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| 0073 |
Sand-Buried Ruins of Khotan : vol.1 |
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behind lower ranges, though only about ten miles away, as
the crow flies. Yet even its bodyguard of minor peaks,
ranging between 18,000 and 23,000 feet, was a sufficiently
inspiriting sight.
I felt the need of looking up to their glacier walls ; for down
on the road it got warmer and warmer. From Gurikot
onwards where the two branches of the Astor River unite, the
road, dusty and hot, winds up the steep scarp on the left side
of the valley until at last the group of villages known as
Astor came in sight spread out over a mighty alluvial fan.
The view that opened here was striking in its ruggedness.
For a wall of rocky ridges seems to close the valley to the
north, while the deep ravines cut by the mountain torrents
into the alluvial plateaus on either side give them a look of
fantastic diversity.
I reached at 3 p.m. the bungalow of Astor, situated on a
dominating point of the plateau, and felt heartily glad of its
shade and coolness. Below me lay the Fort of the Sikhs, now
used for the accommodation of a battery of Kashmir Imperial
Service troops, while on the south there stretched the orchards
and fields of the Astor "capital." The Rajas of Astor have
become "mediatised" since the advent of the Sikhs, and
their power, such as it was, is now wielded by a modest
Tahsildar of the Kashmir administration. Generosity was
not a fault of Sikh rule in these mountain regions, and the
deposed family of hill chiefs have little left to support the
pride of their ancient lineage.
Though Astor lies about 7,700 feet above the sea, the air
would have been decidedly oppressive but for a storm which in
the evening swept over the valley. It left plenty of clouds
behind to screen the sun on the next morning (June 8th) when
I resumed the march down towards the Indus. The valley
became bleaker and bleaker as the route descended, and the
streaks of red, yellow, and grey displayed by the rocky hillsides
offered poor compensation for the absence of vegetation. Of
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