IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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| IIIF Color HighRes |
| Sand-Buried Ruins of Khotan : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
2 CALCUTTA TO KASHMIR [CHAP. I.
Mohand Marg. With a glow of satisfaction I could look up to the crest of the high spur, some 10,000 feet above
the sea and still covered with snow, on which my tent had stood, and where my plans had been formed. It had taken
two years, and bulky files of correspondence ; but at last I had secured what was needed—freedom to move, and the means requisite for my journey.
In the meantime official duty, and minor archæological tours to which I devoted my vacations, had taken me over
widely different parts of India. From Lahore, where during
eleven long years, amidst the worries and cares of University office work, I had ever felt the refreshing touch of the true
East and the fascination of a great historical past, I had been
transferred to Calcutta. With its strangely un-Indian conditions of life, its want of breathing space, and its damp heat,
the " city of palaces " appeared to me like a tropical suburb
of London. From there I had visited Sikkim, that strange half-Tibetan mountain-land where true Alpine scenery is in-
vaded by the luxuriant vegetation of the tropics. I had
wandered in South Bihar, the ancient Magadha, tracing the footsteps of Hiuen-Tsiang, the great Chinese pilgrim, among
the ruins of the sacred Buddhist sites which he had seen and
described more than twelve hundred years ago. Also the fascinating tracts along the Indus and the North-West
Frontier, where the influence of classical art has left its witnesses in the ancient ` Græco-Buddhist ' sculptures of so many a ruined monastery and shrine, had seen me once more on a flying visit.
The thought of the task which was drawing me beyond the Himalaya had followed me everywhere. But it was only when
the final sanction for my proposals reached me on a sultry monsoon night down in Calcutta that I had been able to start some of the multifarious preparations which the journey demanded. Busy as I was with official duties and literary work that had to be concluded before leaving India, I managed to
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