Page:McCosh, John - Advice to Officers in India (1856).djvu/274

 To the north an endless series of mountain ridges come in view, crowned with the snowy peaks of the Great Himalayah, Kedar Nath, and Budrinath, and Nundi-devy, and Juwahir, fit altars to look from nature up to nature's God. No wonder that the Hindoos considered those peaks so sacred, and enjoined pilgrimages to be made to them to offer up their prayers to Mahadeo, with an assurance of a happy immortality to the pilgrims that died of fatigue on the way; or that they offered up themselves as a sacrifice by ascending their heights till they perished in the snow,in "The valley of death." Not fifty years ago, this religious rite was prevalent at Kedarnath, but like many other modes of human sacrifice it was suppressed, when Kumaon became a dependance of the company.

11. ALMORAH.—Almorah is about thirty miles distant from Naineethal towards the north; there is a good road between the two;and staging Bungalows at Ramghur and Powree, but the journey with a spare pony can easily be made in one day. Almorah stands on the summit of a range of mountains considerably lower than its neighbours, at an elevation of only 5500 feet. The country within six or seven miles of it is quite naked, the forests having been cut down for firewood during centuries gone by,but the station is well planted by the householders. The soil is