238 A Sportswoman in India 



provisions and their pots and pans. It is dastur that 

 a Kashmiri cook should rise to the occasion ; and, 

 following " custom," ours cooked for us there in the 

 snow as he never had in the warm valleys. At lunch, 

 in my tent, appeared mutton chops, chip-potatoes, and 

 apple tart, all hot ; again for dinner, excellent soup, 

 mixed pie of pheasant, etc., poached eggs, and plum 

 pudding, all out of this circle in the snow ! Sala Bux 

 was ill all day with fever, after his night out with S. 



We went for a walk in the afternoon, floundering 

 along so slowly that we barely got a mile ; but 

 in the rarefied, intoxicating air it was grand exercise, 

 and the limitless shroud of white over the whole 

 world, as it seemed, was a wonderful sight light, 

 powdery, sparkling like diamonds. Down in the river, 

 in a little black pool broken among the ice and snow, 

 we came upon a brace of teal, which S. shot, and later 

 on a pair of pigeons, all a useful addition to our larder. 

 Our anxiety about getting down out of these regions 

 was set at rest that night by Lalla returning with a 

 band of coolies he had raised from the nearest village. 



Towards evening it froze intensely, with the stars 

 as bright as jewels, the earth spread out in lustrous 

 twilight, and a profound solemnity, an unbroken still- 

 ness. The full moon rose over the top of the nullah 

 as a patin of pure silver, casting on the snow long 

 shadows of the great mountains and the pine-trees, 

 the burdened rock, the shaggy foreland. In the great 

 white desolation distance was a mocking vision ; hills 

 looked near and nullahs far, when hills were far and 



