98 SNOW-PARTRIDGES. 



dead tahr to the men who were to fetch it, he was to rejoin 

 us in the evening. As the way was rough and steep for laden 

 men, and we might up there in some places find the snow 

 lying deep, he recommended our taking only our blankets 

 and ready-cooked food with us. It was late in the morning 

 when Kurbeer and I started with one or two of the men who 

 knew the way, to our quarters for the night. We had not 

 proceeded far when one of those sudden changes, so common 

 in the mountains, came over the smiling face of nature. The 

 hitherto sunny sky became obscured with clouds, and our 

 inveterate enemy the rain was soon falling heavily on us. 

 We toiled upward, nevertheless, until we reached our destina- 

 tion, another cavity among the rocks. Here we made a big 

 fire, for which we fortunately found plenty of wood at hand. 

 At this we dried our wet clothes and blankets, and made 

 ourselves as comfortable as we could under the circumstances 

 for the night. The shikaree turned up before dark, and re- 

 ported that the tahr had been recovered, but that one of its 

 horns had been broken off at the root in its fall, and was 

 nowhere to be found. This was a pity, but we were lucky 

 in having got the animal at all, for the shikaree said the place 

 above where it had fallen was such a tremendous " pakhan " 

 (precipice) that it was as much as they could do to reach where 

 it lay and get back with its spoils. 



As soon as there was light enough to see our way, we were 

 out next morning. The ground in this vicinity was covered 

 with fresh marks of musk-deer, and the air was often redolent 

 with the perfume from their droppings, although we failed to 

 get a glimpse of the animals themselves. We flushed several 

 coveys of snow-partridges, here called " zingooria," a bird 

 something resembling a ptarmigan in summer plumage, and 

 like it, in winter, I was told, becoming pure white. At this 

 season it appeared, on the wing, to be a brownish-grey patched 

 with white. Far away up the face of a bare acclivity near 

 the head of the glen, we espied a herd of tahr. The inter- 



