172 Narrative of a Journey to Cho Lagan, fyc. [Aug. 



Thermometer at 2 p. m. 56°, boiled at 187° ; elevation 14,750 feet. 

 Kardam-khar is probably about 15,000 feet. Thermometer in the sun 

 rose to 76°. The south wind blowing up the valley of the Karnali was 

 disagreeably strong, though I am not sure that the temperature of the 

 air was depressed thereby. 



Our Bhotias went to the Dimg for milk and mutton : the shepherd 

 was very stingy with his milk, but I got just enough to qualify half a 

 lota of tea, which was the most, and perhaps the only, refreshing 

 draught that I had enjoyed since leaving Kunti : hitherto I had sub- 

 sisted on Bhauna's decoction, which was made with a liberal mixture 

 of ghee. The Bhotias make their tea with soda (Bal), which extracts 

 the color, and, as they fancy, the taste of the trash they get from the 

 Lhassa merchants at Gartokh ; the decoction, which is boiled for a long 

 time, with plenty of ghee also, tastes more like broth than tea. In the 

 matter of mutton, the Bhotias insisted on bringing goat, which I rejected. 

 The Tibet goat is the most elegant of his tribe, small and handsome as 

 a deer ; but his virtues reside rather in the fleece than in the flesh. 



We resumed our journey at 7-40 p. m., course east of south; a 

 bright moon little past the full rising soon after, gave me a fair view 

 of the principal objects in the vicinity of our route. 



Leaving the ravine in which we had been encamped, we crossed a 

 mile of high ground, and then entered another ravine wider and deeper 

 than any we had yet crossed in the Pruang valley : a steep descent of 

 some 500 vertical feet, brought us into a flat bottom half a mile broad 

 covered with a profusion of rough granite shingle, of which a very 

 indifferent clearance had been made for the road. The length of the 

 ravines was inconsiderable, the foot of the mountain being hardly a mile 

 from our left, and .the Karnali a furlong below our right. For want of 

 light perhaps, I did not see the houses said to stand on the river bank, 

 but our road passed through fields belonging to the village, and chan- 

 nels for the irrigation of them. 



It was on this ground, the ravine of Toiyon, that the Sikh invaders 

 of Gnari under Zorawar Sing met their well deserved end. After 

 having mastered the whole province, and established himself in Pruang, 

 Zorawar took it into his head to go to Gangri with the greater part of 

 his men : when there they were surprised by the arrival of the relieving 

 army of Hunias from Lhassa, and attempting to effect a retreat, a 



