Western Himalaya and Tibet / A Narrative of a Journey Through the Mountains of Northern India During the Years 1847-8

by Thomas Thomson

PARKUTA.
December, 1847.

Parkuta is a very large village, three or four hundred feet above the river, occupying both slopes of a deep ravine cut in the thick mass of alluvium by a large stream from the south. The alluvium is scarped towards the Indus, and a low granitic hill, the cause of its accumulation to such a height, just rises above the general surface of the platform. This is covered with a mass of buildings, formerly the residence of the Rajah of Parkuta, a branch of the same family who ruled at Iskardo, and dependent on them while that state remained independent; he has, however, been removed by the Sikhs, and his house is at present untenanted. The village is large, with extensive cultivation, and many fine fruit-trees. Vines are plentiful, climbing over the poplars.

TOLTI.
December, 1847.

On the 5th of December my day's journey carried me to Tolti, a distance of twelve miles. The valley continued narrow, and the mountains rose precipitously on both sides. On the early part of the march there were many villages, and much cultivation on the left bank. The village of Urdi, three or four miles from Parkuta, seemed very populous, and extended for a great distance along the river. It was remarkable for an aqueduct supported on pillars of stone, which crossed a ravine immediately above the village. At this spot the cultivation terminated abruptly, and the alluvial platform was for more than a mile, during which space it gradually narrowed by the encroachments of the cliffs, covered with an accumulation of very large granitic boulders, which seemed to have fallen on it from the mountains behind.

KARTASH.
December, 1847.

As I approached Tolti the valley of the Indus became much more rugged and narrow. A long gentle ascent to a ridge more than a thousand feet above the bottom of the valley, but which dipped abruptly to the river, occupied the latter part of the march. At Tolti the belt of cultivation is very narrow, just skirting the river on very narrow platforms of alluvium, which are irrigated by artificial canals carried with considerable labour between the fields and the mountains. Tolti was the most gloomy village which I had yet seen, the precipitous mountains forming a circle all round it, and almost shutting out the light of day. The bird's-nest fort in the ravine behind the village, perched on the top of a rock (in a most untenable position, though probably well suited for defence against sudden attack), accorded well with the gloomy aspect of the place. The temperature was here considerably lower than in the more open valley, as large patches of snow lay still unmelted in the fields, though four days had elapsed since its fall. At Gol, two days before, it had quite melted. On a bank a mile or two below Tolti, I saw a few trees of Populus Euphratica, just recognizable by a few withered leaves which still remained on the tree.

From Tolti, I made three marches to Tarkata, a small village on the Indus, six miles below its junction with the river of Dras. The general aspect of the valley of the Indus was but little changed in this distance, notwithstanding a very long and remarkable bend of the river above Kartash, in which its direction is to the eastward of north. From Tolti, the easiest road in an upward direction crosses the Indus, and proceeds on the right bank; but to avoid the labour of crossing, I suppose, my guides conducted me by a road on the left bank. On this side, the lower part of the valley is so steep as to be impracticable; and I found it necessary to ascend at once from Tolti on a stony ridge, almost directly away from the river. The ascent was long and fatiguing; the ridge being capped, in the same manner as that above Kunes on the Shayuk, with masses of alluvium. The ridge was more than 1500 feet above the river, and its upper part was covered with snow, through which the path lay for four or five miles, after which it descended very abruptly to the river, which had been in sight almost all the way, generally running among precipitous rocks, but with a few villages scattered at intervals on the northern bank. After regaining the bank of the river, the road was for five or six miles nearly level, passing opposite the village of Kartash, with a fort on a hill. Here still resides the Rajah Ali Sher Khan, the most intelligent of the princes of Balti; though now past the prime of life, he still retains the intelligence and kind hospitality for which he is so deservedly praised by Vigne.

INDUS VALLEY.
December, 1847.

Kartash being situated at the northern or lower end of the great bend of the Indus, and in an extremely narrow part of the ravine, is a most sombre-looking place. It is possible, however, that in summer, when the villages are green with cultivation and fruit-trees, the appearance of this and other places may be less gloomy, and that, from having only seen this part of Tibet in the depth of winter, I may be disposed to regard it in too unfavourable a point of view. The abrupt and precipitous rise of the mountains on all sides must undoubtedly tend strongly to modify the summer temperature, which, from the want of rain, and the reflection from masses of bare rock, would otherwise be oppressive. The fort seems to have some good buildings, and to be kept in excellent order, and the village looked extensive and prosperous.

All along the narrow ravine, from Tolti nearly as far as Tarkata, deposits of alluvium were very extensively developed, not only in the valley of the river, but at considerable heights on the ridges. There was, however, I believe, none of the lacustrine clay, as contradistinguished from the coarser alluvium. I speak here with considerable hesitation, as I find with regret that I have not in my notes attended with sufficient care to the distinction between the two, not having at the time sufficiently adverted to their probably different origin. I am now disposed to think that in the narrow ravine above Tolti was situated the barrier which bounded on the east the lake basin of Iskardo, a vast inland sea, which must have extended thence in a north-westerly direction as far as Rondu. This barrier, if my supposition be correct, must have consisted of a mass of coarse drift or alluvium, entirely blocking up the narrow ravine to a height of three thousand feet or more above the present level of the Indus.