The rains continued to fall with untiring assiduity until the latter part of September.
Early in October, I set out with a party of friends on a tour in the interior. We were each provided with a small tent holding a bed and table, which, in addition to our guns and a few bottles of wine and spirits, were all we could take with us; for so rugged and precipitous are the paths, that everything belonging to travellers in these mountains must be carried by the Paharries, (natives of the mountains,) who scramble up the steepest precipices with considerable loads strapped on their backs. There is generally much difficulty in procuring a quantum sufficit of these useful animals. The natives of the plains have a great aversion to the climate of the mountains, which usually disagrees with them, and cannot be made of much use in a journey in the interior. The Paharries, indeed, have a similar feeling towards the plains, and can seldom be prevailed on to remain any length of time in the lower regions.
From Landour we descended amongst the thick brushwood, and long tangled grass which clad the mountain sides until we reached the bottom of a kudd, or valley, not far above the level of the plains, through which foamed an impetuous mountain torrent. We had some difficulty in fording this stream, on account of its rapidity and the quantity of large moveable stones in its bed. Being surrounded by precipitous mountains, which completely intercepted every current of air, the heat in this valley was exceedingly oppressive. The vegetation around us was most luxuriant, and it was with considerable toil we forced our way through the wilderness of shrubs, interwoven with long matted grass.
We now commenced the abrupt ascent of the Tyne mountains, along a narrow Paharrie track, where the footing was extremely precarious, and a false step would have consigned the perpetrator to the tender mercies of the sharp pointed rocks several hundred feet beneath. About nightfall it became very difficult to distinguish the track, but our ponies, who scrambled along without any accidents behind us, seeming to make light of the matter, we mounted and trusted to their sagacity.
I had cause, ere long, to repent this misplaced confidence, for, on turning a sharp angle of rock, I was interrupted during an energetic argument with my successor by a most appalling stumble, and, in an instant, disappeared with my faithless quadruped, from the eyes of my astonished brother disputant.
A few feet under the ledge of rock grew a kind hearted shrub, (better deserving of immortality than the tree of murderous intentions upon Horace,) which I embraced and clung to with affectionate eagerness. My poor pony fared otherwise, and by the crashing amongst the stones and shrubs underneath, I had cause to conjecture he was suffering bitter punishment for his error: far from it, the fall had soon been converted into a roll, on the fortunately gradual slope of this especial spot, and we found him busily engaged with the thick grass which had preserved, and was now nourishing, the little viper.
The moon now made her appearance, and we reached a platform of land where fields of wheat and barley announced the vicinity of a village, whose mud huts we descried on the side of a steep ravine; above which towered a noble grove of the picturesque and lofty deodar. Under these we pitched our tents, and soon became unconscious alike of time and place.
Rising at daybreak, we recommenced the toilsome ascent, and, shortly after noon, reached the summit, whence was beheld an apparently endless range of mountain upon mountain, the nearest bristling with forests, the furthest hoary with snow. The description would be but a continual recurrence to the same imagery, so much does, nature resemble herself in the drapery which she has spread on these wild regions.
Next morning, we commenced our preparations for the chase, and having each taken up a position, our dogs and Paharries entered the heavy cover, each giving tongue as the game started. The ear was now awake with intense expectation; the before-predominating silence was broken by echoed sounds.
The whirr of the gaudy pheasant as he sprang upwards from the covert, was succeeded by the roar of the murderous fowling-piece ringing his death-knell among his native hills; and the sharp crack of the rifle followed the track of the deer, as he dashed from the woods, and bounded wildly down the rocky precipices.