Keeping Warm.

Kaikoura Star, Volume XIV, Issue 677, 26 January 1894, Page 2

Keeping Warm.

In his book on ‘ The Pamirs,’ in which he sketches his recent expedition through Kashmir, Western Tiber, Chinese Tartary, and Russian Central Asia, the Earl of Dunmore describes a curious incident. He and his travelling companion were spending a couple of days with friendly hosts in not very good quarters when the weather became intensely cold. * Tbe thermometer fell to 10 degrees below zero in the afternoon,’ says tbe earl, ‘so we had recourse to various expedients to keep ourselves warm. First we had Russian peasant dances, then Cossack dances, all to the music of an accordion. Then I tried to teach the officers the figures of a reel, and hummed the music of the old Highland tune of* Gamhaidhe sinn an rathaid mor ’ to the Cossack who played the accordion, and which he picked up very quickly, and, such as it was, we danced it to keep ourselves warm, lots of the Cossacks joining in. That was the first Highland reel ever danced on the Pamirs, I should say, to Russian music. As we were going to march the next day, a rather imposing and certainly interesting ceremony followed, namely, the drinking of the healths of Queen Victoria and the Emperor of Russia, the whole garrison saluting and cheering at the toasts. We were genuinely sorry to leave our hospitable quarters and the cheery good fellows who had been our hosts.*