A SNOWY WASTE. 363 



would dart away over the snow, and, with a shrill eerie 

 chirp, suddenly vanish ; and one little bird, something like a 

 robin, that followed us for a long way, flitting and hopping 

 from stone to stone in the ice-bound brook beside us, as if 

 courting our companionship. So profound and deathlike was 

 the solemn hush that brooded over mother earth as she lay 

 wrapped in her snowy shroud, that one was almost startled 

 at the slight rustling noise caused by the slipping of melted 

 snow from off some neighbouring rock ; for, in the still frozen 

 air of that high silent region, fancy almost led one to imagine 

 the sound resembled the mysterious whisperings of invisible 

 beings whose sanctuary we were invading. Even on emerg- 

 ing from this dismal glen upon more open ground, nothing 

 met the weary aching eye but a vast lone wilderness of white 

 undulating hills, and, more distant, domes and pyramids of 

 snow. At last we reached the culminating point, and began 

 to descend, when it was quite a relief to look down on a bit 

 of dark-blue water of the Tso Morari, some 2000 feet below 

 us, cold and cheerless though it appeared as it lay amidst 

 mountains which were now draped in virgin snow almost to 

 its margin. 



The Major's luck with the rifle had been no better than 

 mine. To tell the truth, we were both getting a little tired 

 of toiling after game day after day from morning to night 

 over these desolate regions to so little purpose; so next 

 morning we were not sorry to retrace our steps along the 

 shore of the lake, en route for the verdant and forest-clad 

 slopes of the Himalayas. One or two more geese were 

 bagged ; but they had now become very wary from having 



" I was once resting myself on a cairn at the top of the Niti pass. Every- 

 where around the ground was covered with snow, except on this cairn. One 

 or two of these little things soon appeared from among the stones ; and as I 

 sat perfectly still to watch them, they came up to me and began nibbling at 

 my boots." 



The Niti pass, I may remark, is nearly 17,000 feet high, and well above the 

 limit of any visible sort of vegetation. 



