88 WANDEKINGS OF A 



and handsomer than the hill-men around Dugshai. Many of 

 the young women were fair and beautiful. Here we observed 

 beehives in the walls of the houses, and were informed that 

 when their owners wished to take the honey they did so by 

 beating drums ' behind the hives, until the bees were fairly 

 frightened away, when the outer apertures were closed. This 

 method was practically illustrated to us by a villager beating 

 on a tom-tom with a violence sufficient to have terrified a 

 much less sentient animal than the bee. 



Next day we mounted a ridge leading towards the Chor 

 mountain through forests of oak, deodar, and pine. On the 

 way were observed several monal pheasants (Lophophorus 

 impeyanus), but beyond a transient glimpse of them as they 

 flashed down the vast ravines, amid a blaze of dazzling reflec- 

 tions from their gorgeous plumage, we were unable to get 

 within even rifle distance of them. 



Several red-legged partridges {Gaccahis cJmhar) were killed 

 on the bare rocky places. In little sheltered nooks I gathered 

 two sorts of primroses, which I subsequently discovered to be 

 the Primula purpwea and oUusifolia of Eoyle. The British 

 bracken was plentiful. We were much struck with the mag- 

 nificence of the forest-trees, which attain vast size at these 

 altitudes. 



The height of the Chor is 10,688 feet above the level of 

 the sea, and is composed chiefly of mica-schist and clay-slate, 

 with intrusive dykes or veius of granite. Boulders of the same 

 rock were abundant on the valleys. The summit of the moun- 

 tain is composed entirely of granite. Gneiss was also often 

 met with on the ridges. Both are, however, large-grained and 

 coarse, the quartz predominating. Sometimes great veins of 

 quartz are observed, containing nodules and crystals of horn- 

 blende, especially in the ridge above the village of Churass, 



