Notwithstanding some European articles of furniture of doubtful taste which had already found their way to this apartment, the whole showed clearly the prevalence of Central-Asian manufacture. Carpets from Yarkand, Chinese silks and gaily-coloured prints from Kashgar could indeed make their way to Hunza far more easily over the Sarikol passes than Indian articles before the opening of the Gilgit route. Even now the latter is open to trade for a far shorter period than the passes from the North.
Returning from my visit to this interesting place I noticed several small mosques constructed of wood, and showing on their beams and posts a good deal of effective carving. Rougher in execution than old Kashmir woodwork, it yet displayed, just like the latter, decorative elements of a distinctly early Indian type, e.g., the double ` Chaitya ' ornament, the Sacred Wheel, the Svastika. The work I saw was said to be of comparatively recent date, which makes the survival of these patterns borrowed from the South so much the more curious.
My march on June 21st looked short on the map, but the accounts I had collected of it prepared me for its difficulties. Soon after passing, about two miles above Baltit, the picturesque fort-village of Altit, the valley contracts to a gorge of rugged rocks, almost without a trace of vegetation. A narrow path winds along the cliffs, sometimes close by the swollen river, sometimes several hundred feet above it. A small alluvial plateau, reached some four miles beyond, bears the little village of Muhammadabad. But the track leads far below over the sandy bed of the river. This bed indeed forms the easiest route up the valley, and only when its water is low in the winter can ponies be brought up or down. The frequent crossing of the river which this winter route necessitates is altogether impossible when the snow on the mountains has once begun to melt.
Accordingly a high rugged spur had to be climbed and the
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