132 SPORT AND TRAVEL 



with the glare ; rest was doubly welcome with the 

 knowledge that the Zogi La was behind. 



A few straggling buildings, built of stones in the 

 shape of hollow squares, with courtyards inside and 

 flat roofs, composed the village of Matayun. None 

 of these had windows, and the filth within, where 

 several natives lived, was enough to disgust the 

 most hardened. We had some food on the top of one 

 of these buildings, in the teeth of a bitterly cold 

 wind which had sprung up toward the end of the 

 march, and then repaired to the usual " rest-house," 

 where a fire had been prepared. This one was much 

 less objectionable than the one at Baltal, for al- 

 though it had no windows of any kind, and the floor 

 was as usual of mud, it was cut off from the native 

 quarters, so that their unwelcome odors must first 

 pass through open air to reach us, and when we 

 " sniffed the tainted gale" it had somewhat mel- 

 lowed. Moreover, the smoke from the fire at least 

 made a commendable attempt to get part of itself 

 up the chimney, which at Baltal it had not even 

 thought of trying chiefly because there had been 

 no chimney. 



The following day brought us down below the 

 snow-line, the trail leaving the gorge in which we 

 had been since Sonamarg, and broadening out into 

 a wide brown plain, with the few scattered huts of 



