The Baradurree Was Curiously Built, Close To
An Octagon Tank, The Water From Which Ran At A Great Pace Through
An
arch in the middle of the house.[12] The tank was supplied with
water in great volume, but
from
No apparent source, and was filled with fine fish, all sacred,
and as fat as butter, from the plentiful support they receive from the
devout among the Hindoos, not to mention the unbelieving travellers,
who also supply them for amusement. The tank itself, the natives
informed us, was bottomless, and it really appeared to be so; for
from the windows of the baradurree, some fifty feet over the water,
we could see the sides stretching back as they descended, and losing
themselves in the clear water, which looked, from the intensity of
its blue, both deep and treacherous to an unlimited extent. The water,
too, was so intensely, icily cold, that an attempt to swim across it
would have been a dangerous undertaking, and neither F. nor I could
summon courage to jump in. We, however, bathed in the stream which
ran out of the inexhaustible reservoir, and its effect we found very
similar to that of hot water, so that a little of it went a very Iong
way with us. As for the fish, they swarmed in such numbers that they
jostled each other fairly out of the water in a dense living mass,
while striving for grains of rice and bread.
This also was a favourite resort of Jehangeer and Noor Jehan; and I
found an inscription in the Persian character which, in a sentence
according to Eastern custom, fixed the date of the erection of the
building attached to the tank as A.H. 1029, or, about A.D. 1612. The
inscription runs thus: -
"The king of seven climes, the spreader of justice, Abdool, Muzuffer,
Noor-ul-deen[13] Jehangeer Badshah, son of Akbar, conqueror of kings,
on the day of the 11th year of his reign paid a visit to this fountain
of favour, and by his order this building has been completed. By
means of Jehangeer Shah, son of Akbar Shah, this building has raised
its head to the heavens."
"The 'Inventor of Wisdom' has fixed its date in this line, viz : -
'Aqsirabad o Chushma Wurnak.' "
The fountain or reservoir, and the canal, &c. seem to have been the
work of Shah Jehan, Noor Jehan's son, or were probably remodelled in
his reign. The inscription referring to them runs also in the Persian
character on a slab of copper:
"Hyan, by order of Shah Jahan, King, thanks be to God, built this
fountain and canal. From these have the country of Cashmere become
renowned, and the fountains aye as the fountains of Paradise."
"The poet Survashi Ghaib has written the date in this sentence, viz: -
'From the waters of Paradise have these fountains flowed.' "
JULY 16. - On the road again at daybreak, with the intention of
going to a place called Kukunath, where there were more springs, and
which, from information obtained from the sepoy who accompanied us,
was on our road to Islamabad. However, like most information relative
to either direction or to distance in this country, it turned out to
be wrong, and we accordingly altered our course and made for our old
quarters. Breakfasted under a huge walnut-tree, at a village about six
kos off, and reached Islamabad about one P.M., after a very hot tramp
of ten kos, through groves of sycamore and walnuts, and hundreds and
hundreds of acres of rice-fields, immersed in water, and tenanted by
whole armies of croaking frogs. The people were principally employed
in weeding their rice-crops, standing up to their knees in mud and
water, and grubbing about, with their heads in a position admirably
adapted to give anybody but a native, apoplexy in such a hot sun.
JULY 17. - In the middle of the night we were awoke by a tremendous
uproar in our wooden habitation, as if some one was crashing about the
boards and panels with a big stick; immediately afterwards something
jumped upon my bed, and with a whisk and a rush, clattered through the
room to F.'s side, over the table, and back again to my quarter. Half
asleep and half awake, I hit out energetically, without encountering
anything of our uninvited guest; and the faithful Rajoo coming in
with a light, I found F. brandishing a stick valiantly in the air,
everything knocked about the room; an earthenware vessel of milk spilt
upon the floor, a tumbler broken, and a plate of biscuits on the table
with marks of teeth in them. This latter discovery was quite a relief
to my mind, for the visitation had a most diabolic savour about it,
and we were just beginning to fancy that there was a slight smell of
sulphur. However, the milk and the biscuits being such innocent food,
we were enabled to fancy that the intruder might have been no worse
than a wild cat, which had frightened itself by breaking, our tumbler,
and had eventually jumped through the window and made its escape. This
interpretation, however satisfactory to ourselves, was apparently
not so to the Q.M.G., and to his dying day he will probably remain
rather doubtful of the kind of company we kept that night.
At sunrise I paid another visit to the ruins of Pandau, or Martund,
and sketched it from the north-east; a view which took in the only
columns of any perfection that remained standing.
Islamabad being, as its name implies, the "abode of Mahomedanism,"
I had set the kotwal to work to procure me a good copy of the Koran.
On returning, however, I found that he had collected together a
bundle of the common editions printed in the Arabic alone, without
interlineations. He assured me, however, that they were rare and
valuable specimens; and I was amused by the old gentleman reading out
a passage in a sonorous voice, following each word with his finger,
and astonishing the bystanders by the display of his erudition; but
at the same time holding the precious volume upside down, and thus
failing in impressing at least one of his audience.
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