"The Most High had better go in," said Kâsim, as Babar set to work arranging what best he could for his troopers. "I will see to the men."
But Babar shook his head and went on. He felt that for him to be in warmth and comfort while his men were in snow and drift, for him to be enjoying sleep and ease while his followers were in trouble and distress would be inconsistent from what he owed them and a deviation from that society in suffering that was their due.
"'Death in the company of friends is a feast.' At any rate, so runs the proverb," he remarked lightly. "And indeed, Kâsim, having brought these poor souls to this pass, it is but right that whatever their sufferings and difficulties, whatever they may have to undergo, I should be equal sharer in all."
So when he had done what he could and shown others what to do, he took a hoe and dug down in the snow as deep as his breast without reaching the ground, then crouched down in it. The day was darkening, evening prayer time had passed, and still belated troopers came dropping in. The snow was now falling so fast that the men in the dug-out shelter ran some chance of being smothered as they slept from sheer fatigue. Babar himself found four inches of snow above him as he scrambled out of his hole when a last party straggled in, bringing Binâi the guide, with the welcome news that the cave was far larger than hasty observation would expect, and that a narrow passage led to quite a spacious cavern within where there was ample room for all.
Joyful news indeed! Sending out to call in all his men, Babar soon found himself, by one of his own extraordinary changes of luck, in a wonderfully warm, safe, and comfortable place. For there proved to be firewood within the cave, and such as had any eatables, stewed meat, preserved flesh, or anything else they might have, produced them for a common meal. Thus all escaped, as by a miracle, from the terrible cold, the snow, the bitter, bitter wind.
And the rosy wings of Love fluttered gaily, as Babar laid himself down to sleep--the first sleep he had had for days.
It was the turning point; though there was still distress and misery to come.
The snow, however, had ceased to fall by the morning, the wind had died down. Moving with the first blink of dawn they still had to tread down the snow in the old way: but it was with more hope. The cave in which they had rested was, as they were aware, close to the beginning of the last steep ascent to the Great Pass. This, the shortest way, they knew to be impassable, and even Kâsim and his sons, warned by experience, did not advise its attempt. Bad enough was a lower valley road of which old Binâi the guide had vaguely heard. Yet it was their only chance, so they took it. But evening found them still in the defile; and such was its precipitate nature, that there was nothing for it but for every man to halt where he found himself, dismount, scrape a hole in the snow for himself and his horse if possible, and so await the tardy dawn to bring sufficient light for safe advance. It was an awful night. The retreat of the storm had brought frost; icy, keen, piercing; and though none of the hardy troopers actually lost their lives, many lost hands and feet from frostbite. Babar himself kept his blood warm by pacing up and down, singing at the top of his voice with that curious instinct of shouting which comes always to humanity with the grip of cold. Mayhap it cheered the others to hear the mellow melodious chants echoing so blithely over the snow.
He sang many things, but his favourite was the