Recreations continues...

A European, Mr. Seal, was manager of the Kangra Valley Slate Quarries. He lived in village Kanyara, three miles from Dharamsala where the quarries are situated. He was a very interesting and generous minded man. He retired when I was practising at Dharamsala. He gave me for a nominal price of Rs. 50 a D. B. 16 bore gun, now left in Pakistan. I purchased from him white minorca hens and white Leghorns.

We took over the whole of his poultry farm and maintained it at our lower Dharamsala house. This was my first experience in poultry farming. I also purchased from Seal a copy of the Encyclopaedia Britannica, which I still possess. though the poultry did not last very long.

Bowling and Switzer, two retired railway guards, were old residents of Dharamsala. Their women folk were kind and helpful, and both families were extremely popular among Dharamsala people, Before the earthquake, Switzer owned a hotel in Upper Dharamsala and was the owner of a beautiful Kapurthala estate. His successors have ruined the estate by cutting down its towering Deodar trees for profit. The Bowlings were very kind to us. They once lent us the use of their house and Mrs. Bowling presented my mother with a rocking chair which I still possess. My children were very fond of her as she always gave them chocolates and English sweets which she used to prepare herself. Mr. Switzer once lent us his magnificent house for the summer. Mr. Nowrojee, the proprietor of the only decent general merchants shop in Dharamsala was the life and soul of Dharamsala Society. I remember him riding on a small white pony when I was a young boy. He was an impressive personality, hospitable, sympathetic and kind to village folk and gaddis. He died of a heart attack recently while walking down to lower Dharamsala. With his death upper. Dharamsala lost the only person who made it worth living there. The gap left by him remains unfilled.

to be continued...

( This account is maintained by Har Anand Publication)