The first town that we come to is called Simla (Plate XII.). It is not large, having barely 15,000 inhabitants, but it is one of the most beautiful towns in the world, and one of the most powerful, for in its cedar groves stands a palace, and in the palace an Imperial throne. The Emperor is the King of England, whose power over India is entrusted to a Viceroy. In summer enervating heat prevails over the lowlands of India, and all Europeans who are not absolutely tied to their posts move up to the hills. The Viceroy and his staff, the government officials, the chief officers of the army, civil servants and military men all fly with their wives up to Simla, where the leaders of society live as gaily as in London. During this season the number of inhabitants rises to 30,000. The houses of Simla are built like swallows' nests on steep slopes. The streets, or rather roads, lie terraced one above another. The whole town is built on hills surrounded by dizzy precipices. Round about stand forests dark and dense; but between the cedars are seen far off to the southwest the plains of the Punjab and the winding course of the Sutlej, and to the north the masses of the Himalayas with their eternal snowfields. It is delightful to go up to Simla from the sultriness of India, and perhaps still more delightful to come down to Simla from the piercing cold of Tibet. DELHI AND AGRA From Simla we go down by train through hundreds of tunnels and round the sharpest curves, over countless bridges and along dizzy precipices, to the lowlands of the Punjab. It is exceedingly hot, and we long for a little breeze from Tibet's snowy mountains. Time flies by till we reach Delhi, situated on the Jumna, one of the affluents of the Ganges. Delhi was the capital of the empire of the Great Moguls,[11] and in the seventeenth century it was the most magnificent city in the world. [Illustration: MAP OF INDIA, SHOWING JOURNEY FROM NUSHKI TO LEH (pp. 82-88), AND THE JOURNEY FROM TIBET THROUGH SIMLA, ETC., TO BOMBAY (pp. 130-142).]