DOI article:
Aberigh-Mackay, Patty: A sketching tour in the Kashmir Valley
DOI Page / Citation link:https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.21214#0248
A Sketching Tour in the Kashmir Valley
where a wooden cantilever bridge, with a huddling
mass of houses on each side, guards the entrance
to the Wular Lake. This is one of the manjihs’
favourite tie-ups. My ideas on the subject do not
often coincide with theirs—they love bazaars;
I hate them, except as places to sketch in when
I have a large lump of camphor handy !
The manjihs always take their boats across the
lake at the shriek of dawn, as they are terrified at
the storms which some-
times suddenly arise. You
generally awake to find
yourself gliding through a
silent grey waste where no
line divides the mountains
from the water, and all is
mystery. Here and there
a village clusters on a
splotch of mud, or a group
of kutchoos are tied up.
Then with a bump the
shikara is brought up along-
side, and the hot water in
an old paraffin tin deposited
in your bathroom. Later
on the cook-boat brings
your breakfast.
The manjih women peep
round the mats, or a shapely
brown arm, laden with sil-
ver bracelets, slipping out,
dips a bowl into the water.
Most of the women are
beautiful—all have magni-
ficent eyes and oval faces,
often with very finely cut
features. Men, women,
and children wear the same
dress—a long, loose gar-
ment called a pheran, with
a big tuck about six inches
from the bottom. The
sleeves, very widely inset,
often flap empty, as the
arms are held inside against the body, giving the
figure a weird, maimed appearance.
You rarely see an uncovered head except a tiny
baby’s—it is not considered decent. The men
wear huge puggarees, the women hang a long
drapery over a red padded cap, and the children
wear tight skull caps, with the result that many of the
boys suffer from a very disgusting disease of the
scalp. It is said to be a sign of immorality for a
Mahomedan woman to appear in a clean dress,
242
and judging from the crowd they must be an
intensely moral race.
Once more you are on the river, and the men
drop their poles and take the rope. In spring the
ground is blue with a tiny species of iris; it
stretches like a sea towards the mountains, with
yellow islands of mustard intensifying the colour.
When the almond is over, peach, pear and apricot
blossom in the orchards and in odd corners of the
mud villages. On the little
graveyards the big mauve
and purple iris are in bud.
The valley stretches
before you encircled by
snow mountains and the
eye is positively dazzled
with colour—not the vivid
blots of colour one gets in
the plains of India, but an
opalesque iridescence.
And so we dawdle up
the river, till in the distance
two hills separate them-
selves from the mist—
Hari Parbat, the famous
fort and prison of Srinagar,
and the Takht-i-Sulieman
crowned with a temple said
to be at least two
thousand years old. At
last the boat passes under
the Seventh Bridge into
the city.
I think Srinagar city puts
Venice in the shade —
though of course it is
heresy to say so. As far as
smells go, there is nothing
to choose between them !
In Venice you have more
space, and the contrasts are
greater—it is more majestic.
In Srinagar the tumble-
down, grey-brown houses
have always a background of snows—the effects are
simpler, the tones lower—there is plenty of colour,
but the impression it gives one is that the colour
is all in the mountains and sky, the town in brown
monotone. You rarely if ever have the touch of
black—such a feature of Venice.
On the grass-grown roofs of the houses, flowers
bloom half the year and fruits are dried the other
half. Tulips, iris, crown imperials follow in turn.
Lilacs, petunias, roses and honeysuckle hang over
‘ ‘ Native Woman and Child ”
Pen Sketch by P. Aberigh- Mac hay
where a wooden cantilever bridge, with a huddling
mass of houses on each side, guards the entrance
to the Wular Lake. This is one of the manjihs’
favourite tie-ups. My ideas on the subject do not
often coincide with theirs—they love bazaars;
I hate them, except as places to sketch in when
I have a large lump of camphor handy !
The manjihs always take their boats across the
lake at the shriek of dawn, as they are terrified at
the storms which some-
times suddenly arise. You
generally awake to find
yourself gliding through a
silent grey waste where no
line divides the mountains
from the water, and all is
mystery. Here and there
a village clusters on a
splotch of mud, or a group
of kutchoos are tied up.
Then with a bump the
shikara is brought up along-
side, and the hot water in
an old paraffin tin deposited
in your bathroom. Later
on the cook-boat brings
your breakfast.
The manjih women peep
round the mats, or a shapely
brown arm, laden with sil-
ver bracelets, slipping out,
dips a bowl into the water.
Most of the women are
beautiful—all have magni-
ficent eyes and oval faces,
often with very finely cut
features. Men, women,
and children wear the same
dress—a long, loose gar-
ment called a pheran, with
a big tuck about six inches
from the bottom. The
sleeves, very widely inset,
often flap empty, as the
arms are held inside against the body, giving the
figure a weird, maimed appearance.
You rarely see an uncovered head except a tiny
baby’s—it is not considered decent. The men
wear huge puggarees, the women hang a long
drapery over a red padded cap, and the children
wear tight skull caps, with the result that many of the
boys suffer from a very disgusting disease of the
scalp. It is said to be a sign of immorality for a
Mahomedan woman to appear in a clean dress,
242
and judging from the crowd they must be an
intensely moral race.
Once more you are on the river, and the men
drop their poles and take the rope. In spring the
ground is blue with a tiny species of iris; it
stretches like a sea towards the mountains, with
yellow islands of mustard intensifying the colour.
When the almond is over, peach, pear and apricot
blossom in the orchards and in odd corners of the
mud villages. On the little
graveyards the big mauve
and purple iris are in bud.
The valley stretches
before you encircled by
snow mountains and the
eye is positively dazzled
with colour—not the vivid
blots of colour one gets in
the plains of India, but an
opalesque iridescence.
And so we dawdle up
the river, till in the distance
two hills separate them-
selves from the mist—
Hari Parbat, the famous
fort and prison of Srinagar,
and the Takht-i-Sulieman
crowned with a temple said
to be at least two
thousand years old. At
last the boat passes under
the Seventh Bridge into
the city.
I think Srinagar city puts
Venice in the shade —
though of course it is
heresy to say so. As far as
smells go, there is nothing
to choose between them !
In Venice you have more
space, and the contrasts are
greater—it is more majestic.
In Srinagar the tumble-
down, grey-brown houses
have always a background of snows—the effects are
simpler, the tones lower—there is plenty of colour,
but the impression it gives one is that the colour
is all in the mountains and sky, the town in brown
monotone. You rarely if ever have the touch of
black—such a feature of Venice.
On the grass-grown roofs of the houses, flowers
bloom half the year and fruits are dried the other
half. Tulips, iris, crown imperials follow in turn.
Lilacs, petunias, roses and honeysuckle hang over
‘ ‘ Native Woman and Child ”
Pen Sketch by P. Aberigh- Mac hay