Page:My Climbs in the Alps and Caucasus.djvu/336

Rh run across this, I sat myself comfortably on my hat, and slid down the long slopes almost into the tent, where Zurfluh was still busy emptying the snow from his pockets.

The porter met me with loud shouts of "Allah il Allah! Minghi Tau, Allah, Allah!"

We soon discovered that, instead of consuming the whole of our provisions, the porter had not even had a crust of bread. We urged him to take a preliminary lunch, or rather breakfast, while the soup was cooking, but he refused, and seemed in no hurry for dinner. He manipulated the fire with much skill, making the vile wood burn in a really creditable manner, and only pausing from his efforts to award me an occasional appreciative slap on the back. It being early, 4 p.m., Zurfluh expressed a strong desire to strike camp and descend; but the delights of the kosh did not rouse my enthusiasm, and I refused to move. Indeed, it is one of the great pleasures of Caucasian travelling that the weary tramp over screes, uneven glacier, the horrors of the moraine, and, too frequently, the reascent to the hotel, are unknown. A camp at one spot is practically as comfortable as at any other, and in consequence, so soon as one feels inclined to sit down and laze, the day's work is over and one postpones the screes and moraines to the sweet distance of to-morrow. It is, indeed, a rare delight to sit at one's ease in the early afternoon and gaze