926 Journal of a trip through Kunawur. [Nov. 



whole acres are sometimes ploughed up, and the trees of the forest 

 are crushed or uprooted by the rocky avalanche, more completely than 

 if the axe had cleared the way for cultivation. This devastation 

 is chiefly caused by the alternations of heat and frost ; — the power of 

 the sun during the day acting on the beds of snow, causes innumer- 

 able streams to percolate through the cracks and crevices of the rocks 

 and earth, which being frozen again during the frosts of night, cause 

 by expansion the splitting of the granite into blocks, which being 

 loosened by the heat of the following day from the earth which 

 had tended to support them, come thundering down with fearful rapi- 

 dity and irresistible weight through the forests which clothe the 

 mountain's sides. After proceeding somewhat more than half way to 

 Leepee, my guide, whose thoughts were " wool gathering," very wisely 

 took the wrong road, and led me down a steep glen, at the bottom 

 of which had once been a sangho across the stream, and the road from 

 it was a somewhat nearer route to Leepee ; but alas ! when we arrived 

 at the bottom the torrent had washed away the bridge, and although 

 we might have forded the stream, we learned from some shepherds 

 that it would be labour lost, as the road up the opposite side of the glen 

 had given way and followed the bridge down the stream, so that it was 

 impassable. In this dilemma we had nothing left for it, but to 

 reascend on the side we were on, and the shepherds gave us some 

 comfort, by saying we need only climb up a little way, when we should 

 find a path. To work we went accordingly, setting our faces to 

 the hill with a willingness that did not last very long, for we found 

 that the short way of a Kunawurree was something like the " mile and 

 a bittock" of bonnie old Scotland, " aye the langer, the farther we 

 went." 



This was truly the steepest hill-side I had ever encountered. 

 Without the vestige of a path or any track, up we toiled, now 

 grasping by the rock, and now by the roots of shrubs or tufts of grass, 

 until at last it got so bad that we could scarcely proceed at all, partly 

 owing to the steepness, and partly to the slippery nature of the pine 

 leaves which thickly covered the soil. At several places the first up 

 was obliged to let down a rope or a part of his dress to assist the 

 others up. After a time, however, as we approached the top of the 

 hill, and when well nigh exhausted with fatigue and heat, the ascent 

 became more easy, and at last we debouched from the forest of pines 

 upon a large open, swampy tract, immediately below the snows, which 

 supplied water for a hundred rills, studded with a small yellow 

 flowered ranunculus that I have some recollection of having seen in 



