From Egypt to Japan

But suppose all difficulties vanquished – the deserts crossed and the mountains scaled, and the Russians descending the passes of the Himalayas – what an army must they meet at its foot! Not a feeble race, like that which fled before Nadir Shah or Tamerlane. With the railways traversing all India, almost the whole Anglo-Indian army could be transported to the Punjaub in a few days, and ready to receive the invaders.

With these defences in the country itself, add another supreme fact, that England is absolute master of the sea, and that Russia has no means of approach except over the deserts and the mountains, and it will be seen that the difficulties in the way of a Russian invasion render it practically impossible, at least for a long time to come. What may come to pass in another century, no man can foresee; but of this I feel well assured, that there will be no Russian invasion within the lifetime of this generation.

We had now reached the limit of our journey to the North, though we would have gladly gone farther. Dr. Newton had spent the last summer in Cashmere, and told us much of its beauty. We longed to cross the mountains, but it was too early in the year. The passes were still blocked up with snow. It would be months before we could make our way over into the Vale of Cashmere. And so, though we "lifted up our eyes unto the hills," we had to turn back from seeing the glory beyond. Might we not comfort ourselves by saying with Mohammed, as he looked down upon Damascus, "There is but one Paradise for man, and I will turn away my eyes from this, lest I lose that which is to come."

And so we turned away our eyes from beholding Paradise. But we had seen enough. So we thought as on Saturday evening we rode out to the Shalamir gardens, where an emperor had made a retreat, and laid out gardens with fountains, and every possible accompaniment of luxury and pride. All remains as he left it, but silent and deserted. Emperor and court are gone, and as we walked through the gardens, our own footfall on the marble pavement was the only sound that broke the stillness of the place. But the beauty is as great as ever under the clear, full moon, which, as we rode back, recalled the lines of Scott on Melrose:

"And home returning, sooth declare,Was ever scene so sad and fair?"

CHAPTER XV

A WEEK IN THE HIMALAYAS

Ever since we landed in India my chief desire has been to see the Himalayas. I had seen Mont Blanc, the highest mountain in Europe, and now wished to look upon the highest mountains in Asia, or the world. To reach them we had travelled nearly fifteen hundred miles. We had already had a distant view of them at night, lighted up by fires blazing along their sides; but to come into their presence one must leave the railway and cross the country some forty miles.

We left Lahore Monday morning, and at noon were at Lodiana, a place with sacred missionary associations; which we left at midnight, and in the morning reached Saharanpur, where also is one of our Presbyterian missions. Rev. Mr. Calderwood met us at the station, and made us welcome to his home, and sped us on our way to the Hills.

Saharanpur is forty-two miles distant from Dehra Doon, the beautiful valley which lies at the foot of the Himalayas. A mail wagon runs daily, but as it suited our convenience better, we chartered a vehicle not unlike an omnibus, and which the natives, improving on the English, call an omnibukus. It is a long covered gharri, that looks more like a prison van than anything else to which I can compare it, and reminded me of the Black Maria that halts before the Tombs in New York to convey prisoners to Blackwell's Island. There are only two seats running lengthwise, as they are made to lie down upon in case of necessity. Much of the travelling is at night, and "old Indians," who are used to the ways of the country, will spread their "resais" and sleep soundly over all the joltings of the road. But we could sleep about as well inside of a bass drum. So we gave up the idea of repose, and preferred to travel by day to see the country, for which this sort of conveyance is very well contrived. The canvas top keeps off the sun, while the latticed slides (which are regular green blinds), drawn back, give a fine view of the country as we go rolling over the road. Our charioteer, excited by the promise of a liberal backsheesh if he should get us into Dehra Doon before nightfall, drove at full speed. Every five or six miles the blast of his horn told those at the next stage that somebody was coming, and that a relay of fresh horses must be ready. As we approached the hills he put on an extra horse, and then two, so that we were driving four-in-hand. Then as the hills grew steeper, he took two mules, with a horse in front as a leader, mounted by a postilion, who, with his white dress and turbaned head, made a very picturesque appearance. How gallantly he rode! He struck his heels into the spirited little pony and set him into a gallop, which the mules could but follow, and so we went tearing up hill and down dale at a furious rate; while the coachman blew his horn louder still to warn common folks to get out of the way, and the natives drew to the roadside, wondering what great man it was who thus dashed by.

But horses and mules were not enough to sustain such a load of dignity, and at the last stage the driver took a pair of the beautiful white hump-backed oxen of the country, which drew us to the top of the pass. The hills which we thus cross are known as the Sewalic range. The top once attained, two horses were quite enough to take us down, and we descended rapidly. And now rose before us a vision of beauty such as we had not seen in all India. The vale of Dehra Doon is enclosed between two walls of mountains – the Sewalic range on one side, and the first range of the Himalayas on the other. It is fifteen miles wide, and about sixty miles long, extending from the Jumna to the Ganges. Thus it lies between two mountains and two rivers, and has a temperature and a moisture which keep it in perpetual green. Nothing can be more graceful than the tall feathery bamboos, which here grow to a great height. Here are fine specimens of the peepul tree – the sacred tree of India, massive as an English oak – and groves of mangoes. Everything seems to grow here – tea, coffee, tobacco, cinnamon, cloves. The appearance of this rich valley, thus covered with groves and gardens, to us coming from the burnt plains of India, was like that of a garden of Paradise. Riding on through this mass of foliage, we rattled into the town, but were not obliged to "find our warmest welcome at an inn." Rev. Mr. Herron had kindly invited us to accept his hospitality, and so we inquired for "Herron-sahib," and were driven along a smooth road, embowered in bamboos, to the Missionary Compound, where a large building has been erected for a Female Seminary, chiefly by the labors of Messrs. Woodside and Herron, the latter of whom is in charge of the institution, one of the most complete in India. Here we were most cordially received, and found how welcome, in the farthest part of the world, is the atmosphere of an American home.

But once in presence of the great mountains, we were impatient to climb the first range, to get a view of the snows. Mr. Herron offered to keep us company. We rose at four the next morning, while the stars were still shining, and set out, but could ride only five miles in a carriage, when we came to the foot of the hills, and were obliged to take to the saddle. Our "syces" had led three horses alongside, which we mounted just as the starlight faded, and the gray light of day began to show over the mountain-tops, while our attendants, light of foot, kept by our side in case their services were needed.

And now we begin the ascent, turning hither and thither, as the road winds along the sides of the mountain. The slope of the Himalayas is not a smooth and even one, rising gently through an unbroken forest. The mountain side has been torn by the storms of thousands of years. In the spring, when the snows melt and the rains come, every torrent whose rocky bed is now bare, becomes a foaming flood, rushing down the hills, and tearing its way through the lowlands, till lost in the Jumna or the Ganges. Thus the mountain is broken into innumerable spurs and ridges that shoot out into the valley. Where the scanty herbage can gather like moss on the rocks, there is grazing for sheep and goats and cattle; and these upland pastures, like those of the Alps or the Tyrol, are musical with the tinkling of bells. High up on the mountains they are dark with pines; while on the inner ranges of the Himalayas the mighty cedars "shake like Lebanon."

One can imagine how lovely must be the Vale of Dehra Doon, with its mass of verdure, set in the midst of such rugged mountains. Although we were climbing upward, we could but stop, as we came to turning points in the road, to look back into the valley. Sometimes a projecting ledge of rock offered a fine point of view, on which we reined up our horses; or an old oak, bending its gnarled limbs over us, made a frame to the picture, through which we looked down into the fairest of Indian vales, unless it be the Vale of Cashmere. From such a point the landscape seemed to combine every element of beauty – plains, and woods, and streams and mountains. Across the valley rises the long serrated ridge of the Sewalic range. Within this space is enclosed a great variety of surface – undulating in hill and valley, with green meadows, and villages, and gardens, while here and there, along the banks of the streams, whose beds are now dry, are belts of virgin forest.

The industry of the people, which turns every foot of soil to account, is shown by the way in which the spurs of the mountains are terraced to admit of cultivation. Wherever there is an acre of level ground, there is a patch of green, for the wheat fields are just springing up; and even spaces of but a few rods are planted with potatoes. Thus the sides of the Himalayas are belted with lines of green, like the sides of the Alps as one descends into Italy. The view is especially beautiful at this morning hour as the sun rises, causing the dews to lift from the valley, while here and there a curl of smoke, rising through the mist, marks the place of human habitation.

But we must prick up our horses, for the sun is up, and we are not yet at the top. It is a good ride of two hours (we took three) to the ridge on which are built the two "hill stations" of Mussoorie and Landour – which are great resorts of the English during the summer months. These "stations" do not deserve the name of towns; they are merely straggling Alpine villages. Indeed nowhere in the Alps is there such a cluster of houses at such a height, or in such a spot. There is no "site" for a regular village, no place for a "main street." One might as well think of "laying out" a village along the spine of a sharp-backed whale, as on this narrow mountain ridge. There is hardly an acre of level ground, only the jagged ends of hills, or points of rocks, from which the torrents have swept away the earth on either side, leaving only the bare surface. Yet on these points and edges – wherever there is a shelf of rock to furnish a foundation, the English have built their pretty bungalows, which thus perched in air, 7,500 feet high, look like mountain eyries, and might be the home of the eagles that we see sailing over the valley below. From such a height do they look over the very top of the Sewalic range to the great plains of India.

But we did not stop at this mountain to look back. Dashing through the little straggling bazaar of Landour, we spurred on to the highest point, "Lal Tiba"; from which we hoped for the great view of "the snows." We reached the spot at nine o'clock, but as yet we saw "only in part." Our final vision was to come three days later. Away to the North and East the horizon was filled with mountains, whose summits the foot of man had never trod, but the intervening distance was covered with clouds, out of which rose the snowy domes, like islands in a sea.

My first impression of the Himalayas was one of disappointment, partly because we "could not come nigh unto" them. We saw their summits, but at such a distance that they did not look so high as Mont Blanc, where we could come "even to his feet" in the Vale of Chamouni. But the Himalayas were seventy miles off,4 filling the whole horizon. Nor did they rise up in one mighty chain, like the Cordilleras of Mexico, standing like a wall of rock and snow against the sky; but seemed rather a sea of mountains, boundless and billowy, rising range on range, one overtopping the other, and rolling away to the heart of Asia; or, to change the figure, the mountains appeared as an ice continent, like that of the Polar regions, tossed up here and there into higher and still higher summits, but around which, stretching away to infinity, was the wild and interminable sea.

Thus the view, though different from what I expected, was very grand, and though we had not yet the full, clear vision, yet the sight was sublime and awful, perhaps even more so from the partial obscurity, as great clouds came rolling along the snowy heights, as if the heavenly host uprose at the coming of the day, and were moving rank on rank along the shining battlements.

We had hoped by waiting a few hours to get an unobstructed view, but the clouds seemed to gather rather than disperse, warning us to hasten our descent.

In going up the mountain, C – had kept along with us on horseback, but the long ride to one not used to the saddle had fatigued her so that on the return she was glad to accept Mr. Herron's offer of a dandi, a chair borne by two men, which two others accompanied as relays, while we, mounted as before, followed as outriders. Thus mustering our little force, we began to descend the mountain.

A mile or so from the top we turned aside at the house of a gentleman who was a famous hunter, and who had a large collection of living birds, pheasants and manauls, while the veranda was covered with tiger and leopard skins. He was absent, but his wife (who has the spirit and courage of a huntress, and had often brought down a deer with her own hand) was there, and bade us welcome. She showed us her birds, both living and stuffed, the number of which made her house look like an ornithological museum. To our inquiry she said, "The woods were full of game. Two deer had been shot the evening before."

We asked about higher game. She said that tigers were not common up on the mountain as in the valley. She had two enormous skins, but "the brutes" her husband had shot over in Nepaul. But leopards seemed to be her special pets. When I asked, "Have you many leopards about here?" she laughed as she answered, "I should think so." She often saw them just across a ravine a few rods in front of her house, chasing goats or sheep. "It was great fun." Of late they had become rather troublesome in killing dogs. And so they had been obliged to set traps for them. They framed a kind of cage, with two compartments, in one of which they tied a dog, whose yelpings at night attracted the leopard, who, creeping round and round, to get at his prey, at length dashed in to seize the poor creature, but found bars between them, while the trap closed upon him, and Mr. Leopard was a prisoner. In this way they had caught four the last summer. Then this Highland lady came out from her cottage, and with a rifle put an end to the leopard's career in devouring dogs. The number of skins on the veranda told of their skill and success.

Pursuing my inquiry into the character of her neighbors, I asked, "Have you any snakes about here?" "Oh no," she replied carelessly; "that is to say not many. The cobras do not come up so high on the mountain. But there is a serpent in the woods, a kind of python, but he is a large, lazy creature, that doesn't do any mischief. One day that my husband was out with his gun, he shot one that was eighteen feet long. It was as big around as a log of wood, so that when I came up I sat down and took my tiffin upon it."

While listening to these tales, the clouds had been gathering, and now they were piled in dark masses all around the horizon. The lightning flashed, and we could hear the heavy though distant peals of thunder. Presently the big drops began to fall. There was no time to be lost. We could see that the rain was pouring in the valley, while heavy peals came nearer and nearer, reverberating in the hollows of the mountains. It was a grand spectacle of Nature, that of a storm in the Himalayas. Thunder in front of us, thunder to the right of us, thunder to the left of us! I never had a more exciting ride, except one like it in the Rocky Mountains four years before. At our urgent request, Mr. Herron spurred ahead, and galloped at full speed down the mountain. I came more slowly with C – in the dandi. But we did not lose time, and after an hour's chase, in which we seemed to be running the gauntlet of the storm, "dodging the rain," we were not a little relieved, just as the scattered drops began to fall thicker and faster, to come into the yard of the hotel at Rajpore.

The brave fellows who had brought the dandi deserved a reward, although Mr. Herron said they were his servants. I wanted to give them a rupee each, but he would not hear of it, and when I insisted on giving at least a couple of rupees for the four, which would be twenty-five cents a piece, the poor fellows were so overcome with my generosity that they bowed almost to the ground in acknowledgment, and went off hugging each other with delight at the small fortune which had fallen to them.

At Rajpore the carriage was waiting for us, and under its cover from the rain, we rode back, talking of the incidents of the day; and when we got home and stretched ourselves before the blazing fire, the subject was renewed. I have a boy's fondness for stories of wild beasts, and listened with eager interest to all my host had to tell. It was hard to realize that there were such creatures in such a lovely spot. "Do you really mean to say," I asked, "that there are tigers here in this valley?" "Yes," he answered, "within five miles of where you are sitting now." He had seen one himself, and showed us the very spot that morning as we rode out to the hills, when he pointed to a ravine by the roadside, and said: "As I was riding along this road one day with a lady, a magnificent Bengal tiger came up out of that ravine, a few rods in front of us, and walked slowly across the road. He turned to look at us, and we were greatly relieved when, after taking a cool survey, he moved off into the jungle."

But leopards are still more common and familiar. They have been in this very dooryard, and on this veranda. One summer evening two years ago, said Miss P., I was sitting on the gravelled walk to enjoy the cool air, when an enormous creature brushed past but a step in front between us and the house. At first we thought in the gloaming it might be a dog of very unusual size, but as it glided past, and came into the light of some cottages beyond, we perceived that it was a very different beast. At another time a leopard crossed the veranda at night, and brushed over the face of a native woman sleeping with her child in her arms. It was well the beast was not hungry, or he would have snatched the child, as they often do when playing in front of native houses, and carried it off into the jungle.

But we will rest to-night in sweet security in this missionary home, without fear of wild beasts or thunder storms. The clouds broke away at sunset, leaving a rich "after-glow" upon the mountains. It was the clear shining after the rain. Just then I heard the voices of the native children in the chapel, singing their hymns, and with these sweet suggestions of home and heaven, "I will lay me down in peace and sleep, for thou Lord only makest me dwell in safety."

We had had a glimpse of the Himalayas, but the glimpse only made us eager to get the full "beatific vision"; so, after resting a day, we determined to try again, going up in the afternoon, and spending the night, so as to have a double chance of seeing the snows – both at sunset and at sunrise. This time we had also the company of Mr. Woodside, beside whom I rode on horseback; while Mr. Herron gave his escort to C – , who was "promoted" from a dandi to a jahnpan, which differs from the former only in that it is more spacious, and is carried by four bearers instead of two. Thus mounted she was borne aloft on men's shoulders. She said the motion was not unpleasant, except that the men had a habit, when they came to some dangerous point, turning a rock, or on the edge of a precipice, of changing bearers, or swinging round the bamboo pole from one shoulder to another, which made her a little giddy, as she was tossed about at such a height, from which she could look down a gorge hundreds of feet deep. However, she takes all dangers very lightly, and was enraptured with the wildness and strangeness of the scene – to find herself, an American girl, thus being transported over the mountains of Asia.

So we took up our line of march for the hills, and soon found our pulses beating faster. Why is it that we feel such exhilaration in climbing mountains? Is it something in the air, that quickens the blood, and reacts upon the brain? Or is it the sensation of rising into a higher atmosphere, of "going up into heaven?" So it seemed that afternoon, as we "left the earth" behind us, and went up steadily into the clouds.

I found that the Himalayas grew upon acquaintance. They looked more grand the second time than the first. The landscape was changed by the westering sun, which cast new lights and shadows across the valley, and into the wooded bosom of the hills. To these natural beauties my companion added the charm of historical associations. Few places in India have more interest to the scholar. The Sewalic range was almost the cradle of the Brahminical religion. Sewalic, or Sivalic, as it might be written, means literally the hills of Shiva, or the hills of the gods, where their worshippers built their shrines and worshipped long before Christ was born in Bethlehem. The same ridge is a mine to the naturalist. It is full of fossils, the bones of animals that belonged to some earlier geological epoch. The valley has had a part in the recent history of India. Here the Goorkas – one of the hill tribes, which stood out longest against the English – fought their last battle. It was on yonder wooded height which juts out like a promontory into the plain, where the ruin of an old fort marks the destruction of their power. Today the Goorkas, like the Punjaubees, are among the most loyal defenders of English rule.

At present the attraction of this valley for "old Indians" is not so much in its historical or scientific associations, as the field which it gives to the hunter. This belt of country, running about a hundred miles along the foot of the Himalayas, is composed of forest and jungle, and is a favorite habitat of wild beasts – tigers and leopards and wild elephants. It was in this belt, called the Terai, though further to the East, in Nepaul, that the Prince of Wales a few weeks later made his great tiger-hunting expedition. He might perhaps have found as good sport in the valley right under our eyes. "Do you see that strip of woods yonder?" said Mr. Woodside, pointing to one four or five miles distant. "That is full of wild elephants." An Indian Rajah came here a year or two since for a grand hunt, and in two days captured twenty-four. This is done by the help of tame elephants who are trained for the purpose. A large tract of forest is enclosed, and then by beating the woods, the herd is driven towards a corner, and when once penned, the tame elephants go in among them, and by tender caressing engage their attention, till the coolies slip under the huge beasts and tie their feet with ropes to the trees. This done, they can be left till subdued by hunger, when they are easily tamed for the service of man.

These creatures still have the range of the forests. In riding through the woods one may often hear the breaking of trees, as wild elephants crash through the dense thicket. I had supposed that all kinds of wild beasts were very much reduced in India under English rule. The hunters say they are so much so as to destroy the sport. But my companion thinks not, for two reasons: the government has made stringent laws against the destruction of forests; and since the mutiny the natives are not allowed to carry fire-arms.