1 6 P, Von Hugel,
2 i, 249.
3 7 i. 62.
4 Vii. 81.
5 2 Wilson in Pref.
6 to Moorer, liii.
7 240 SIRINAGUR.
8 pile of square deodar logs, each abouta foot thick, and laid one
9 over another as beams are usually stored in a timber-yard, so that
10 each face presents a succession of butts and sides. These pillars
11 are about ten feet high, and seem to have been devised with a pre-
12 cautionary view against earthquakes, which are here of frequent
13 occurrence, and have damaged the rest of the structure without
14 shaking them, or causing them to deviate from the perpendicular.
15 The deodar is a timber so durable that though these pillars have
16 stood nearly two centuries, they exhibit no symptoms of decay.
17 The ground-plan of this spacious building is a square of about
18 four hundred feet.6 The mosque of Shah Hamedan is built of
19 deodar in a singular style of architecture, resembling the Chinese,
20 but less fantastic and meretricious. The Jailum is crossed by
21 seven bridges. The piers of these are formed of deodar logs, ar-
22 ranged as in the pillars of the great mosque, the road being formed
23 by beams of the same timber stretching from one pier to another.
24 There are no parapets nor side-rails of any kind, and as the beams
25 are in most places some distance asunder, the passage of these sin-
26 gular bridges is not altogether free from danger. So durable is the
27 material, so gentle the current of the Jailum, and so exempt the
28 climate of Kashmir from storms, that some of these apparently
29 frail structures have lasted for several centuries. Houses are
30 built on some of them, and in many places trees have spon-
31 taneously grown up. Close to the east of Sirinagur is the city
32 Dal, or Lake, described by Vigne’ as five miles in length from
33 north to south, and two and a half miles in breadth from east to
34 west. The water is very clear and not deep, in few places ex-
35 ceeding eight or ten feet. The lake is divided into two nearly
36 equal parts by an artificial causeway made across it in the direc-
37 tion from south-west to north-east. This is covered with
38 rushes, and has the appearance of a green line traversing the
39 water. A single opening, bridged over, admits the passage of
40 account and that of Vigne.' ‘* The foundations are of stone, but the roof of
41 the surrounding cloister, or interior, is supported by two rows of pillars, three
42 hundred and ninety-two in all, on plain stone bases, each pillar being formed
43 of a single deodar-tree, about thirty feet in height.’ In attempting to de-
44 cide between such discordant statements, it should be borne in mind that
45 Vigne was an eye-witness, and that the work styled Moorcroft’s Travels is a
46 compilation from materials which the learned rédacteur was ‘‘ compelled to
47 compress unmercifully.’”*