From This We Gradually Got Into A Region Of Fruit-Trees, Interspersed
With Pines; And Sometimes We Came Upon A Group Of Scented Palms, Which
Looked Strangely Enough In Such Unusual Company.
Through clustering
pomegranates, figs, plums, peach-trees, wild but bearing fruit, we
journeyed on and on; and, as new
Beauties arose around us, we could
not help indulging in castles in the air, and forming visions of
earthly paradises, where, with the addition only of such importations
as are inseparable from all ideas of paradise, either in Cashmere or
elsewhere, one might live in uninterrupted enjoyment of existence,
and, at least, bury in oblivion all remembrance of such regions as the
"Plains of India."
About ten A.M., after a continuous series of ups-and-downs of varied
scenery, we arrived at "Chungas," a picturesque old serai, perched
upon a hill over the river. It was marked off in our route as having no
accommodation, but, located among the mouldering remnants of grandeur
of an old temple in the centre of the serai, we managed to make
ourselves very comfortable, and thought our "accommodation" a most
decided improvement upon our late fashionable but rather overcrowded
halting-place. From the serai we can see, for the first time, the
snowy range of the Himalayas, trending northwards, towards the Peer
Punjal Pass, through which our route leads into the Valley of Cashmere.
JUNE 17. - Another ride through hill and dale to "Rajaori," or
"Rampore," a most picturesque-looking town, built in every possible
style of architecture, and flanked at one extremity by a ruined
castle.
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