102 Extracts from the “ Journal of a Survey to explore (Ave. 
our return, and not too soon, as we found ; for the snow was so 
soft, and the increase of the water so great, that though we went 
with the utmost expedition, it was only by 21 hours’ hard labour 
of wading and floundering in the snow, and scrambling among 
rocks, where they would give a footing, that we reached the turf, 
tired and bruised with falls, and the skin taken off from our 
faces and hands by the sun and drying wind of these elevated 
regions. 
It now remains to give some account of this bed or valley of 
snow, which gives rise to the Ganges. It appears that we pass- 
ed up it, somewhat more than a mile and a half. From our last 
station, we could see onwards as we estimated about five miles 
to where there seemed to be a crest or ridge of considerable 
elevation, though low when compared with the great peak which 
flanked it. The general slope of the surface of the snow valley 
was 7°, which was the angle of elevation of the crest, while that 
of the peak of St. George, one of those which flanked it to the 
left, was 17° 49’. In the space we had passed over the snow 
bed, the Ganges was not to be seen; it was concealed probably 
many hundred feet below the surface. We had a fair view 
onward, and there was no sign of the river; and I am firmly 
convinced that its first appearance in day is at the debouche I 
have described. Perhaps indeed some of those various chasms 
and rents in the snow bed which intersect it in all sort of irregular 
directions, may occasionally let in the light on some part of the 
bed of the stream, but the general line and direction of it could 
only be guessed at, as it is altogether here far below the broken 
snowy surface. The breadth of the snow valley or bed is about 
a mile and a half, and its length may be six and a half miles, or 
seven miles from the debouche of the river to the summit of the 
slope, which terminated our view: as to the depth of the snow, 
it is impossible to form a correct judgment, but it must be very 
sae It may easily be imagined that a large supply of water is 
urnished at this season by the melting of this vast mass in the 
valley, as well as by the melting of that of the great peaks which 
bound it. From their bases torrents rush, which, cutting their 
way under snow, tend to the centre of the valley, and form the 
young Ganges, which is further augmented by the waters which 
filter through the rents of the snow bed itself. In this manner, 
all the Himalaya rivers, whose heads I have visited and passed 
over, are formed ; they all issue in a full stream from under thick 
beds of snow, and differ from the Ganges in as much as their 
streams are less, and so are their parent snows. On our return 
down the snow valley, we passed nearer to its north side than in 
going up, and saw a very considerable torrent cutting under it 
from the peaks ; this was making its way to the centre: at times 
we saw it through rents in the snow, and at others only heard 
its noise, As there must be several more such feeders, they 
will be fully sufficient to form such a stream, as we observed the 
