[ILLUSTRATION: THE JHELUM AT SRINAGAR]
“Over the great windy waters, and over the clear crested summits,
Unto the sea and the sky, and unto the perfecter earth,
Come, let us go!”
CLOUGH
1907
I DEDICATE THIS BOOK
TO
“JANE”
I observe that it is customary to begin a book by an Introduction, Preface, orForeword. In the good old days of the eighteenth century this generally tookthe form of a burst of grovelling adoration aimed at some most noble orotherwise highly important person. This fulsome fawning on the great was laterchanged into propitiation of the British public, and unknown authors revelledin excuses for publishing their earlier efforts.
But now that every one has written a book, or is about to do so, I feel that myapologies are rather due to the public for not having rushed into print before.I have really spared it because I had nothing in particular to write about, andI confess I am somewhat doubtful as to whether I am even now justified ininvoking the kind offices of a publisher with a view to bringing forth thisliterary mouse in due form!
No admiring (if partial) relatives have hung upon my lips as I read them myjournal, imploring me with tears in their eyes to waste not an instant, butgive to a longing world this literary treasure. I have no illusions as regardsmy literary powers, and I do not imagine that I shall depose the gifted authorof Eöthen from his pride of place.
I claim, however, the merit of truth. The journal was written day by day, andthe sketches were all done on the spot; and if this account—bald andinadequate as I know it to be—of a very happy time spent in ramblingamong some of the finest scenery of this lovely earth, may induce any one tobetake himself to Kashmir, he will achieve something worth living for, and Ishall