264 WANDEEINGS OF A 



banlcs of the Zakut, which has to be crossed and recrossed 

 several times. This latter stream is also called the Buchee 

 by the natives, who do not appear to know it by the name 

 given in maps. A small stream called Tafee joins the Buchee 

 near the picturesque-looking village of Shergol, situated on an 

 eminence overlooking a somewhat broad valley. The chief 

 lion of Shergol is its strange Lama temple, formed in the face 

 of a roc'k above the village. The mountains appeared to 

 consist chiefly of granite, and a conglomerate of a porphjoitic 

 structure. I shot a kestrel, and Young saw several chuckore. 

 The black-throated wheatear was common in stony places. 

 The carrion-crow was frequently observed, and the lark-toed 

 wagtail {Bvdytes citreold) in the irrigated fields. The pretty 

 little red-fronted finch {Metoponia pusilla, PaH.) is a tenant ' 

 of waste places, and usually seen singly or in small flocks 

 feeding on the seeds of a species of wormwood, on which 

 goldfinches, house-sparrows, and one or other of the 

 roseate grosbeaks also feed. This finch is easily recog- 

 nised by its small size, a red spot on the forehead, and 

 yeUowish-brown of the upper parts j the females and young 

 are darker in plumage. Its song is sweet and melo- 

 dious, and, in consequence, it is in great request as a cage- 

 bird in the Punjaub, to which it is brought from Afghanis- 

 tan. On the Buchee I killed a European dipper (Cinclus 

 aguaticv£). The houses in the villages are built as close to- 

 gether as possible, even one on the top of the other, in cout 

 sequence of occasional avalanches, and very rigorous winters, 

 that shut out aU communication with their neighbours. 

 These arrangements as to crowding, in a sanitary point of 

 view, bid defiance to all ideas of ventilation and cubic space ; 

 and we found, on inquiry, that as in more civilised life, 

 death often stalks silently through these villages, and num- 



