UP AMONG THE ICE. 407 



On this occasion I had left Almora in the middle of September, 

 about the worst season of the year for travelling, and my road 

 to Pindree lay up the valley of the Surjoo, a particularly hot 

 and unhealthy valley ; and all this had not been a very good 

 preparation for crossing a very high and difficult pass. We 

 had had a great deal of rain on the way up, and the leeches 

 had been very troublesome. I lay awake all this night with a 

 very bad toothache, and in the morning felt anything but fit 

 for a hard day's work. All these Danpoorees, on the contrary, 

 seemed as gay as larks, and were playing each other practical 

 jokes. We breakfasted before daybreak, and ascended the 

 hillside about 2000 feet, when we reached the top of a range 

 and descended 200 or 300 feet on to a glacier, which we never 

 left for the rest of the day. Our way lay over this glacier for 

 about five miles. The slope was very gentle, and there was 

 no difficulty whatever in this part of our journey, beyond 

 meeting, now and then, broad crevasses ; but we managed 

 to turn them all. We then reached the crest of the pass (at 

 an elevation of about 18,000 feet), which is a depression in the 

 ridge that connects Nundadevi (25,700 feet) with Nunda- 

 kote (24,000 feet). Up to this the sun had been very bright, 

 and the glare so painful that I had not been able to look 

 about me. For the last five miles I had seen nothing but 

 snow and glacier, both singularly pure and free from cttbris 

 and rocks, and the glacier broken up into chasms and pinnacles 

 of pure ice of most fantastic shape, and of colours varying 

 from deep blue to deep green, according to the light thrown on 

 them. 



" On arrival at the crest of the pass, I found before me a 

 descent of about 2000 feet, over snow much too steep to de- 

 scend. At first we thought of tying ourselves together and 

 sliding down. This we should have done if it had not been for 

 some broad ugly-looking crevasses down below, that appeared 

 open-mouthed ready to receive us. I sent men to the right 

 and left to see if there were any better place to commence the 



