India, past and present - C. H. Forbes-Lindsay (1903) (14784474832)

Identifier: indiapastpresent01forb (find matches)
Title: India, past and present / C. H. Forbes-Lindsay
Year: 1903 (1900s)
Authors: Forbes-Lindsay, Charles Harcourt Ainslie, 1860-
Subjects: India -- Description and travel
Publisher: Philadelphia : John C. Winston
Contributing Library: University of California Libraries
Digitizing Sponsor: MSN



Text Appearing Before Image:
birds of prey include thevulture, falcon and hawk. Venomous snakes areextremely rare, but the cobra has been found in thevalley. The inhabitants of Kashmir are, as might be sup-posed from their environment, a fine and healthy race.The men are tall, muscular and well-built, w^ith com-plexions usually olive, but sometimes fair, and evenruddy, especially among the Hindus. Their featuresara regular and attractive, and in the jNIuhammadansdisplay the Jewish cast so marked in the Pathan, towhom they are related. The women from of oldhave been celebrated for their beauty. Hamilton,writing in 1828, gives a somewhat mixed descriptionof the natives of Kashmir, whom he describes as gay and lively, eager in the pursuit of wealth,accounted much more acute and intriguing than thenatives of Hindustan, generally and proverbiallyliars. They are also much addicted to literature,poetry and drinking. This is not entirely fair to theKashmiri. The Muhammadans form the majority of the popu- Girls of Kashmir
Text Appearing After Image:
KASHMIR. 311 lation, but they are not very greatly in excess of theHindus. Caste sits lightly on the latter, even thoughthey be Brdhmans. So great a difference existsbetween the Brahmans of Kashmir and those of Indiaproper that when one of the former leaves his countryhe is looked upon as cutting himself off from hisreligious affiliations. It is not long since his emigra-tion was considered equivalent to dcnth, and theservice for the dead was performed over him. Thosewere the days, however, when the way was beset withnumerous and various difficulties and dangers, and ihemeans of communication were scant. INIoreovcr, thewanderers in time took up the severe ritual andimbibed the strict ideas of the Bnlhmans of theplains, which naturally filled them with horror anddisgust of the loose practices of their own people inthe matters of food and drink, and intercourse withlow-castes and Muharamadans. The Kashmiris, of all classes, have the tea-habitto an excessive degree. The Indian leaf is us