Page:The journal of the Royal Geographic Society of London. Volume 34, 1864. (IA s572id13663720).pdf/246

42 which was much broken and fissured; the amount of moraine was very small, and, at a short distance up, the ice became quite clear, except where along the left bank there was a long continuous line of moraine of great length, and about 500 yards in breadth. The disappearance of moraine at such a short distance from the end of the glacier greatly increases the difficulty of travelling along it. This vast and magnificent ice-stream, which I at first thought might be from 15 to 18 miles long, I now ascertained to be upwards of 40.

There is a way over the chain by this glacier of Biafo into Nagayr, which is 12 marches distant, the glacier being of very nearly equal length on either side. It was by this way that the Nagayr men used to come into the Braldoh and loot the villages; their last raid was some twenty-four years since, when a body of from 700 to 800 crossed over, and carried off about 100 men and women, together with all the cows, sheep, and goats they could collect.

The weather, which had been bad during the early part of the month, became now so much worse that I was compelled to proceed down the Braldoh to its junction with the Basha (these two rivers form the Shigar River lower down), and had to give up the plan I had formed of crossing the R’Zong La into Nagayr, and round by the Nushik La. I left Askolè in the morning of the 24th, and passed Surūngo, Tongnol, and Chongo, near which is a fine spring of hot water (temp. 104⋅5), with a somewhat unpleasant sulphurous smell, but perfectly clear. The water stands in a basin some 15 feet in diameter and about 3feet deep, on the top of a conical mound of limestone about 30 feet high. The mound is a deposit formed by the water which flows over on every side, and, as much more of this limestone was to be seen about, either the springs must have been at some time more numerous, or have shifted from one place to another. We now crossed the Braldoh to the left bank, by a rope bridge. The stretch of this bridge from the bar on one side, over which the rope passes, to the other bar, was 276 feet: it was very strongly made, but very slack, so that the descent at starting, and the ascent on the other side, were by no means easy. The ropes are made of birch-twigs—9 ropes form the footway, with 9 on either hand to hold by.

My camp this morning was near the village of Puskora, on the left bank close to another rope bridge, which we crossed on the 25th. The scenery about this spot was wild and grand, and the river, being somewhat confined, went tossing and roaring along amongst the huge blocks which strewed its course.

The path from the bridge to the Hoh Loombah was terribly bad, and even dangerous in places, from the steepness of the mountainsides, and from the yielding materials over which it passes, which