Kashmir 169 



was one of the highest within our reach, and singularly 

 beautiful amongst the ocean of mountains around us. 

 The peaks were soft and sharp as the sun rose ; even 

 the shadowed parts were radiant with reflected light 

 more brilliant than man could depict. The sunlight, 

 as it moved along, revealed the delicate ripple of lines 

 which marked the waves of drifted snow and the 

 concealed crevasse. 



" It was another of those cloudless mornings ; in our 

 sunless, misty climate in England it is difficult to realise 

 the influence which persistent fine, cold weather 

 exercises on the spirits. We followed a goat-track 

 for some time, but quitted it when it bore away to the 

 east, and struck off across the moraine. 



" It was a desolate waste of gigantic rocks, hard work 

 to climb across ; but * toil and pleasure* says Livy, ' in 

 their nature opposite, are yet linked together in a kind of 

 necessary connection* and we clambered on across this 

 fringe of the edge of the great glacier above us. Now 

 and again between the debris of rock we looked down 

 into a fissure filled with the blue-green light of ice, 

 and showing what lay below the moraine. 



" Leaving it altogether, we struck out across the 

 glacier itself. Here we decided that it was advisable 

 that we should be roped. As events showed, it was by 

 no means a needless precaution ; we none of us knew 

 the country, and though our two <c menkind," H. and 

 F., were experienced mountaineers, it is not like having 

 a local guide. H. went first, G. second, Chowry 

 third, myself fourth, and F. fifth. Thus the female 



