•20G ASCENT OF KAZBEK. 



a height of 11,000 feet, the previous morning-. The com- 

 mission was promptly executed, and in the course of the 

 evening the porters returned, bringing in safety all our 

 belongings. Even a pair of spectacles, mislaid in the hurry 

 of a start in the dark, had been picked up, and were now 

 restored to their owner. The men, who naturally had sup- 

 posed us lost, and felt uneasy as to what the authorities 

 would say to their having allowed us to go on alone, were 

 overjoyed to see us again, and now simultaneously talked, 

 kissed, and hugged us all, including Fran^-ois. The excite- 

 ment among the villagers grew intense ; the porters told 

 them that we had disappeared up the mountain, and that 

 our tracks were visible to a great height on the southern 

 face ; the shepherd-boy, who had arrived with us, was a 

 witness to our mysterious appearance on the other side the 

 same evening. The two facts showed that we must have 

 crossed the mountain very near the top, and been, at any 

 rate, thousands of feet higher than those before us, and 

 we suddenly found ourselves installed as heroes, instead of 

 humbugs, in the public opinion of Kazbek village. Two of 

 the porters even thought it worth while to allege that, 

 searching for us on the second day, they had followed in our 

 footsteps to the top; but this bold fiction was only intended 

 to raise their reputation at home, and they did not press it 

 on our acceptance, or make it the ground of any mone}^- 

 claim. 



The old men's chorus, by whose help our first arrange- 

 ments were made, came in during our supper, when 

 more kissing and hugging had to be endured. The chief of 

 the party was very excited and enthusiastic in his con- 

 gratulations, and dilated at length on the Generals and 

 Colonels, who, with companies of Cossacks to aid them, had 

 desired to do what we had done, and had failed. We tried 

 to explain to him the use of the rope and the ice-axe, and to 



