1846.] and Boorun Passes over the Himalaya. 99 



ESE. at angles of from 10° to 20°, considerably to the right of the 

 three-grouped and similarly inclined peaks, often but erroneously 

 pointed out as the Boorun Pass. It is owing to this conformation of 

 the strata that the routes up the vallies near this portion of the Snowy 

 range invariably keep to their western and SW. sides ; on the opposite 

 ones, the strata ,{ crop out" in inaccessible crags. 



Beautiful are the " balancings of the clouds" at this and the past 

 season in the Himalaya, and the endless variety of light and shade, 

 which they cause on mountain, forest, field, rock, and meadow. No 

 sooner has a shower fallen, and the sun shone out, than the process of 

 evaporation commences in the heated vallies ; the rising vapours are con- 

 densed at a given elevation into clouds, which, with a snail-like move- 

 ment, creep up the mountain sides, and invest the summit or languidly 

 tumble over the ridge into the next valley ; " even in their very motion 

 there is rest." Occasionally an entire valley or large tract of the moun- 

 tain is covered with one fleecy mass, on which the spectator looks down 

 as on a sea, a lofty peak here and there jutting up like an island. It 

 must be confessed, however, that they are best at a distance and in 

 poetry. Disagreeable at Simla, they are dangerous on the Shatool, 

 where we had not been above half an hour, on the narrow crest, when 

 from the south, clouds 



"Rose curling fast beneath us, white and sulphury, 

 Like foam from the roused ocean of deep hell, 

 Whose every wave breaks on a living shore, 

 Heaped with the damned like pebbles ! ! !" 



The wind also being very keen, and our only seat the snow, we effected 

 a speedy retreat down the great northern snow-bed, of which we only 

 reached the termination in an hour and three-quarters. The upper por- 

 tion had been covered to the depth of two or three inches by a recent 

 fall. To this succeeded a wearisome and, in many places, very steep and 

 difficult moraine composed of enormous sharp, shapeless, fragments of 

 gneiss piled on each other in wild confusion, the lowest ones resting on 

 frozen snow. These would indeed prove "destruction's splinters" to 

 the unfortunate, overtaken here by a snow storm, which would paralyse 

 his hands and feet, and blind his eyes — all most essential accessories now ; 

 and accordingly this was the scene where Dr. Gerard in September 

 1820, had two of his people frozen to death at midday, and escaped 



