“The oostand, or head-workman,” says Hamilton, “superintends, while his journeymen are employed near him, under his directions. If they have any new pattern in hand, or one with which they are not familiar, he describes to them the figure, colour, and threads that are to be used, while he keeps before him the pattern on which they happen to be employed drawn on paper. During the operation the rough side of the shawl is uppermost on the frame, notwithstanding which the head-workman never mistakes the regularity of the most finished patterns. A shop may be occupied with one shawl above a year, provided it be a remarkably fine one, while other shops make six or eight in the course of that time. Of the best and most noted sorts not so much as a quarter of an inch is completed in one day by three persons, which is the usual number employed. Shawls containing much work are made in separate pieces at different shops; and it may be observed, that it very rarely happens, when the pieces are completed, that they correspond in size.”
Forster was much disappointed in the women of Kashmere. They were handsome brunettes, but by no means endowed with that extreme beauty or elegance of form which has been attributed to them by other travellers. It is probable, however, that since the period of the Afghan invasion, which introduced into the country a rabble of adventurers from Kabul and the neighbouring regions, the race may have been deteriorated by a mixture with these ill-favoured foreigners; and that poverty, compelling them to have recourse to inferior food, and inducing habits of filth and a general squalidness, may have considerably aided in producing this result. In fertility they have by no means degenerated. Their families are numerous, whether poor or rich,—a circumstance which our traveller, who participated in Montesquieu’s opinion respecting the fecundity of all ichthyophagi, partly attributes to the great abundance of fish in their lakes and rivers.
During his stay in this country he was much alarmed at the suspicions of a Georgian, who, on observing the form of his head, which he averred was too flat at the top to be that of a Mohammedan, declared him at once to be a Christian. Forster, understanding that this man possessed an estate at Benares, in order to check his indiscretion or impertinence, disclosed to him his true story, informing him at the same time, however, that should any evil arise from his treachery or want of discretion, his estate would be confiscated, and the person of his commercial partner residing in the British territories exposed to punishment.
This circumstance, together with an increasing disgust at the character of the people, induced Forster to hasten as much as possible his departure from Kashmere. But this was a measure not easily effected. No person could leave the province without a passport from the governor, who, when this document was applied for, observed, that the Turks were good soldiers, and that as he just then happened to be in want of men, he would employ the traveller in his army. Forster now began to perceive that his Turkish character, which had hitherto procured him respect, was likely to advance him to a post of honour which he had very little ambition to occupy. One agent after another was employed to obtain the passport from the governor, a ferocious and sanguinary Afghan, who, like Charles IX. of France, shot men for his amusement; and at length, by dint of unremitted perseverance and a trifling bribe, the selfsame Georgian who had conjectured his religion from the form of his scull, with a sagacity which would have done honour to Dr. Gall himself, contrived to deliver him from the honour intended him by Azad Khan, and obtain the tyrant’s permission for his leaving the country.
Fearful lest the khan should alter his determination, and transform him, whether he would or not, into a trooper, he took into his service a Persian boy, hired a horse of a native of Peshawer, who was returning to that city, and on the 11th of June set out from Kashmere. His evil genius, in the form of vanity, had suggested to him the propriety of adorning his person with a gaudy red coat, in the pocket of which he deposited his passport. This showy garment, which no doubt excited the envy of many an Afghan beau, on the second day of his journey was snatched by a thief from his bed just as he was awaking, who, in spite of every obstacle, succeeded in bearing off his plunder. Not having passed the frontiers, he began to apprehend that a return to the capital might be necessary; but found, upon trial, that his Indian gold was considered every whit as good as Azad Khan’s written permission.
The scenery through which his road now lay was of a magnificent description, mountainous, rocky, savage, gloomy; forests below, snowy pinnacles above, with here and there a torrent bursting and dashing through rocky chasms with the noise of thunder. The path, impassable to horses, which were sent by another route, wound round the projections of the mountains, and sometimes consisted of a floor of planks laid over beams which were driven into the cliff. The rivers were crossed in baskets slung upon ropes, or on sheep’s or dogs’ skins inflated, and placed under the breast, while the traveller impelled himself forward by the motion of his feet. In other places a sort of bridge was formed in the following manner:—A stout rope, fastened to wooden posts on either shore sustained a number of carved pieces of wood resembling oxen-yokes, with forks placed vertically. The sides of these yokes being embraced by smaller ropes afforded a hold to the passengers.
On the 10th of July they crossed the Indus, about twenty miles above the town of Attock. “The stream,” says Forster, “though not agitated by wind, was rapid, with a rough undulating motion, and about three-quarters of a mile or a mile in breadth where it was not interrupted by islands, and having, as nearly as I could judge, a west-and-by-south course. The water was much discoloured by a fine black sand, which, when put into a vessel, quickly subsided. It was so cold from, I apprehend, a large mixture of snow then thawed by the summer heats, that in drinking it my teeth suffered a violent pain. In our boat were embarked seventy persons, with much merchandise and some horses. This unwieldy lading, the high swell of the current, and the confusion of the frightened passengers made the passage dangerous and very tedious.”
Next day, having crossed the Attock or Kabul river, they arrived at Akora, where Forster entered a spacious cool mosque to escape the intense heat of the sun, spread his bed, and laid himself down quite at his ease. Here he remained until the time of evening prayer, when he was summoned by the moollah, or priest, to prepare himself for the ceremony. Persons who adopt a fictitious character commonly overact their part, and thus frequently render themselves liable to suspicion; but Forster’s error lay on the other side, which was perhaps the safer; for, although it drew upon him the charge of negligence, it by no means disposed his associates to regard him as an infidel, their own practice too generally corresponding with his own. In the present case, upon his excusing himself from performing the accustomed prayer on account of the debilitated state of his body, the moollah replied, with extreme contempt, that it was the more necessary to pray, in order to obtain better health. The honest Mohammedan, however, like the priests of Æsculapius in Aristophanes, used, it seems, to make the tour of the mosque at midnight, and compel his miserly brethren to perform an act of charity in their sleep, by disposing of a part of their substance for the benefit of the establishment. From our traveller the contribution attempted to be levied was his turban; but happening unluckily to be awake, he caught the holy marauder by the arm, and demanded who was there. The poor man, utterly disconcerted at this unseasonable wakefulness, replied, in a faltering voice, that he was the moollah of the mosque,—the same man, apparently, who had so rudely reprehended the stranger for his neglect of prayer.
On the morrow a body of Afghan cavalry encamped in the environs of Akora. This event spread no less terror and consternation through the country than if a hostile army had suddenly made an incursion into it; for the licentious soldiery, devouring and destroying like a swarm of locusts wherever they appeared, conducted themselves with insufferable insolence towards the inhabitants. It must be observed, however, in mitigation of the enormity of their transactions, that they are in a measure compelled to subsist themselves and their horses in this manner; for their ignorant and unreflecting sovereign, in need of their service, but unwilling to reward them, suffers them in peaceful times to be reduced to such distress, that they are frequently constrained to sell their horses, arms, and even apparel, to purchase a morsel of bread.
In three days from this they arrived at Peshawer, a large, populous, and opulent city, founded by the great Akbar. Of all the places visited by our traveller in Northern India, none appeared to suffer so intense a heat as this city; but by skirting round the northern limits of the Punjâb he avoided Lahore, where he would probably have found an atmosphere equally heated with that of Peshawer. Other cities, he observes, may be afflicted with a too-great warmth; hot winds blowing over tracts of sand may drive their inhabitants under the shelter of a wetted screen; but here the air, during the middle of summer, becomes almost inflammable. Yet, notwithstanding this burning atmosphere, the inhabitants enjoy exceedingly good health, and are but little liable to epidemical disorders. This fact may easily be accounted for. The air of Peshawer, like that of the deserts of Arabia, in which the finest Damascus blades may be exposed all night without contracting the slightest rust, is extremely dry; and it would appear that heat, however intense, is not, when free from humidity, at all subversive of health. Another circumstance greatly tended to increase the salubrity of this city; provisions were excellent and abundant, especially the mutton, the flesh of the large-tailed sheep, said to have been first discovered in South America.