The Bridges Are Annually Swept Away, And
So Suddenly Does The Hard Weather Make Its Appearance, That Even Now
The Inhabitants Were In Fear And Trembling Lest The Snows Should Come
Down On Them Before Their Crops Of Wheat And Barley Were Carried For
The Winter's Use.
Numbers of fields of corn are still within a week or so of ripening,
and, should they be lost, the chance of winter's subsistence would
be small indeed.
The appearance of a Thibetian settlement here, as one looks down upon
it from a height, is very much that of an ant-hill. The huts are built
on the top of each other, and generally on mounds, and the people,
like ants, are busily and laboriously employed in laying up their
winter store, not only of grain, but also of firewood, and anything
capable of serving in its place, to enable them to struggle through
their dreary mouths of captivity.
Huge loads of corn and stacks are to be seen moving about, apparently
spontaneously, disappearing through queer holes and corners of the
earth, and again appearing on the housetops, where they are stacked
and stored. The bundles of fire-wood being placed with the branches
outside, and neatly ranged, they give the peaceful settlement quite
a bristling and warlike appearance, as if defended by CHEVAUX DE
FRISE. The Zemindars here pay but two rupees a year to the Maharajah,
but it seems a hard case that such hardly-subsisting people should
have to pay anything whatever in such a sterile dreary territory as
they possess.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 169 of 303
Words from 45777 to 46037
of 82277
