We were suddenly startled from our repast by a noise like loud thunder, crash following crash, and echoing through the valley. The Phipun got up, and coolly said, "The rocks are falling, it is time we were off, it will rain soon." The moist vapours had by this time so accumulated, as to be condensed in rain on the cliffs of Chomiomo and Kinchinjhow; which, being loosened, precipitated avalanches of rocks and snow. We proceeded amidst dense fog, soon followed by hard rain; the roar of falling rocks on either hand increasing as these invisible giants spoke to one another in voices of thunder through the clouds. The effect was indescribably grand: and as the weather cleared, and I obtained transient peeps of their precipices of blue ice and black rock towering 5000 feet above me on either hand, the feeling of awe produced was almost overpowering. Heavy banks of vapour still veiled the mountains, but the rising mist exposed a broad stony track, along which the Lachen wandered, split into innumerable channels, and enclosing little oases of green vegetation, lighted up by occasional gleams of sunshine. Though all around was enveloped in gloom, there was in front a high blue arc of cloudless sky, between the beetling cliffs that formed the stern portals of the Kongra Lama pass. CHAPTER XXI. Top of Kongra Lama -- Tibet frontier -- Elevation -- View -- Vegetation -- Descent to Tungu -- Tungu-choo -- Ponies -- Kinchinjhow and Changokhang mountains -- Palung plains -- Tibetans -- Dogs -- Dingcbam province of Tibet -- Inhabitants -- Dresses -- Women's ornaments -- Blackening faces -- Coral -- Tents -- Elevation of Palung -- Lama -- Shawl-wool goats -- Shearing -- Siberian plants -- Height of glaciers, and perpetual snow -- Geology -- Plants, and wild animals -- Marmots -- Insects -- Birds -- Choongtam Lama -- Religious exercises -- Tibetan hospitality -- _Delphinium_ -- Perpetual snow -- Temperature at Tungu -- Return to Tallum Samdong -- To Lamteng -- Houses -- Fall of Barometer -- Cicadas -- Lime deposit -- Landslips -- Arrival at Choongtam -- Cobra -- Rageu -- Heat of Climate -- Velocity and volume of rivers measured -- Leave for Lachoong valley -- Keadom -- General features of valley -- Lachoong village -- Tunkra mountain -- Moraines -- Cultivation -- Lachoong Phipun -- Lama ceremonies beside a sick-bed.