However, our welcome in camp is a pleasing memory. The supply of tea was inexhaustible. Somervell confesses to having drunk seventeen mugfuls; he can hardly have been so moderate. Morshead probably needed to drink more than any of us; he ascribed his exhaustion on the mountain to want of liquid, and medical opinion was inclined to agree with the suggestion. However that may be, the night’s rest at a lower elevation had largely restored his strength, and Morshead arrived at Camp III no more fatigued to all appearances than the rest of us. But he bore the marks of his painful ordeal. His condition had made him a prey to the cold, and we only began to realise how badly he had been frostbitten as we sat in camp while Wakefield bound up the black swollen fingers. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ THE ATTEMPT WITH OXYGEN By CAPTAIN GEORGE FINCH ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CHAPTER VII THE SECOND ATTEMPT With the departure of the last of our companions on March 27, Crawford and I found ourselves left behind in Darjeeling impatiently awaiting the arrival of the oxygen equipment from Calcutta. A week elapsed before we were able to set out for Kalimpong, where we picked up the oxygen stores on April 4. On the evening of our second march out from Kalimpong, suspicious rattlings were heard in the cases containing the oxygen cylinders. On investigation, it transpired that they had been packed metal to metal, and the continual chafing caused by the rough mule transport had already resulted in considerable wear in the steel. This dangerous state of affairs, which, if not speedily remedied, would undoubtedly soon have led to the bursting of some of the cylinders, with consequent demoralisation of our transport, let alone possible casualties, called for immediate attention; so throughout the night of April 5–6, Crawford and I, aided by our porters, worked steadily at grommeting the cylinders with string and repacking them in such a manner as would render impossible any recurrence of the trouble. On April 8, in a snowstorm, we crossed the Jelep La; thence, proceeding viâ the Chumbi Valley and Phari, we ultimately rejoined the main body of the Expedition in Kampa Dzong on the 13th. The rest of our journey across Tibet to the Base Camp has already been described elsewhere, but perhaps I may be permitted to give a few of my own impressions of the country and its inhabitants.