ith large flowers were abundant, also an
oxalis very like our own wood-sorrel.

Emerging from the pines, we crossed a grassy slope covered with tall
primulas (P. _denticulata_) of varying shades of mauve and lilac, and sat
down for a bit among the flowers while the shikaris looked for game. (I
need hardly remark that the noble but elusive beast had appeared on the
scene shortly after I left on Saturday; a Gujar told the shikari, and the
shikari told me, so it must be true.) When we had gathered as many flowers
as we could carry, we strolled back to the camp to watch the sunset
transmute the snowy crest of Haramok to a golden rose.

Yesterday, Tuesday, I left the camp at dawn, and went all over the same
ground, but with no better success, only seeing a couple of bara singh,
hornless now, and therefore comparatively uninteresting from a "shikar"
point of view. After a delightful but bearless ramble I returned to
breakfast, and then we struck camp, and completed the ascent of the pass
over into the Lolab. Arrived at the top, we turned off the path to the
right, and, climbing a short way, came out upon the lower part of the
Nagmarg, a pretty, open clearing among the pines where the grass, dotted
thickly with yellow colchicum, was only showing here and there through the
melting snow. Choosing a snug and dry place on some sun-warmed rocks at
the foot of a tree, we prepared to lunch and laze, and soon spread abroad
the contents of the tiffin basket.

There is something, nay much, of charm in the utter freedom and solitude
of Kashmir camp life. There is no beaten track to be followed diligently
by the tourist, German, American, or British, guide-book in hand and guide
at elbow. No empty sardine-tins, nor untidy scraps of paper, mar the clean
and lonely margs or village camping-grounds.

The happy wanderer, selecting a grassy dell or convenient shady tree with
a clear spring or dancing rivulet near by, invokes the tiffin coolie, and
if a duly watchful eye has been kept upon that incorrigible sluggard, in
short space the contents of the basket deck the sward. What have we here?
Yes, of course, cold chicken--

"For beef is rare within these oxless isles."

Bread! (how lucky we sent that coolie into Srinagar the other day). Butter,
nicely stowed in its little white jar, cheese-cakes (one of the Sabz Ali's
masterpieces), and a few unconsidered trifles in the form of "jam pups"
and a stick of chocolate.

Whisky is there, if