76 
NARRATIVE. 
cook pulse, and the tea required to be actually boiled 
for some time instead of being only infused. 
Fires burn at this altitude precisely as they do 
at the sea-level, and although my attention was directed 
to the flame of the candle, any alteration in its ap- 
pearance was not very marked, neither was there any 
very marked difference in the report of a gun ; but in 
this case and in that of the candle-flame it is difiicult, 
without very carefully performed experiments, which I 
did not make, to ascertain and measure the eflects pro- 
duced by elevation above the sea. The ravens and 
butterflies seemed to fly with quite as much vigour as 
at lower altitudes. 
Leaving Gnischu on the 21st July, we marched 
eighteen miles and encamped on the Lingzi Thang 
plains. At first we followed the course of the stream 
through a wide valley which ended about six miles 
from Gnischu, and we then emerged from the low 
rounded hills on to the open plain of Lingzi Thang, 
and made towards a dome-shaped peak thirty miles 
to the north, but to all appearance not above ten miles 
distant, so clear was the atmosphere. The stream 
which we had followed from Gnischu turned to the 
left on leaving the hills, and is said to end in a lake 
some miles to the eastward. 
When we left the stream there were some fossili- 
ferous limestone rocks, my specimens of which I 
afterwards lost. We then travelled over a bare 
desert plain of shingle for three miles, when we came 
to an abrupt descent of about 100 feet, and from the 
brink of this the view was very remarkable. The 
desert plain extended in every direction for at least 
twenty miles, and the horizon was bounded by snowy 
