128 SPORT AND TRAVEL 



beside a brook, and in the afternoon pushed on to 

 Goond, the end of the stage. Here as before the 

 tents were pitched on a grassy plateau overlooking 

 a deep cleft in the valley, which had already nar- 

 rowed perceptibly: ahead were snow-mountains, 

 and behind, our last view of the Valley of Kash- 

 mir, framed in a vista of blossoming apricot trees, 

 meadow -land, forest, and river. 



But two more stages were to bring us into sur- 

 roundings as desolate and wintry as the present 

 landscape was warm and beautiful. For a short way 

 the route led up the valley over a pretty road, with 

 fruit trees all in blossom and new snow-mountains 

 continually appearing. Then suddenly the flanking 

 hills closed in, the rocky sides of steep mountains 

 rose on each side, the snow falling in small glaciers 

 to their very foot, and the river swirled wildly 

 through a narrow channel, the entrance to the Sona- 

 marg Gorge. Fully ten miles brought us once more 

 out into the open, but here no pleasing valley ap- 

 peared ; only a vast field of snow extending straight 

 away for miles, inclosed between grand and jagged 

 peaks, and near its other end a group of rude little 

 huts, the village of Sonamarg. A dirty hovel, bear- 

 ing over its door the unconvincing sign, " Telegraph 

 Office," was to us, weary and with soaked chaplis, as 

 luxurious a hostelry as I remember ever having run 



