280 CAUCASIAN GLACIERS AND FORESTS. 



of Gebi.'^ This portion of tlie cliain is the one which 

 seems most completely to have puzzled geographers, and 

 many books and maps fall into the serious error of repre- 

 senting the Zenes-Squali as rising entirely on the southern 

 side of a spur of the main chain. They thus deceive a 

 traveller, by giving the idea that only one ridge separates 

 the sources of the Eion and Ingur, whereas it is in reality 

 necessary to cross no less than three in going from one to 

 the other. 



We had been full half an hour on the top before the 

 porters came up, escorted by Paul ; Moore and Francois 

 were not far behind, and we all made our midday meal 

 together. When it was time to think of pursuing our 

 journey, we enquired what course was usually taken in 

 descending to the Zenes-Squali : the porters pointed out a 

 long and manifestly absurd circuit, invclving a considerable 

 further ascent along the ridge on our right. There was 

 no difiiculty in going down the steep shaly rocks and snow- 

 filled gullies immediately below us, into the head of the 

 valley ; but when we intimated our intention of doing so, 

 the men gave us to understand that if we liked to risk our 

 lives, they did not mean to peril their own, and that 

 nothing should induce them to follow us. 



Having fixed as our meeting-point the junction of the 

 stream in the glen below us with the eastern Zenes-Squali, 

 we abandoned our train to the consequences of their folly, 

 and set off down the rocks, which were perfectly easy to 

 anyone of mountaineering habits. A short scramble 

 enabled us to get into a snow-filled trough, down which 

 we slid rapidly, until the foot of the declivity was reached, 

 and the gully came to an end amongst stones and uneven 



* I have been confirmed in this theory, since I wrote the above, by seeing, in 

 the Atlas to Dubois dc Montpereux' ' Caucase,' a profile of the Caucasian chain, in 

 which the outline of Tan Totiinal and the Jibiani peaks is clearly given, and the 

 name Pass-Mta is applied to them. 



