The New Books.
In Kashmir and Western Tibet[1]
The handsome volume entitled "Where Three Empires Meet" contains the interesting account of Mr. E. F. Knight's recent travels in Kashmir, Western Tibit, Gilgit, and adjoining countries; the book taking its title from the fact that it is hard by Gilgit, on the high roof of the world, as it were, that the three greatest empires, Great Britain, Russia, and China, converge. Mr. Knight is a very agreeable writer, with a keen eye for out-of- the-way traits and humors; and his book, besides being rich in the solider sort of facts, is pleasantly anecdotal, and, on occasion, drily humorous. Kashmir has been called the northern bastion of India, and Gilgit may be described as her farther outpost. Of the Happy Valley itself, the author did not, as he tells us, see much, the greater part of the year (1891) being spent by him among the desolate mountain-tracts to the north of it, where the ranges of the Hindoo Koosh and Karakoram form the boundary between the dominions of the Maharaja and that rather vaguely defined region called Central Asia. In the course of the journey he visited the mystic land of Ladak, and he reached Gilgit in time to take part in Colonel Durand's expedition against the raiding Hunza-Nagars, thus falling in with exceptional opportunities for observing how things are ordered on the Indian frontier, both in peace and war. Mr. Knight prudently confines himself, so far as possible, to the narrative of his own sufficiently varied experiences, without attempting to theorize as to what ought to be done or left undone on the frontier. He remarks:
"The Indian government can be trusted to do everything for the best, as heretofore; and while it is foolish for people at home to airily criticise the policy of those highly-trained Anglo-Indian experts who have made the complicated problems of our Asiatic rule the study of a lifetime, it is still more foolish for one to do so who has spent but a year in the East, and who, therefore, has just had time to realize what a vast amount he has yet to learn."
Especially interesting and opportune is the account of Kashmir a sort of debatable land, at present, the affairs of which are likely soon to attract a good deal of attention. In order to understand the ground, at least the ostensible ground, of late British interference in that country, a few general facts touching its more recent history must be borne in mind. Kashmir, having been wrested from the Pathans by the Sikhs in 1819, was attached to the Punjab until the termination of the Sutlej campaign, when it fell into the hands of the British—who did not, as the author significantly observes, at that time realize its immense value. It was at once assigned by treaty, dated March 16, 1846, to the Maharaja of Jummoo, partly in consideration of certain services rendered. In exchange for the cession the Maharaja was to pay over the very inadequate sum of seventy-five lacs of rupees, besides engaging to come to the assistance of England with the whole of his army whenever she was at war with any of the people near his frontier. He also acknowledged England's supremacy, and agreed to pay an annual tribute—consisting mainly of Kashmir shawls—to the government. By this treaty, not only the Vale of Kashmir, but Ladak, Baltistan, and the Astor and Gilgit districts, became the appanage of the Maharajas of Jummoo. During the reign of the present ruler, Pertab Singh, the Indian Government has "lent" to the Kashmir State military and civil officers "to superintend the much-needed reforms in the administration of the country." The author describes what he saw of the work of these officials in a rather non-committal way, and he reaches the conclusion that the present active policy of Great Britain in Kashmir, "while having for its object the safeguarding of our Imperial interests, will bring about a great amelioration in the condition of the population." Despite this need of foreign interference in its internal affairs, Mr. Knight found Kashmir the "safest land he had ever seen or heard of"—one of the few countries, indeed, in which it is possible for a lady to travel without escort in a perfectly unconventional way.
"Every summer English ladies wander about Kashmir alone, taking their caravans of native servants, baggage animals, and coolies, pitching their tents at night, and riding the stages in the same independent fashion as their brothers and husbands would."
This immunity of travellers from offences against person or property seems to be due partly to the native dread of the dominant British race, partly to the drastic Oriental custom by which a whole district is made amenable for crimes committed within its boundaries.
The account of Kashmir itself, its climate,
- ↑ Where Three Empires Meet. A Narrative of Recent Travel in Kashmir, Western Tibet, Gilgit, and the Adjoining Countries. By E. F. Knight. Illustrated. New York: Longmans, Green, & Co.
