Page:My Climbs in the Alps and Caucasus (1908).djvu/32

26 The English population is much larger than I imagined at Astor—there is the Assistant Resident of Gilgit (Colonel Stewart) and two post-office officials, and similarly all through.

Ladies travel freely up and down, and, as you may imagine, take very big caravans.

Our big camp is fixed under some willows.

There is a small stream a short distance behind, and a fairly flat stretch of meadows extending along the bank of the torrent for three or four miles.

If you could only be transported here without the labour of the journey, you would like it no end.

Don't be anxious about us. We shall not get into any difficulties.

We had a great spree yesterday, building a bridge over the Rupal torrent. The old boys, in their queer clothes, and with their merry faces, made a scrumptious picture; one of them subsequently carried my heavy box up an awful moraine, across the end of a glacier, on to here, and seemed to think nothing of it!

The cuckoo and lark are both about, and it sounds most home-like.

Camp life out here is a great spree. One has every luxury, and men run errands, and fetch and carry at every turn.