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No. 455, December 11, 1858.] THE L E A D...
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INDIA AND INDIAN PROGRESS
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THE "LAST NEW- WOULD. In this day, when,...
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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No. 455, December 11, 1858.] The L E A D...
No . 455 , December 11 , 1858 . ] THE L E A D E B . 1359
India And Indian Progress
INDIA AND INDIAN PROGRESS .
The "Last New- Would. In This Day, When,...
THE "LAST NEW- WOULD . In this day , when , all fields of excitement are supposed to be exhausted , and when a new book of travels is supposed to be impossible , and professed books of travels are looked upon as specimens of book-making , the Travellers' Club is in danger of losing its qualification , and the adventurous of losing all chance of the novel or unattempted . Europe is undreamt of * its northern streams are fished , and the green parasol marks evea Constantinople as familiar . Australia is not tempting , and in America buffalo hunting is not attended with distinction . Africa we pass over because Gordon
hybrid Spaniard , and narrows his bounds in the plains , and the wild beast issuing from his lair ^ in the mountains or the forests , or the snake lurking in the latter , restrains the red man . So it is in India , where still within our own territory , as in one of the p asses of the Dehrah Dhoon , for instance , a single tiger , known for its ferocity , or a savage elephant bestained with human blood , will forbid traffic , and render the passage dangerous even for Europeans , as their bearers and servants will dessert them on the alarm of the dreaded monster .
There the Nemean lion has his . parallel in some monarch of the waste , and there , too , the successful combatant boasts of his spoils , and is hailed with the triumphant applause of the rescued people . So long as the jungle remains undisturbed and gives cover , and the mountain valleys and passes are unoccupied by the English , wild beasts will be the scourge of the plains of India , an object of solicitude to collectors , and not unworthy Of the attention of the Supreme Government . It is . however , in the Himalayas that the hunter ,
who can get leave of absence and has strength to enjoy it has the height of happiness , and yet , strangely enough , his life must be spent in small tents in the open air . The practice of encamping on marches , journeys , and circuits , nevertheless , reconciles our countrymen , who never slept sound under a roof at home , to this hardihood . On such occasions they pursue large game over districts as large as a Scotch shire or the whole Northern Highlands , and through miles of glens , cut out by the watercourse of a mighty river . Above them rise the majestic peaks of the Himalayas , the monarchs of
the mountain world , crowned with unfading snow , and throned on everlasting glaciers . The air around them of lower pressure , dry and fresh , gives them buoyancy of feeling , and adds to the earnest enjoyment of a life of freedom and activity the paradise of the lover of vigorous enjoyment , as the indolence and luxuriance of the warmer valleys is of the devotee of sweet nothing-doing . There cvre many of our officials and captains whose lives would be spent in these mountain-campaigns did the regulations of the service allow , but they have to content themselves with the occasional enjoyment of the luxury of the chase on a scale which an English duke or a European king does not attain with all his fortune , and which costs our countrymen scarcely the income of a well-paid mechanic .
No generalisations point so forcibly as particular instances , and we bring our general observations to a conclusion that we may bring forward a not uucommon example in the huntiug excursion of Keith Leslie in Hundes , which he , with more industry than some of his brother sportsmen , has portrayed at length in the Friend of India , though his narration partakes more of the recital of an enlightened traveller than the loose observations of a common sportsman . The country to whioh he directed his steps lies above Kumaon and Gurhwal , on a portion of the line of watershed of the Himalayas , whioh is at present a physical and political impediment to our
frco intercourse with the great Thibetan marts of Gartok and X > uba . Into this region of Hundes the adventurer determined to penetrate , and he started from Almora with two servants , mid about twenty coolies , the latter of whom carried his equipment , which included two suialjl tents , portable bedstead and bedding , cotton and woollen clothing , a' hunting-knifo , a spring balance , tea , sugar , and preserved ^ moats , four saucopaus , two kettles , two gridirons , two sots of plates , cups , knives , forks , and spoons , a rifle and gun , one bag of largo shot , five hundred bullets , six ilasks of powder , caps , and
wads . Hundcs is above tho range of tree vegetation , exoept just at Gong , where birch-trees and a kind of cypress are plentiful , but it is covered with good grass , votch , lupins , wild onions , locks , aud many flourishing plants . Tho herbage foods of largo game , tho burrul or snow sliccp , tho nynu or oois anwion , tho kynng or wild horso , and tho bunohowr or wild yak . The only boast oi' prey is a kind of wolf . It was bunohowr move particularly thut tho sportsman sought , as it was said that only four Englishmen had up to that time succoodod m killing tho bunohowr . Tho writer says that tho bunchowr ia a noble-looking animal , something in
appearance like the American bison , but larger . The bull comes down to the nullahs of Shelshel and K ' , which alone are accessible to English sportsmen , and as these nullahs have no thoroughfare and are not entered by human beings for years at a time , the bunchowr bulls roam in solitary grandeur from the beginning of winter to the end of July , when they go baclc to visit their families on the Gartok hills . When our traveller entered the Salkh Nullah , on the 5 th of July of this year , it had not been visited for three years , and he came upon six bulls together , but the wind and scent being unfavourable they
were alarmed and got off , and though lie hunted for a fortnight in the neighbourhood he never saw them again . On the same afternoon he saw another bull , but it was not till the 27 th July that in the Keo Nullah he came across a bull again , which Eroved to be this very bull , and wind and ground eing favourable he was killed , and proved to be nine feet around the chest , with horns sixteen inches in diameter at the base , and eleven inches half-way up . He proved good meat . The condition of the country is * however , described with more minuteness than the bull-hunt . Hundes and the neighbouring districts are almost
uninhabited ^ being tliinly peopled by Hunmas , who live in temporary or movable villages , and Carry , on trade between Thibet and the plains . The town of Daba has only one pucka-house , and the capital of Gartok has only two . In Hundes there is no town , and the district is dependent on Gartok . The trade over the elevated passes , One of which is the difficult and dangerous pass of . Cb . or-Ho . ti , 18 , 300 feet high , and another the Drunjun , is carried on by means of the yak , or tame bunchowr , the j oobul , a cross breed between the yak and the hfll cattle , goats aud sheep . The yak will carry 150 to 200 lbs ., t
the joobul 100 to 150 lbs ., he sheep and goat about ten or fifteen pounds' weight . The reason sheep and goats are so much employed is that sheep alone go from the higher to the lower country without dv ing . It is" supposed some fifteen or twenty thousand of these animals yearly cross this tract . The traders take floweivice , sugar , and cotton into Thibet , and bring back borax , salt , sheep ' s wool , and goats' hair . To the state of the trade considerable attention was paid by the writer , and he is clearly of opinion that with the improvement of the road along the Gong river , it could be greatly improved .
The district officer is called a Zumpun , and he is dependent on the Garkoon of Gartok . The Zampuu has a dozen police and an unpaid writer called a vizier , and he has almost absolute power over the people . The Garkoon has about a hundred police , or ragamuffins , armed with bad matchlocks and two or three swords apiece . These men are commanded by a captain of police . The superior of the Garkoon of Gartok is the Shibohid of the province of Bood , a month ' s march from Gartok . The country is open to Ghoorkas , Hindosta ' necs , Sikhs , ana all pcoplo , except the English ; but though the Hundes arc friendly towards -us , the authorities forbid our access , ana the late
Zumpun for allowing two Englishmen to reach the Munsorawur Lako , was dismissed and fined 20 / . Ou . reaching Iloti , the traveller found an outpost of four Hunuias , without weapons of any kind , who , hearing of an Englishman entering Bhote , had come to watch his movements . They wanted him to go back at once , but ho insisted on seeing tho Zumpun , and sent forward a coolie as ail ambassador , with a letter and a Viotoria plaid tartan shawl , requesting an interview , and promising a stereoscope and a number of daguerreotype slides , whioh ho had brought on purpose , and tho wonders of which , woro duly appreciated in tho oainp . The
ambassador was received by tho Zumpun ' s wife , who took tho shawl and promisod an intorviow with her husband on his return . This took place , and ho was found to bo more like a Chinaman than a Huimia , dressed in a sort of yollow ilounccd silkgown , with a mandarin hat and plain glass buttons . Ho wished tho Englishman to leave Huudes at onco , whioh tho hit ! or dcqlinod ; but though no could have rosistod the Zumpun ' s iorce , ho contented himself with requiring tho right of shooing about tho villages without entering thorn . The stereoscope was greatly admired , but tho iLngUsh
Gumming has tarnished the glories of the chase for all followers , even could they kill more lions , and Livingstone has made a path through Mid Africa , which he may repeat , for he has a title to it , but which any one who imitated must do in silence , for he can no longer boast of it . No one will seek the thousand islands to found a new rajahship like Brooke , aud the openin g of Japan vrill not afford six months' food of table-talk for half a dozen men . Who knows ? perhaps Albert Smith is now promenading through the streets of Jeddo instead of returning from his ovation at
Hong-Kong ! We have discovered so much , that in tliTs age of discovery we feel we can discover nothing , and in an epoch as fruitful in heroes and heroism as the Homeric age , and that of the Ger ^ manic invasion of Rome , or the era of Columbus , ¦ or the time of Elizabeth , we begin to despair of finding new food for adventure , and yet there is almost a world open for the exertion of the active in the vast countries of our Indian dependencies in the Himalayas and the regions of Central Asia to which they give access . While the rental of some sniall moor or contracted forest in Scotland is made a contest between
our magnates , there are Indian sportsmen who are following far nobler game than grouse and ved-dcer in the jungles and over the mountains , with a province for " hunting ground . There the sportsman , like Hercules and the demigods of old , in pursuing his own pleasure , is hailed by the miserable mountaineers as a benefactor , and has the pride and satisfaction of becoming the pioneer of civilisation . So vast , however , are the countries of the Terai and the mountains , and so small . is our population , that as yet they can only be hunted over . Such is the progress of settlement in many of our countries . In the West the trapper follows the beaver and the
fur beast , the trader comes in his wake , and a fixed post becomes the cradle of a new city which is to transform the wilderness into regions of fertility . In South Africa , tho lion hunter moves ahead , seeking for skins , feathers , and ivory , clearing the country of lions and beasts ravening for fiesh , and of the elephant and baboon , fatal foes to the vegetable crops . The trader is his attendant ; and then into the cleared country come the herds of oxen and sheep , no longer fearful of the lion , the leopard , and the hyena . The farmer succeeds the herdsman , and the steps of civilisation arc made good . In India , tho love of pleasure in some of our countrymen , and tho pursuit of health in others , lend them to devotp weeks , and sometimes months , to hunting parties in the waste districts , sometimes an Englishman with nativo ^ attendants , sometimes
two Englishmen or more togetlior . Ihere are seasons when tho jungle patohos can be searched for ti mers and leopards , winch are . tho dread of the cowering black , and which drive him from his field , iiis pastures , or his home . Then tho Englishman and las hunting party are welcomed , and for a season tho country is cleared of its encmios . Indeed , thoro is a great part of tho country which is only cleared of the wild beasts aud kept open for oooupation by thq skill and courago of tho English sportsmen . How beasts still contend with moil for the possession of tho earth , as they did in the earliest ages of its history , is a matter unfamiliar to « 8 , but not unknown in tho East ivnd the "West . Ihero hayo been parts of Europe whoro in fninino tod postilenco tho wolves and tho bears havo driven * u tho frontiers of oooupation , devastated villages , and drivon forth tho surviving inhabitants ; so in ? south America tho Indian contends with tho
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Dec. 11, 1858, page 23, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse2.kdl.kcl.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_11121858/page/23/
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