And speaking of winters

Speaking of winters, I posted this last year at The Liberty Blog-

Lovat Fraser writing in 1903 had this to say* of Delhi winters-

I never dreamed of  this, and I cannot stand it. I should think there is nothing in the world like the cold of  Delhi. It is not that it is severe; it is the quality of  it that knocks you over. Dry cold in other places is invigorating and stimulating. This is a sort of  dead cold, and reduces you to a clammy corpse. It creeps in everywhere; the thickest overcoats are not proof  against it. From ten in the morning to five in the afternoon I live; then the climate is delightful. But that is just the time when I want to be out seeing things; and when I start at night to write, my brain is congealed. It will not work, not will my hand hold the pen. Do you know how I wrote my last letter? My servant kept replenishing a basin of  hot water on the table, and I dipped my fingers  into it at the end of  every sentence. How can I write decently under such conditions? And this is your coral strand! Never will I grumble at the English winter again.

*Lovat Fraser. At Delhi. Bombay: Times of India; London:W.Thacker&Co.,
1903. pp. 55-6. 

Paradise passeth

Sadly the winter passeth away. I shall miss snuggling into a rajai (quilt) with a favorite book. One of the best feelings in the world. Imitating the Mughal emperor Jahangir*, one can say -

Gar bar-ru-e-zamin ast; hamin ast, hamin ast, hamin asto!

If there is paradise anywhere on earth, it is here, it is here, it is here!

And that paradise is in the security of the quilt. It's a whole different world in there.

Mughal emperor Jahangir with a sufi saint,1618

*Jahangir said this about Kashmir, his favorite place.