A Troublesome Descent on Vertical Rocks
On the pass, 19,016 feet, we erected a cairn, and I took observations on most of my men. [[195]]They nearly all suffered from mountain sickness, and the pulse of all was much accelerated. The highest registered 126, 118, 134, 108 pulsations. The average pulsations of these men at the altitude where they lived was from 66 to 90. The usual symptoms were present: a very warm forehead, pains and vigorous thumping at the temples, pressure and aches in the top and back of head. Curiously enough, when the pain in the temples was only on one side, it was generally on the right side of the head. Occasionally this pain extended all along the posterior fissure of the cranium. Heart-throbbing as well as thumping in the centre of the chest were general, and great sleepiness and exhaustion prevailed among them. The pupils of the eyes were abnormally contracted, almost to the size of the point of a pin.
When we had rested sufficiently we found ourselves confronted with rather a trying task. On the other side of the pass of rotten rock, several hundred feet in height, not unlike what we had met on the Savage Pass, was a precipitous wall, requiring somewhat of a steady head and endless labour in getting over. Perhaps a glance at the illustration depicting the scene will give a better idea of the situation than a long description. [[196]]My men can be seen conveying down the baggage—a most tedious and long performance, each package being passed down from one man to another stationed at intervals along the vertical rock. As the distance was considerable and the men few, each man had to undergo considerable exertion and a lot of climbing up and down to collect from the man above and deliver each load to his neighbour below. So that to go those few hundred yards took us several hours. The sheep accompanying us, too, had to be carried down one by one, and in some places let down by means of rope slings.
We had passed a small glacier on the east watershed of the pass, and now we had below us to the south-west the great Lebung Glacier, feeding the Dholi Ganga by two or three streamlets. We skirted it to the north on a lot of débris. The main portion had a general direction from north-east to south-west, then an arm extended due west. In the latter portion of the glacier were big cracks in the ice, while to the north-west was an immense dune of ice, mud, and débris, forming a line from 30° to 231°. From this point of observation the Lebung Pass stood at 210° b.m. There were fine terraces in this glacier, supported on a high wall of [[197]]ice and mud. To the south-east could be seen one of the high snowy peaks towering over the Rama Glacier to the south of the Lebung.
The Darma Valley, in which we now found ourselves, takes its name from the Darma Yangti, a river which has its birth at the foot of the Lumpiya Pass, and is further fed by the tributary streams from glaciers on either side.
The Darma Parganah was of some interest to me, as one of the minor routes into Tibet was along this river. Darma proper was divided into two divisions: the Malla and the Talla, or “upper” and “lower,” Darma. The Malla Darma is that portion which comprises the Lissar River and the Dholi Ganga, whereas the Talla Darma, as its name suggests, lies nearer to the point at which the Dholi Ganga meets the Kali River.
The Darma Shokas, a tribe somewhat differing from the Shokas of Bias and Chaudas, carry on the entire trade with Tibet by the Darma route. Gyanema is the main centre, and the commodities are chiefly borax, salt, wool, skins, cloth, and utensils, in exchange for which the Tibetans receive silver, wheat, rice, sattoo, ghur, candied sugar, pepper, beads of all kinds, and a few articles of Indian manufacture. [[198]]
It was getting towards the end of September when I was in this region, and the weather was very cold and stormy. We had plenty of snow every night and the winds were cutting. It was a great temptation, I must confess, when we reached the Dholi River, to turn towards the south, which would bring us to lower elevations and therefore to warmth and comfort; but my work was not finished, and we had again to go towards the north (N.N.W., to be strictly accurate), for I wished to solve certain geographical problems and visit some passes into the Forbidden Land which I had not yet ascended.
