Page:McCosh, John - Advice to Officers in India (1856).djvu/279

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been proofread, but needs to be validated.
IN INDIA.
259

though a tree of five or six feet in diameter, is too brittle for service, and the pine and the deodar (cedar) are rare. The neighbouring hills are for the most part bare, and only a few peaks of snow are to be seen on the horizon.

Landour, as I have said,is about 1000 feet higher than Missourie, with a very easy ascent by a well made road. It is a depot for sick European soldiers, and contains barracks for about 200 men, and a very excellent hospital, with an assistant-surgeon in charge. A commanding officer, an adjutant and several officers doing duty reside on the hill. A limited number of invalids is every year sent up by different regiments in the adjoining provinces, where they reside one or two years, and in most cases return to their duty effective men. Of the comparative advantages of Missourie and Landour,much may be said on either side, there is more society, more gaiety, less rain, less fog, and less lightning at Missourie. At Landour there is more retirement, a cooler temperature and more sublime scenery, and if on duty there, rent-free quarters; but articles from the bazar must be brought up from Missourie, and water from 300 feet below its level, for there is no water on the hill of Landour in the dry season.

The Dhoon and the Dhoon breeze, and the Dhoon mist, are the most prominent traits in each landscape. Few scenes in nature can surpass the