a colony so large, and includ- 

 ing invalid troops, where even the Mem Sahib's piano had 

 to be carried up by coolies, were becoming aggravated. 

 Government therefore decided to construct a cart-road to 

 connect so important a station with the plains. In those 

 days of activity and fresh awakening after the terrible 

 troubles of the Mutiny, there was very little red tape or 

 routine about the Government. Men of the right stamp 

 had shone out, and worked the machine, while the ineffi- 

 cient and slow had dropped out of authority. Con- 

 spicuous as one who had formed and administered the 

 provinces of Garhwal and Kumaon from their acquisition, 

 with brilliant success, was the well-proved and honoured 

 Colonel Henry Ramsay, C.B.,* Commissioner of Kumaon 

 and Garhwal. He had saved his division by his prompt 

 action in promising the Gurkha sepoys the contents of 

 the treasury at Almora, when the fate of India was hang- 

 ing on a thread as it were, during the worst period of the 

 Mutiny, when not a European soldier was near to protect 

 the hundreds of women and children, refugees from 

 Mussooree and the plains. He was the acknowledged 

 * Afterwards Hon, Sir Henry Ramsay, K.C.B. 



