A humourous postcard showing a sleeping father, who is supposed to be pulling the punkah [fan] string to cool the off-framed European, but instead has delegated the task to his son. The punkahwallah not doing his duty was a common postcard theme.
A refreshing portrait of a woman looking straight back at the viewer, not contained by the frame. Most probably from a portrait by Charles Scowen in the 1870s, who photographed the same woman in slightly different poses.
In her Tourist's India (1907), Eustace Alfred-Reynolds Ball writes: "Colonel Durand in his "Making of a Frontier" gives in few words a picturesque yet accurate description of Srinagar from the river : "The town, a huddled mass of lightly-built
This early postcard was published by the "Bazaar for the Suffering Child," a missionary group in Germany for domestic consumption and draws our attention to two features of early European postcards.
The photographic original of one-half of the lithograph A Fair Exchange by W. Cooper.
Postcards were an important advertising tool for hotels from the mid-1890s, when Alpine hotels in Austria, Germany and Switzerland helped to popularize the medium.
An unusual embossed scene, likely in Andhra Pradesh, where the frame contrasts nicely with the blue canal. Produced by a missionary organization, probably to raise money or advertise their activities in India.
Although the women do look somewhat similar in this set of a dozen Mughal Empresses, they can be identified individually thanks to the Urdu captions beneath each: [From Top Left to Top Right, First Row] Jamila Khatoon W/o [Wife of] Muhammad Mirza,
Some of the most interesting postcards are bazaar and storefront scenes, which can be staged or candid, but always seem to contain a wealth of information about life a century or more ago.
[Original caption] The Royal Botanical Gardens on the west bank of the river, were founded in 1780 on the suggestion of Colonel Kyd, and have been of more service to public and private gardens of the world than any other horticultural institute.
