88 Trip to the Bulcha and Oonta Dhoora Passes. [No. 134. 



was no wind, I did not feel the cold so much as on the top of Oonta 

 Dhura yesterday, where the ther. was 61°. Saw a large raven (size of 

 the English raven, or very near it ;) but could not get a shot at him. 

 Started at 6h. 50m. a. m., descended to river, then turned up East 

 along it, and at 7b. 8m. a. m. crossed the Louka, just above its junc- 

 tion with Doldunka, stream rapid, but not above knee-deep, and some 

 twenty feet wide. An East wind had sprung up about starting time, 

 and brought intense cold with it. Shortly after the wind lulled, heavy 

 clouds to N. W. and South, and a light snow falling, and continued 

 up the Doldunka, chiefly flowing under snow between two steep sheets of 

 rock, till 7h. 35m., then turned up left (North) to the Kalee Mutteea 

 Churhai ; very steep, covered with loose stones over a black crumbling 

 slate. The latter part of ascent was less steep, but without holding on 

 by a jooboo's tail, the whole of it would have been a most tedious 

 job. I picked up a few bad fossils by the way ; also pieces of a thin 

 cylindrical slate-coloured stuff, called doda ka puthur, (milk stones) 

 and used by the Booteas as an application to swelled nipples in women. 

 Reached top of ascent at 9h. 1 5m. (This is the intermediate gorge men- 

 tioned as visible from Oonta Dhura.) Occasional snow beds during the 

 latter part, hills on either side bare precipitous sheets of sand-stone. 

 Had a good view of Oonta, and took a rough sketch, to be perfected 

 hereafter, perhaps.* The crest is composed of small loose stones rising 

 in a sweep to the top of the hills on either side (East and West) North 

 beyond a good extent of valley and low hills covered with brush- wood, 

 rises the Buloha range, beyond which are the plains of Tibet. This 

 range is here and there streaked with snow. The hills from Oonta, 

 thus far, seem chiefly of brown sand-stone. The strata mostly dip 

 East, and are very vertical. I observed some strata here and there. On 

 the crest here I picked up a good sized piece of white alabaster- 

 looking stone, very soft. The Booteeas consider it of value, call it 

 huon phool, (snow flower,) and dissolve it in water with two or three 

 medicines as a lotion for sore eyes, &c. &c. Commenced the descent to 

 Chingoor, (a halting place only,) at 9h. 40m. ; route lay about due 

 North over alternate snow-beds and loose stones from the hill above 

 (E.); and was bounded E. and W. by two high ranges of (I think) 



* See Sketch. 



