General Gatacre Part 2

Major-General Sir Harcourt Bengough, who was a few years senior to Gatacre in the regiment, writes thus:

"The impression I retain of him as a young soldier is that of a strong will and a quick determination to succeed, combined with a very kindly disposition and a great charm of manner."

Another officer tells us that in the hottest weather Gatacre was always cool, smiling, and good-tempered. He was noticeably abstemious and frugal, and very careful of his appearance. At one time he used to clean his own boots because he was too hard up to pay for this service.

When he related this in after-life he added, with the pride of efficiency, "And they did shine!"

An officer's wife who knew Gatacre in these early days, and saw him at intervals throughout {16} his career, tells us that there hung about him when he first joined a certain countrified simplicity of mind and manner, as opposed to the conventionality of a town-bred man. Though he enjoyed society, social distractions got little hold on his self-contained nature, and it was rarely that any of his friendships developed into intimacy. He had, however, a ready sympathy, was easily interested in whatever went on around him, and, being very unselfish, was always prepared to do any one a service.

[Sidenote: 1865]

Young Gatacre's letters to his mother from Allahabad disclose a reasoned industry inspired by ambition. The reiteration of the recurring features of his life, cholera, rain, and work, is suggestive of the monotony of existence in the summer months. But his experiences and his surroundings differ in nothing from that of every other subaltern in the Plains. That he worked with a.s.siduity at acquiring the language is shown by his having been placed first out of twenty-two in the Higher Standard, after only two years' study. When the 77th moved to Bareilly, Gatacre was made secretary to the Mutton and Poultry Club, and kept a quailery, which was a venture of his own. The following letter shows the real interest that he took in his charges:

_July_ 31, 1865.

"When the musketry instructor comes down from leave on September 30, I shall try for fifteen days' leave. I cannot get more, as the {17} course begins on October 15, with all its hard work. It is raining very hard here, and I am sitting in the verandah watching all my ducks and geese enjoying themselves. I have both my horses in the field round the house: one of them has a peculiarly unpleasant temper with strangers. The other day the doctor was breakfasting with us; when he went away and had got a short distance, he saw this animal coming at him open-mouthed, but he turned and ran for my room, and both the doctor and horse came into the room together. He does not run at me, as he knows me so well, but I never trust him much; they are very uncertain in India."

[Sidenote: On leave]

In November 1866 the 77th was sent to Peshawur, and in the following May young Gatacre took six months' leave to Kashmir. But he did not confine himself to shooting in the Happy Valley; he was filled with an adventurous curiosity to see the temples and wild scenery of the mountains beyond. He felt that his pleasure in the trip would lie in his freedom to go where he chose, and when he chose, and as fast as he chose. He knew that his mobility would outstrip that of any companion, and so decided to go alone. In this decision, in which we see the first indication of originality, Gatacre showed a fearlessness, a confidence in his own resources, and a willingness to sever communications with all external support that are remarkable in a lad of only twenty-three. These characteristics never faded; they may be traced throughout the record of his life {18} whenever occasion arose for his individuality to take action. What other man would have attempted to explore the forests of Abyssinia unaccompanied at the age of sixty-one! His fearlessness and his confidence were with him to the end, and to the end he preserved a mobility that preferred to be unhampered.

[Sidenote: 1867]

Young Gatacre's first objective was Leh. He left Srinagar on May 2, and halting at Manasbal Lake one night, reached Kangan. Here he learnt that the road over the Zoji-La between Sonamarg and Dras was still blocked with snow, and so made up his mind to halt for a time. His diary during this fortnight's halt shows that he was more interested in what he saw than in what he shot. This is the feature of his trip; he writes much more of the temples that he has sketched than of the game that he has killed. One day when he had run across some friends he writes: "Saw a gerau deer that Troop had killed; would like to get one to make a sketch of." He subsequently collected many of his sketches in a book; and these early water-colours are quite surprising in their freshness and finish. They are not pictures, but most painstaking studies of what he saw--picturesque men and women, animals, temples, idols, and occasionally the detail of some designs from the temples.

He records with the greatest interest the flowers and birds that he sees, and speaks of its physical features if the country he was pa.s.sing through was of special interest. It is clear that he had at some time studied the elements of geology, {19} for he writes of the Zoji-La: "Rocks very barren, and look very old--no sharp points."

[Sidenote: Goes after bear]

After ten days he moved one march up the road to Reval, and spent ten days there shooting, whenever the rain and the snow allowed. On May 16 he writes:

"Fine morning at last; put everything in the sun to dry. Went out shooting after breakfast, and had a good day; killed a black bear about 200 yards from camp. Had a shot at an ibex; saw nine, but did not hit one. Slept under a tree for about an hour; on my way back killed a brown bear with a beautiful silvery skin, and hit a barrasingh buck in the chest; tracked him a long way, found some blood. Night was coming on and it began to rain, so had to give up the search or should probably have got him--a magnificent beast, horns about a foot high, just beginning to grow. In jumping across the stream I fell in and got wet through; water very strong, was carried down like an arrow; caught hold of a stone and came ash.o.r.e, took off my things and stood in the sun to dry: sketch reserved."

There is a pleasant vein of boyish humour in some of the entries.

"Went after a huge black bear that we saw on the hill-side, but could not find him. Climbed one of the stiffest and most slippery hills that I ever was on after the aforesaid bear, and found his cave. Thought him a fool for selecting such a spot; going up there once was bad enough, but to have such an ascent to one's residence was absurd.

Found some one of the name of {20} Thorpe had arrived at the camping-ground, asked him to dinner, but he refused as he was so tired; could not understand his reason--the very one why I should have accepted, as he could have gone to bed directly afterwards, my dinner being ready and his not.

It was not till May 23 that he got really started, and even then the road was still deep in snow, or the melting snow was flooding over the road in many places. Under date May 25 we read:

"Pa.s.sed some dead men in the pa.s.s; they were men going to Yarkand (eight men and a woman) several days ago, when they were overtaken with snow and smothered, all their bedding, clothes, etc., lying about."

Next day, writing from Dras, he notices the great change that has come over the country; and here he spent three days, partly because his servant had fever, and partly because he finds so much to sketch that he cannot tear himself away. The same motive kept him at Lama Guru, of which he gives an excellent description. He reached Leh on June 9, having accomplished the 250 miles from Reval in seventeen days, or deducting four halts, thirteen days; which works out at an average of over nineteen miles every marching day.

[Sidenote: At Hemis]

The following day he started off for Hemis, where there was a great gathering for the visit of the Burra Lama: this involved a stony and arduous march of twenty-four miles, but he was {21} up early next morning and was very much interested in what was going on.

_June_ 11, 1867.

"Went all over the Monastery and gained a little information--not much, as the monks keep no records, only from year to year. The place is about 1,300 years old, well built of stone with a whitening on it, on the side of a rock. There are several halls of worship (Gompas) hung round with splendid silk flags and banners, all Chinese silk. There are a few idols, but very small ones, magnificently woven pictures of G.o.ds on silk being the chief things. About 10 o'clock the tamasha began, monks dressed in the most magnificent silk garments and quaint tall hats and masks dancing; the costumes were varied about every quarter of an hour and every one equally grand as the former. They each held in their hands a drum like a warming-pan and either a bell or a rattle. They danced a sort of war-dance in a circle, occasionally singing and drumming. Under the verandah of the Quadrangle were seated about thirty monks dressed in red and yellow silk gowns, with fan-shaped hats on their heads; some with drums, some with cymbals, and some with long trumpets, silver and copper, formed the band; they played from music and it went very well with the wild dance. One dance was performed with bears, another was supposed to be a wild man's dance: about ten monks--dressed in hideous masks, yellow embroidered silk jackets, on the shoulders of which tigers' heads were embroidered, and round whose waists were strings of bells, from which were suspended strips of tiger skins--danced in a circle, beating drums and ringing bells. The figure of a man {22} bound hand and foot was placed in the centre. After they had danced round the figure some time, one of them cut off his head with a sword. One of the side walls of the Quadrangle, about 30 ft. high and 12 ft. broad, was covered with a single cloth or flag on which was most beautifully woven the figure of one of their G.o.ds and other subjects--worth about 5,000 or 6,000 rupees. This was at first covered with long silk streamers, which were removed; and when the large banner had been duly worshipped and admired, it was rolled up and replaced by another equally splendid, but not so large, by a third and by a fourth. Each dress could not have cost less than 80 or 100--I never saw anything so magnificent; the whole Quadrangle was hung round with silk streamers too. Round the Quadrangle, the prayer-books--viz. rollers of wood with the prayers written on them--are placed, one turn of which is equal to saying a prayer. All the villagers have them at their doors; at one corner of the Quadrangle there is a room in which there is a huge prayer roller.

They are called Marni-prayer."

Gatacre was determined to make the most of his opportunities, and insisted on seeing the Burra Lama, whom he thus describes:

"He is a short, stout, middle-aged man, clothed in fine scarlet cloth, sitting on a throne on which incense was burning; he is never seen by any one except on the occasion of the festival, when he comes and sits on a platform in the Quadrangle for about half an hour. I could not wait till evening to see him, so as a special favour was allowed to see the mortal whom no vulgar European eye had seen before. He {23} received me graciously, and asked me to be seated and how I was; asked me if I had anything to give him. I had brought nothing from Ladak with me, but had some matches with me, which I gave him. He comes from Lha.s.sa; it is three months' journey from here, and he comes once in every five or six years. It was great luck my seeing this festival, as occurring so early in the year it is seldom or never seen."

[Sidenote: The Salt Lakes]

On his return to Leh, Gatacre was horrified at getting letters telling him to hurry back to Peshawur, as cholera had broken out. But he was too cunning to take this very literally, and at once got his friend the Wazeer to lend him ponies to ride to the Salt Lakes; he adds most sapiently: "If I don't see them now, probably never shall."

It was, however, a very long way (ninety-eight miles) to the Salt Lakes at Rupshu; he did this journey in two days, and on the second day writes:

"The distance I came to-day was fifty-eight miles; I was nearly dead with fever, and sun and cold, and walking, and riding in a wooden saddle all day."

He spent one day in his tent with fever on the snow-covered plain, but was better next morning and able to get about, and on the following day he started on the return journey, which he accomplished in two marches as before.

After four days spent at Leh with some friends who had turned up, he marched back by the same {24} route, covering 265 miles from Leh to Kangan in twelve days, one of which was a halt at Lama Yuru, where he "slept nearly all day."

[Sidenote: Off again]

Writing from Baltal on July 1, he comments on the change that has taken place in the Zoji-La in his absence:

"The Pir is a very different-looking place from what it was when I came through it before. Then it was a wilderness of snow, ice, and rocks; now it is the most beautiful pa.s.s, hills covered with gra.s.s and flowers and shrubs and trees that were before buried in the snow. The snow rivers are very full and furious; nearly lost a pony in one of them; drove him through it and carried saddles, etc., over the snow some way higher up; the pony was rolled over and over and with difficulty came to land. Now that the snow has disappeared, one sees what a quant.i.ty there must have been in the pa.s.s when I went through, at least 70 or 80 ft. in some places. The Pir is covered with sweet peas and flowers of all colours and shapes, excessively pretty.

"The hills wear a quite different aspect to what they did when I came up. The snow has melted except on a few of the highest peaks, and the gra.s.s has grown, likewise the shrubs. The barley and all the corn is in the ear; it was hardly sown when I came, just a month ago. There are waterfalls from nearly every rock, which looks very pretty and the water is such as 'only teetotallers desire or deserve.' The wild roses, white, red, and yellow, are covered with blossoms, and their smell is delicious."

But before he reached Srinagar the orders for his return were cancelled, and we find him shooting in his old haunts round Kangan.

{25}

It is clear that he was enjoying himself thoroughly, that he felt no impatience to return to civilisation, and that he considered his march to Leh and back very much worth doing, for at the end of July he started on another extended tour. It is about 120 miles from Kangan to Skardo, about 200 thence to Leh, and about 250 from Leh to Srinagar, so that he added another 570 miles to his score in the fifty days between July 28 and September 15. Leaving the Sind River by the tributary valley to the north called w.a.n.gat, he crossed into the valley of Tylel by a little-known route "said to have been a track made by a gang of horse dealers who came from Tylel into Kashmir years ago." There were two very steep hills, of which the coolies only managed to accomplish the first.

Turning north-east, he made his way across the plains of Deosai, but there was a difficult pa.s.s to negotiate before he descended into the valley of the Indus. On August 7 he writes: