is THE PULSE OF ASIA
government, build to order. That is one reason why houseboats are so common ; for in a boat, not only does the landlord become one's servant, but one can move about freely. To people who are on the outside and want to get in, the seclusion of Kashmir seems a bad quality; but it has at least one advantage. Drew relates how, on the Pir Panjal pass, to the south of Kashmir, at an elevation of 11,400 feet, he " found the ground and the snow for two or three miles' distance strewn with dead locusts [a pest on the plains to the south], which about the middle of May had been destroyed by the cold in an attempted invasion of Kashmir."
The climate of Kashmir is comparable in some respects to that of the northeastern part of the United States, although the sun is hotter because of the more southerly latitude; the summers are more trying because the heat is more rarely interrupted by showers and cool storms ; and snow falls earlier in the autumn because of the great altitude, so that the crops are sometimes ruined by it. The second day of our stay in Kashmir (March 19) was warm and clear. Our boat was being towed slowly eastward up the river by the boys and girls of our native family, who trudged barefoot along the towpath at the rate of less than two miles an hour. A stroll on shore in the bright sun among thatched houses surrounded by orchards, or beside broad pools, with glimpses of hunters shooting waterfowl with huge blunderbusses, and a clear view of the wonderful ellipse of snowy mountains encircling the plain made us realize that Kashmir can be idyllic. Most of our twenty-two days in the basin, however, were cold and raw, with several frosts and a little snow, so that we sympathized
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