144 
THROUGH ASIA 
intended to meet me himself, and with that end in view 
set out to cross the Alai Mountains. But in the pass 
of Att-yolli, near Talldik, he had been overtaken by 
a snow -hurricane, and so prevented from continuing his 
journey. In the same storm forty sheep were buried 
in a snowdrift, their shepherd narrowly escaping with 
his life. When he found himself stuck fast, the volastnoi 
managed to get six other men sent forward in his place 
with the tent and fuel. But they had had hard work to 
force their way through the pass, and after nine days’ 
toil, and the loss of one horse, were compelled to abandon 
both tent and fuel. Four of them, struggling on, suc- 
ceeded at length in getting through to Jipptik, where 
MARCHING UP THE ALAl' VALLEY 
they borrowed another tent and fresh fuel from the 
chieftain of the Kirghiz of that place. When we at 
last met them in Urtak, they were very uneasy about 
the two comrades they had left behind. One of the 
four had got a frost-bitten foot ; whilst another was 
suffering from snow-blindness. He had been walking 
for three days through the dazzling snows, and con- 
sequently had overstrained his eyes. His companions did 
their best to screen their eyes with tufts of horsehair 
stuck between their caps and foreheads, also with pieces 
of leather strap through which they had cut narrow 
openings. Both invalids were tended with the greatest 
care, and at the end of a couple of days were all right 
again. 
