THE PUHAEEIES. 105 



to like and appreciate the good qualities of 

 the Puharries, which subsequent expeditions 

 in the hills only confirmed. They are a fine 

 set of fellows, strong and hard as iron, and 

 much attached to Europeans who treat them 

 well. Civil without servility and honest as 

 the day, you might send a basket full of pice 

 from one end of their country to the other 

 without losing one ; but this is not the case, 

 either in Koonawur or in Cashmere ; in 

 Thibet they are equally to be trusted as in 

 the valley of the Ganges. Year after year 

 we had the same men with us, changing 

 perhaps a brother for a brother or a cousin, 

 but all from the same part of the hills, 

 except a few men from the lower villages in 

 Wilson's immediate vicinity, and although 

 at first averse to going any great distance 

 from their homes, they at last volunteered to 

 accompany us even into Cashmere. They 

 are not so bigotted in matters of caste and 

 religion as the people of the lower ranges 

 and the plains ; but although all Hindoos 

 and hard ridden by the Brahmin priests. 



