After settling the business that was the motif of the journey, and partaking of the hospitality of the River Column headquarter mess, Gatacre {77} announced his intention of starting back at 2 o'clock. The men who acted as escort were dismayed at the Colonel Sahib's startling decision; indeed, only half of them were capable of setting off at once, but these insisted on being allowed to do so. Half-way up the mountain they were dead-beat; and as a small party able to take their place had been accidentally met with, the services of the newcomers were impressed, and Gatacre proceeded. It is a question for mountaineers whether the descent or the ascent was the more trying to a man's muscular system, and a question for Anglo-Indians whether the sun is hotter in the forenoon or the afternoon; anyhow, it must have been fairly fierce at 2 p.m. in the deep gorge of the Indus, and to have reached Khaim Gali again the same evening was an achievement worthy of mention in despatches. We are told that the first part of the ascent was very precipitous for about 2,500 ft., and impracticable even for mule carriage; the next 1,500 ft. was nothing but a succession of steps. Farther on, the line lay across terraced cultivation, which involved climbing up the walls supporting the fields, and walking across the soft plough which they enclosed, while throughout the march there were "passages which were impossible for anything but a goat." At 11 p.m. that same night Gatacre marched into the Headquarter Camp at Khaim Gali, the only man who had completed the double journey. The two marches had occupied six hours and nine hours respectively, and two hours only had {78} been spent in the triple business of negotiation, refreshment, and repose. This feat did not pass unnoticed at the time. The editor of the _Broad Arrow_ of October 20, 1888, says: "The story is suggestive of physical endurance and courage, and may be read with profit by fireside warriors and cynical philosophers upon the decline of the British officer." [Sidenote: Active service]