Page:The Romance of Isabel, Lady Burton.djvu/616

578 everywhere was grand and bold. We made several excursions in the neighbourhood, and I found the natives, or jungle people, very interesting.

On the 23rd we left Mátherán. We started early in the morning for Narel, walked down the steep descent from Mátherán, then rode. We arrived hot and a little tired at Narel station, and the train came in at 10 a.m. We mounted the break, and much enjoyed the ascent of the Highlands, arriving in about three hours at Lanauli on the Bhore Ghát. At Lanauli we found a fairly comfortable hotel, though it was terribly hot. What made the heat worse was that most of the houses at Lanauli were covered with corrugated-iron roofs, which were bad for clothes, as they sweated rusty drops all over the room, which left long stains on one's linen and dresses. I came away with everything ruined. The air was delicious, like that of São Paulo or Damascus in the spring.

The next morning we were up and off at dawn to the Karla Caves. There was brought to the door at dawn for Richard a jibbing, backing pony, with vicious eyes, and for me a mangy horse like a knifeboard, spavined, with weak legs, and very aged, but nevertheless showing signs of "blood." On top of this poor beast was a saddle big enough for a girl of ten, and I, being eleven stone, felt ashamed to mount. However, there was nothing else to be done. We rode four miles along the road, and then crossed a river valley of the mountains. Here we descended, and had to climb a goatlike path until we came to what looked like a gash or ridge in the mountain-side, with a belt of trees.