Among the Celestials : vol.1 / Page 292 (Color Image)

0292	Among the Celestials : vol.1

246 AMONG THE CELESTIALS. [CHAP. IX.

or cold to try us. The grave, anxious look

on the men's faces passed away ; they now

stepped cheerily along by my side chaffing

over all the difficulties they had gone through,

and, at each village we came to, taking a fill

of dried apricots and grapes and walnuts, so

plentiful in this fruitful valley.

The country we were now in was Baltistan,

the inhabitants of which called Baltis—are a

patient, docile, good-natured race, whom one

hardly respects, but whom one cannot help

liking in a compassionate, pitying way. The

poor Balti belongs to one of those races which

has gone under in the struggle of nations. In

their better days the Baltis are said to have

been able to fight well ; but their fighting days

are past. They could not resist the Dogra

invasion from Kashmir ; and now they are

ruled by a foreign race, and because they were

such good carriers, and because the roads

through their own and the adjoining countries

were so bad, it fell out that they were employed

more and more for carrying purposes, till the

patient, long-suffering Balti coolie became a

well-known feature in the valleys of this

frontier.

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