JULY 15th.--Started as soon as it was light for Gingle, fourteen miles
distant. Road greatly improved, hilly of course, but tolerably smooth so
that one could get on without clambering. About half way passed Dorie on
the left bank of the river, where there is another fort and a strong
rope bridge, it is one of the halts on the Murree road, farther on came
to an old ruin, four thick walls perforated by arches enclosing an open
square in the middle of two of the sides, large masses of masonry formed
archways or entrances. It is built of the rough stones and boulders with
which the surface of the ground is covered, yet the arches are of very
good shape. On the opposite bank of the Jhelum there are forests of
Deodar, but though they grow down to the waters edge, there is not one
on this side. (Larix Deodora, called by the Hindoos, "the God Tree" is a
stately pine, growing to a great height, and of a very gradual and
elegant taper. Its foliage is of the darkest green colour, and it gives
the mountains a very sombre appearance.) The hills have become much more
rugged and abrupt. I know of no single condition which gives a scene so
great an aspect of wildness and desolation, as dead fir trees. There
they stand on the most barren and inaccessible places, rearing their
gaunt and whitened forms erect as ever, and though lifeless yet not
decayed.
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