A WILD EXHIBITION

New Zealand Times, Volume XLIII, Issue 9999, 17 June 1918, Page 2

A WILD EXHIBITION

POLO IN LADAKH BAZAAR A GO-AS-YOU-PLEASE GAME, So keen is tho Himalayan hillman for his <f pulu”—tho word is from the Tibetan, by tho way, and means a willow boll—that ho no more thinks of foregoing it for lack of a field than does tho street urchin his cricket for lack of a pitch. If topographical exigencies forbid a maiden, ho. plays in the village bazaai or up and down tho solitary street. Those are tho wildest exhibitions of all. “What in the name of common sense did you bring those old polo balls along forP” X asked tho young British officer of an Indian regiment who had accompanied mo on shikar in Kashmir (says Leslie R. Freeman in “Land and Water”). Wo had followed up tho Sind from Srinagar, crossed the lofty Zoji La and were in camp at Leh. tho capital o’f Ladakh. With tho country for hundreds of miles in every direction tipping one way or tlicothor at an angle of forty-five degrees, toy question was a natural ono. “For your especial amusement,” was the reply. “Tossing a polo ball into a Ladakh bazaar beats throwing copper coins to famine sufferers for excitement. Coine on down and see for yourself,” and Nepali shouldered Pa than, Khirgiz, and Dogra, and the gossip of half a continent buzzed in Leh bazaar as, pushing between ponies and yaks, goats and sheop, B* and l picked our way to breathing room in the centre of tho little square. THE GAME. Shouting something in his fluent Hindustani. my companion held the battered ball aloit for a moment, and then tossed it upon tho cobbles among the vendors of grains and pack gears. The effect was electric, explosive. The vendors seized armfuls of their stock and bolted for shelter, tollmen of a dozen races came running with stubby mallets in their hands, and, mounting the nearest pony, pressed upon the ball. Yaks grunted, goats and sheep bleated, ponies snorted, women chattered and screamed and men yelled. Now a dozen ponies were stamping tho tough lump of bamboo root into tho stones, now a score. The air was black with flailing sticks, , nd their resounding thwacks, as they fell on man and beast alike, mingled with the bedlam of cries. Now tho ball was kicked from the press and a quick wrist stroke sent it flying out of the bazaar and down the narrow street. A fugitive Tibetan girl with her arms full of strings ot turquoise hair ornaments blundered in front of the leader, fell sprawling, and half the cluttering pack passed over her felt-padded anatomy without doing apparent harm to anything but the scattered stock of jewellery. Every able-bodied pony i n tho bazaar mounted, and sent in pursuit of the flying throng. There was no endeavour to resolve, into sides. Each man Strove only to hit the ball as hard and * 01 ten as possible—where it went was a secondary consideration. Wayfarers and loiterers seemed to understand what was coming, and the street cleared as before the charge of a troop of cavalry, -■lost of the traffic bolted to safety TTin 8 J™' 1 doors ’ fcut a small Uotk of fat-tailed sheep, which refused to be driven into someone’s front narj?!ll-. ."'aa fed into. the vortex of hoofs lilco meat into a sausage machine to emerge m about tho same condition! A couple of unhorsed tollmen, scarcely distinguishable, in their sheepskin coats from the bodies of tho trampled wethers, were left floundering in the shambles as ten4 P +TV'n r H 0n ’ A Wi, ’ d B 'do-swipe sr>nt tho ball through an open window, and the iron-shod hoofs struck sparks from the flinty cobbles in the rush, to bo lirat nnon it as it was tossed out. Then a <JutoV-eyed Tibetan on a shaggy rat of a ' ibetan pony got away for a clean nin and hitting the. hall time after time as it shuttled back and forth between side-wall and pavement, carried it out of sight round n corner. THE BILL FOR DAMAGES.

And I. already late for tea at the Commissioner s, had reluctantly to forego following further in the wok© of tho avalanche wo had set in motion. As an altcrmath, however, wo were called upon that evening to give audience to a “damages deputation,” and, after an hour’s P a Ti°y> P ai d for five fat-tailed sheep, iiali-a-dozen sets of shattered hair ornaments, several bags of gram, and a number of minor losses. The claims, strange to say, wero entirely reasonable, amounting to less than thirty rupees in all, and tbe fun, especially for one interested in polo, was cheap at the price. This will give some idea of what early Indian polo must have been, the polo that was passed on from tho Himalayan bill states to tho sport-loving nobles of llnjpnt.aua and the Punjab. It was the game as developed by those latter that came to bo known as “the game of kings, ’ for the manly Nawnbs, Rajaflis a ( nd Maharajahs of these war-like States ever used to taking personal lend in battle and tho chase, were not content to remain passive while anv contest of strength or skill was going on. Soma of tho best nolo players tho game has over produced have been rulers of one or another of the native states of India, nor, indeed, need T nso the past tense in making that assertion.