Mr. Dartnell, Surgeon of H. M. 53rd regiment, gives the following account
of the building of a fort which has lately been erected at Michnee to check
the incursions of the Momunds into the Peshawur Valley:
"There was little to be done, except to build a fort, and here the
officers had to superintend and direct the working parties which were
daily sent out.... Laborers from far and near, Cashmerees, Caboolees,
men from the Hindoo Koosh, Afreedees, Khyberees, &c., all working
together with hearty goodwill, and a sort of good-humoured rivalry....
It is only when working by contract, however, that the Cashmeree
displays his full physical powers, and it is then perfectly refreshing,
in such a physically relaxing and take-the-world-as-it-goes sort of a
country as this, to observe him.... And then to see him carry a burden!
On his head? No. On his back? Yes, but after a fashion of his own,
perfectly natural and entirely independent of basket, or receptacle of
any kind in which to place it. I have now in my garden some half-dozen
of these labourers at work, removing immense masses of clay, which are
nearly as hard as flint, and how do they manage? My friend Jumah Khan
reverts his arms, and clasping his hands together behind his back,
receives the pyramidal load, which generally overtops his head, and
thus he conveys it to its destination," &c.--Colburn's _United Service
Magazine_, December, 1852, pp. 514, 515.
Thucydides tells us that as soon as the crews of the Athenian ships,
weatherbound at Pylos in the spring of the year B.C. 425, had made up their
minds to kill time by fortifying their harbour of refuge,--
"They took the work in hand, and plied it briskly.... The mud that was
anywhere requisite, for want of vessels, they carried on their
shoulders, bending forwards as much as possible, that it might have
room to stick on, and holding it up with both hands clasped fast behind
that it might not slide down."--Book iv. chap. 4. (Smith's
Translation.)