On Inquiry, However, The Real Cause Turned Out To Be, That The
Sepoy Himself Was In The Habit Of Exacting A Heavy Tax On All Purchases
On Our Part, And Fear Of Him, Not Us, Was The True Difficulty.
In the evening, we took a tour through the village, and DISCOURSED,
as well as we could, a native Zemindar, whom we found with his
household around him, gathering in his crop of grain, which had been
partially destroyed by the early snow.
His land appeared to be about
four acres in extent, and for this, he told us, he paid twelve rupees
per annum to the Maharajah of Cashmere. He failed signally, however,
in explaining how he produced that amount by his little farm. The
produce of his land sufficed only to feed himself and his family,
and the proceeds of the sale of wool, belonging to his twelve sheep,
he estimated at only two rupees. Besides these, he possessed a few
cows, and appeared as cheery and contented a landholder as I ever met,
in spite of his losses by the snows, and his inability to make out,
even by description, his ten rupees of ground-rent to the Maharajah.
The crops around consisted chiefly of bearded wheat (kanuk), barley
(jow), anik, tronba, and gunhar, all otherwise nameless; and also a
small quantity of tobacco, turnips, and radishes.
SEPTEMBER 11. - Having with some difficulty procured a pony for the
cook, we started again for Cashmere, and, after a very steep ascent,
through woods of magnificent pine-trees, with every now-and-then a
glorious peep of distant snow-peaks towering in the skies, we reached
the summit of the peer, which separates the territory called Kushtwar
from that of Cashmere.
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