. Winter India . was a clear, cloudless day, with hoar-frost overthe grass of the bare hillsides and on the rice-fieldsthat in curving terraces filled every valley and ra-vine, rippling away in lines that seemed designedfor ornament only. There were plantations of trees,but no forests—none of the jungles that one expectsat the foot of such a mountain-range. In the dis-tance clumps of intensely green Pimis longifoliawaved their nine- and ten-inch-long needles as softlyas bamboos. We mounted long inclines, whence wehad a magnificent view of the hills and plains be-low, or looked up and across to
. Winter India . was a clear, cloudless day, with hoar-frost overthe grass of the bare hillsides and on the rice-fieldsthat in curving terraces filled every valley and ra-vine, rippling away in lines that seemed designedfor ornament only. There were plantations of trees,but no forests—none of the jungles that one expectsat the foot of such a mountain-range. In the dis-tance clumps of intensely green Pimis longifoliawaved their nine- and ten-inch-long needles as softlyas bamboos. We mounted long inclines, whence wehad a magnificent view of the hills and plains be-low, or looked up and across to the loops of the roadabove us. Sometimes we could watch the next relaystation as we drove toward it, and with the glassesnote the preparations for our arrival. Bullock-trainsunder guard of sepoys, low mail-tongas bringingconvalescents down from the sanatoriums, and afew camel-trains passed by. The bearded Sikhs, theturbaned Pathans, and the handsome Kashmiris ofLahore and Amritsar streets had vanished, and in. SIMLA 317 their places appeared a nondescript people in soberattire,—sturdy hill-men whose clothes and cheek-bones had the same Chinese suggestion as thoseof the hill-folk around Darjiling, At ten-thirty weshook off our razais and rugs and limped into the dakbangla at Solon, with fierce mountain appetitesadded to what naturally succeeded the imitation ofa breakfast at Kalka. A courteous old khansamah,with a velvet manner and perfect decorum, ush-ered us to a dining-room where the chill of Hima-layan summits lingered, and we soon had the tablebrought out to the sunny veranda. Twenty-sevenmiles of travel, and a lift of a few thousand feetin air, had raised the art of cookery far above itslevel at Kalka, and we breakfasted with two plunging animals refused either to beled or backed up to the fitton, the babu informedus that this was the best post-road in India; thatit had the best carriages and best ponies; that thegovernment pays one and two hundred ru
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1900, bookdecade1900, bookidwinterindia0, bookyear1903
