228 SUGHEIT. 



been despatched to direct the wanderers- to our haven, 

 and was told one had ; but think not till I spoke. A 

 long time elapsed ; and then the voices drew nearer, and 

 at nine o'clock all had come in safe, to my great relief. 

 They had naturally followed on the main track, from 

 which we had turned off to camp, and so they had 

 strayed some miles beyond us. 



I had given orders for an entertainment to be prepared 

 for all hands to-morrow, including our mercantile friends, 

 to commemorate the passage of the Karakorum, as also 

 to freshen up my exhausted coolies, who have had four 

 consecutive hard days' work. The whole party look 

 worn and haggard. Much pleasure was evinced at the 

 prospect of the morrow's rest and refreshment. I got 

 out additional clothes to sleep in, and, having carefully 

 scraped up the dirt and stones against my tent-foot to 

 exclude the piercing wind, hope to make out the night 

 comfortably. 



19th August. Sunday. I enjoyed a tolerable night's 

 repose, thanks to the precautions taken to render my 

 shuldary proof against the icy blasts coming down from 

 the snowy summits around. I strolled out, and selected 

 as favourable a site as this wild offered, where to sit and 

 ruminate. My reflections were not altogether satisfac- 

 tory, not unmixed with growing apprehensions of disaster, 

 from loss of cattle extending to loss of men. I have re- 

 duced the coolies' loads to a mere trifle ; still they get on 

 with difiiculty. It is not the burden, but the difficulty of 

 respiration, that oppresses them. Another goat was 

 obliged to be killed on the road yesterday. The want of 

 natural nourishment is terrible : and the fact of this 

 region not producing sufficient herbage to support a goat 

 may well define its inhospitable sterility. The few wild 

 animals existing must pick up a precarious and meagre 



