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0059	Innermost Asia : vol.1
極奥アジア : vol.1

duly noted by our supposed geographer of, say, A. D. 3000 might for all his archaeological indica-
tions have taken place five hundred years after our own time. He would merely have confused,
as is not infrequently done, post hoc with propter hoc.

Section III.—ON THE WAY TO DARĒL

At Chilās four emissaries of Rāja Pakhtūn Wālī had awaited my arrival, and their presence
gave welcome assurance that all arrangements had been made to facilitate our progress through
the territory now held by their ruler that no European had previously explored. It had been
a special stipulation on the Rāja's part that not a single man from the territory controlled by
the Gilgit Political Agency was to accompany me beyond the border of his own, and he may well
have intended, by sending ahead some particularly trusted henchmen, to make sure that this
condition was not evaded ; for the relations between the ruler and his newly subdued subjects
were evidently such as to invite intrigue on the lines traditional in these regions—if any one cared
to follow them. On my side it was a great relief to find that a request communicated by me some
time before my start from Kashmīr had found acceptance with the chief. The interest of our
intended survey work, quite as much as the wish to avoid the excessive summer heat of the Indus
gorges, had made me ask that we might be taken to Darēl by the mountains at the head of the
Khānbarī and Dudishāl valleys instead of the usual route which leads through the former, and
this was agreed to.

The first march or two at the outset of this somewhat devious journey was to take us up the
Hōdar valley to the north of the Indus, and for this we set out on the morning of August 11th.
The heat was great in the deep rocky defiles of the Indus, and the banks of the river below Chilās
were forbiddingly barren. So while the baggage was sent some ten miles down-stream by a track
that was just practicable, to a point facing the mouth of the Hōdar Nullah, I was glad myself
to effect the descent on a skin raft. With the tossing current of the river sweeping the frail-looking
craft along at the rate of some fourteen miles an hour, it was an exciting journey, but at the same
time refreshing and restful. For most of the distance the huge glacier-fed volume of water was
compressed within a bed only 200 to 300 yards wide, closed in on either side by bare black rocks
or flats strewn with large boulders. The raft, which consisted of six bullock skins, was protected
by our crew of four 'Sōniwāls' from the violence of the whirling currents with a skill inherited
through many generations. The snowy weather prevailing on the high glacier-clad ranges far
away north and eastwards had caused the river to fall to some twenty-four feet below high-water
level. Yet the flood volume was still large enough to allow us to sweep down in safety over what
at other seasons is a succession of impassable rock ledges and rapids. It is only below Sazīn that
the Indus was said to become altogether impossible for this rapid mode of progress.

Opposite the spot where the Hōdar Nullah debouches the river bed somewhat widens, and
here with the help of a skin-raft ferry our baggage was carried across (Fig. 2) ; in spite of its small
quantity, the operation took nearly four hours. The Hōdar valley with its present population
of only some eighty families forms a separate little republic, but has come under British influence
since a garrison was established at Chilās. At the very mouth of the valley I found visible evidences
of the changes that had come over this ground within historical times. About a mile to the east
of the spot where the small Hōdar stream falls into the Indus after watering the few sandy fields
of Sarī, there rises a detached rocky ridge to a height of about 300 feet (Fig. 5). Noticing the
remains of walls I ascended to its top and found the whole of it covered with ruined dwellings
built of rough but large and well-set stones. The area, closely packed with decayed walls, extends
for about 160 yards from south-east to north-west and is about 100 yards across. No enclosing

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