Memoir of William Watts McNair, Late of "Connaught House," Mussooree, of the Indian Survey Department, the First European Explorer of KafiristanHoward, J. E.
History
Memoir of William Watts McNair, Late of "Connaught House," Mussooree, of the Indian Survey Department, the First European Explorer of Kafiristan
Howard, J. E.
McNair, William Watts, 1849-1889; Nuristan (Afghanistan) -- Description and travel; Nuristani (Asian people)
in language and terms required by an explorer to do his work
effectively. Where man is equipped by that instinctive faculty of
accommodating himself to the men of all nations with their physical
attributes and surroundings, I think he may dispense, in a large
measure, with the science of language as an open sesame. Nature has her
own methods.
This being more in the nature of a memoir purely personal in its
details, giving the characteristics of the man who performed an exploit
deemed by the Royal Geographical Society worthy of the Murchison Grant,
I may be pardoned for adding a few private particulars of the events
leading to the death of one so young, and whose career was so full of
promise at its earthly close.
During the summer of the year 1888, McNair met with a very serious
horse accident, one, indeed, that might with complete natural sequence
have terminated his life on the spot. The vicious horse of a friend he
was riding to tame the brute (for he was a skilful horseman as well as
good at sports), reared and fell over on him. By the display of
personal alacrity he managed to avoid vital injuries, but sufficient of
the animal's body came on his own to render it necessary that he should
be carried home in a "jhampan," or Sedan chair, used in the mountain
sanitaria of India for the conveyance of ladies. A friend's house in
the neighbourhood of the spot where the accident occurred was of great
use in restoring him somewhat from the effects of the accident. The
kind friends who helped him to undertake the journey to his house,
about a mile distant (carried in this way on men's shoulders), did Mr.
McNair one of those services for which India is renowned as a land of
friendly help. The injuries sustained internally nevertheless kept the
patient in bed for a month, and the nursing of a mother and sister
brought him round sufficiently to enable him to do his work as usual to
all appearance. During the ensuing winter he had very hard work, which
involved much exposure, and he suffered exceedingly from the effects of
that accident. Immediately after he felt indisposition of any kind he
complained of a return of the pains due to the accident, and there can
be but little doubt that the inward injuries then sustained had left
their mark, though nominally healed. 1888-9 was a severe winter in the
mountain regions of our frontier, and a letter I had from McNair in
April, 1889 (the last letter I ever received from him), gave some
description of the vicissitudes of temperature he had to undergo. I
give the letter in his own words in the Appendix, as a facsimile of his
handwriting, to show how precise a hand he wrote, and as a memento of
himself which some of his many friends might wish to cherish, for I
believe that in many respects handwriting bears marked characteristics
of the qualities of the individual. Here I will only extract the
following description of the trials my friend had to undergo in the
matter of temperature.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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