A Journey to Katmandu (the Capital of Napaul), with the Camp of Jung Bahadoor: Including a Sketch of the Nepaulese Ambassador at HomeOliphant, Laurence
History
A Journey to Katmandu (the Capital of Napaul), with the Camp of Jung Bahadoor: Including a Sketch of the Nepaulese Ambassador at Home
Oliphant, Laurence
Nepal -- Description and travel
Daylight, however, revealed a prospect which banished at once the
remembrance of our nocturnal annoyances. The whole of the Himalayan
range, tinged by the glowing rays of the rising sun, displayed to our
delighted and astonished gaze its long and majestic line of snowy peaks,
while the atmosphere, cleared by the night's heavy rain, brought out in
bold relief the sharp outline of every point and angle from the clear
horizon-line of the various summits down to where the light morning haze
still shrouded their base.
Unobscured by intervening mountains, and towering high above a sea of
mist, well may they impress with wonder and admiration the traveller
journeying over the plains of India, as he beholds them for the first
time; nor could I, familiar as they were to me, withdraw my gaze until
the increasing power of the sun rendered the atmosphere more hazy, and
gradually veiled this glorious picture from my view, as if it were too
precious to be exhibited for any length of time.
The journey to Goruckpore occupied us two nights and a day of incessant
travelling over a flat but cheerful-looking wheat country. It is a
pretty little station, containing a regiment and a few civilians, and is
situated on the banks of the Rapti, our old Nepaulese acquaintance under
a very different face.
The Gograh, which we crossed the following morning, is the boundary that
divides the British territory from that of his Majesty of Oudh; and
Fyzabad was the first town in his dominions at which we halted. Situate
about six miles from the river, it is approached by a narrow muddy lane
which winds among numbers of squalid huts, while a considerable
sprinkling of handsome mosques and minarets showed the predominance of
Mahomedanism in the country in which we were now travelling; but they all
seemed falling to decay, and were inhabited chiefly by Hindoo monkeys,
who lazily inspected one another on the sunny corners of some ruined
temple, or chased each other irreverently through the sacred groves.
Fyzabad was formerly the capital; but the seat of government was changed
to Lucknow at the accession of Azof-up Dowlah in 1775.
We were not sorry, after spending another twenty-four hours in our
rickety palanquins, to see the massive mosques and lofty minarets of
Lucknow looming in the distance, while handsome buildings in varied
styles of architecture gave to this city a handsome and more imposing
appearance than any I had yet visited in the provinces of India.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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