EARLY MORNING NEAR PAHLGAM, LIDAR VALLEY
Above Pahlgam the valley bifurcates, one branch going to Aru, by which a road leads over a troublesome pass into the Sind valley; and the other leading to Shisha Nag and to the famous caves of Amarnath, the resort of many hundreds of pilgrims in July and August. Immediately beyond Pahlgam, on this latter route, the path leads through beautiful woods with fine views of rocky heights and snowy peaks. Numerous maiden-hair and other ferns, primulas, crane's bill, gentians, and many other well-known flowers line the road-side. Above the wood line are fine grassy uplands frequented by Gujars with their cattle, ponies, buffaloes, sheep, and goats. Lidarwat is a lovely camping-ground in a green lawn fringed by a deep belt of trees. Beyond is the Kolahoi glacier, the road to which leads over a wide and treeless valley, and in places crosses snow bridges. The camping-ground is 11,000 feet above sea-level, and is set in a circle of stately peaks. The end of the glacier is of grey ice, and so strewn over with fragments of grey rock as hardly to be recognisable as ice, though the ice is, in fact, two hundred feet thick. Above it rises the bold peak of Kolahoi, so conspicuous in its sharp needle form from Gulmarg, and six thousand feet above the glacier.
The cave of Amarnath is about 41 miles from Pahlgam, and is about 13,000 feet above sea-level. It is therefore above all tree vegetation, and is set in wild and impressive scenery. The cave itself is of gypsum, and is fifty yards long by fifty broad at the mouth, and thirty at the centre. Inside is a frozen spring which is the object of worship, and beside it is a noble glacier and bold and rugged cliffs.
Martand
Of all the ruins in Kashmir the Martand ruins are both the most remarkable and the most characteristic. No temple was ever built on a finer site. It stands on an open plain, where it can be seen to full advantage. Behind it rises a range of snowy mountains. And away in the distance before it, first lies the smiling Kashmir valley, and then the whole length of the Pir Panjal range, their snowy summits mingling softly with the azure of the sky. It is one of the most heavenly spots on earth, not too grand to be overpowering, nor too paltry to be lacking in strength and dignity, and it is easy to understand the impulse which led a people to here raise a temple to heaven.
THE RUINS OF MARTAND
The temple of Martand is the finest example of what is known as the Kashmirian style of architecture, and was built by the most noted of the Kashmir kings, Lalataditya, who reigned between the years 699 and 736 a.d.