772 Some account of the valley of Kashmir. [Sept. 



is strewed a fine cake of earth with grass seed ; and the rain cannot 

 penetrate. 



The shawl dukdns or looms in all Kashmir are in number about 

 3,000 or a few more. Two or three men are employed at each. A 

 large and rich pair of shawls (2,500 rupees) occupies fifteen men for 

 eight months. The wool is brought first from Jautan or Chautan, 

 thence to Ruddk, fifteen days ; thence to Laddk fifteen more : it is 

 carried on the back of mountain sheep. Poor Henderson would 

 have told you more of this had he lived. His enterprize led him 

 without any comforts about him to the foot of the Karakharam moun- 

 tains, and he is the first European who has ascertained the course of 

 the Indus, from a distance of eight days' march to the north of Laddk. 

 I have no time here to relate the processes it undergoes, beyond 

 that the thread when dyed is dipped in rice water to strengthen it for 

 the weaver. It then becomes necessary to soften the shawl. This is 

 done at one particular spot near the city. The shawls are washed 

 with bruised kritz, the root of a parasitical plant. Soap is only added 

 for the white shawls. I have sent specimens of this root and of the 

 soil at the washing place to Mr. Edgeworth of Amballa. 



The shawls altogether have never been better than at present, 

 in the time of the Patans : and Shah Timur himself has told me that 

 a fine shawl would pass through a finger ring ; but he spoke of those 

 that were neither worked nor colored. Now the patterns are con- 

 stantly changing, and the shawls are very rich and massy. I inspect- 

 ed their colours, of which they have forty shades. But lac and 

 cochineal has been known only for thirty years, and I was much 

 amused and surprized by finding that the dyer extracted a fine green 

 from English sixpenny green baize, and that green and fine blues 

 were much wanted. My informant almost went on his knees to me 

 for some prussian blue ! They will make the pashmina to any pattern 

 or of any material you choose, otherwise silk is very little worked. 



A word on the natural history of the valley. I have seen but six 

 or seven different kinds of fish. Bears are numerous and very 

 large. Musk-deer plentiful in the southern forests. The Chikor or 

 red-legged Himalayan partridges plentiful near the hills ; but as a 

 sportsman I can hardly believe my eyes and ears when asserting that 

 I have never seen a hare in any part of Kashmir, although the ground 

 is the most likely imaginable. I do not say there are none ; but every 

 one tells me so. I saw yesterday in the jangal a young woodcock. — I 

 am sure of it. None of the foxes of this place have the black or grey 

 mark*. Wild ducks are in immense numbers in the winter ; they 



* This part of the MS. is so completely effaced by wet on the road that it is 



