114 THE PEOPLE

points he already has, and with all Nature to back him, he would make Kashmir literally perfection.

The boatmen, who are the class with whom visitors to Kashmir come most intimately into contact, are a separate tribe from the villagers. They are said to claim Noah as their ancestor, and certain it is that if they did not borrow the pattern of their boats from Noah's ark, Noah must have borrowed the pattern from them. They are known as Hanji or Manjis, and live permanently on their boats with their families complete. Some of these boats will carry between six and seven thousand pounds of grain. Others are light passenger boats. They all have their little cooking place on board, and a gigantic wooden pestle and mortar in which the women pound the rice. Both men and women have extrerely fluent and sharp tongues. They are quick - witted, and can turn their hands to most things, and"make themselves useful in a variety of ways.

Besides carrying goods and passengers among the numerous waterways of Kashmir, some gather the singhdére (water nuts) on the Wular Lake, others work market gardens on the Dal Lake, others fish, and others dredge for driftwood in the rivers.