42 CASUALS IN THE CAUCASUS 



I feel I must erect a little scaffolding whereon to nail 

 a few wandering facts, otherwise the exact whereabouts 

 of our hunting grounds will be " wropt " in mystery. 



My vague childish ideas were not so very " out " 

 after all, as regards the geographical side of the country, 

 for though my herring-bone was too continuously solid, 

 too persistently uniform, the great Caucasian rampart 

 is a chain of lofty linked heights, divided into three 

 sections, of which the central range is the most magni- 

 cent. Here are many summits rising above 15,000 

 feet, and myriad lesser peaks with pinnacled tops 

 lying in the zone of everlasting snow, on whose con- 

 torted sides the iridescent glaciers stream in seas 

 of ice. 



Of this central portion Mr. Freshfield, in his Ex- 

 ploration of the Caucasus, says : " It consists of a 

 number of short parallel, or horse-shoe ridges, crowned 

 with lofty peaks, and enclosing basins filled by the 

 neves of great glaciers." 



The best known of the ice-crowned Titans is, of 

 course, Elbruz, 18,470 feet, ascended for the first time 

 by Mr. Freshfield in 1868. The average non-moun- 

 taineering Briton has the haziest of notions regarding 

 all the rest of the Caucasian peaks, save, perhaps, 

 romantic Kasbek, Koshtantau, and Dykhtau. 



Eastward of the central mass curves a mountainous 

 region of lesser importance, though in this secondary 

 section are to be counted many summits exceeding 

 13,000 feet, and one, the volcanic Basarjusi, which 

 touches 14,722 feet. This mountain checks the east- 

 ward line of elevation, and from thence to the Caspian 



