Page:Journey to Lhasa and Central Tibet.djvu/58

 How exhausted we were with the fatigue of the day's journey, how overcome by the rarefication of the air, the intensity of the cold, and how completely prostrated by hunger and thirst, is not easy to describe. The very remembrance of the sufferings of that dreadful night makes me shudder even now, but I quickly recover under the inexpressible delight I feel at the consciousness of my great success. This was the most trying night I ever passed in my life. There was a light breeze blowing, attended with sleet, which fortunately weighed my blankets down and made them cover me closer than they otherwise would have done. And so with neither food nor drink, placed as if in the grim jaws of death in the bleak and dreary regions of snow, where death alone dwells, we spent this most dismal night.

November 30.—The coolies once more picked up their loads, and our guide began in his gravest tones to recite his Pema-jung-ne samba duba and other mantras. The morning was gloriously radiant, and the great Kangla chen glittered before us, bathed in a glory of golden light. Fortunately for us, there was no fresh snow on the ground; for, had there been any, we could not possibly have advanced. We found that we had stopped not more than a furlong from the Phugpa karpo, which, by the way, is not a cave at all, but only a crevasse between two detached rocks. Our guide, leaving his load in charge of his brother, took the lead, driving his long stick into the snow at each step, and digging footholds in the soft snow. From the White Cavern the top of the pass bore due east, and was distant about two miles. Just at the base of the final ascent there is a little sandy plain, in the middle of which is a huge boulder: this is the "Place of Salvation" (Tarpa gang), thus called because, when once this point is reached, travellers may be confident of attaining the summit of the pass.

I steadily followed in the footsteps of the guide, and would not let him take me on his back; for if I succeeded in ascending to the highest summit of Kangla chen without any help, I could look to the achievement with greater pride. Ugyen here gave out, and it was with difficulty that I persuaded Phurchung to carry him on his back, for they were far from being on the best of terms. An hour's hard climbing brought us to the summit of the pass. The sky was cloudless and of the deepest blue; against it a snow-clad world of mountains stood out in bold relief. Far beyond the maze of snow-clad peaks we saw in the north-west the mountains of Pherug,