Our guide was a Pashāī named Pīr Sulṯān (Old sultan?). Whether it was through old age, whether from want of heart, whether because of the deep snow, he lost the road and could not guide us. As we were on this route under the insistance of Qāsim Beg, he and his sons, for his name's sake, dismounted, trampled the snow down, found the road again and took the lead. One day the snow was so deep and the way so uncertain that we could not go on; there being no help for it, back we turned, dismounted where there was fuel, picked out 60 or 70 good men and sent them down the valley in our tracks to fetch any one soever of the Hazāra, wintering in the valley-bottom, who might shew us the road. That place could not be left till our men returned three or four days later. They brought no [Sidenote: Fol. 193b.] guide; once more we sent Sulṯān _Pashāī_ ahead and, putting our trust in God, again took the road by which we had come back from where it was lost. Much misery and hardship were endured in those few days, more than at any time of my life. In that stress I composed the following opening couplet:— Is there one cruel turn of Fortune's wheel unseen of me? Is there a pang, a grief my wounded heart has missed? We went on for nearly a week, trampling down the snow and not getting forward more than two or three miles a day. I was one of the snow-stampers, with 10 or 15 of my household, Qāsim Beg, his sons Tīngrī-bīrdī and Qaṃbar-i-`alī and two or three of their retainers. These mentioned used to go forward for 7 or 8 yards, stamping the snow down and at each step sinking to the waist or the breast. After a few steps the leading man would stand still, exhausted by the labour, and another would go forward. By the time 10, 15, 20, men on foot had stamped the snow down, it became so that a horse might be led over it. A horse would be led, would sink to the stirrups, could do no more than 10 or 12 steps, and would be drawn aside to let another go on. After we, 10, 15, 20, men had stamped down the snow and had led horses forward in this fashion, very serviceable [Sidenote: Fol. 194.] braves and men of renowned name would enter the beaten track, hanging their heads. It was not a time to urge or compel! the man with will and hardihood for such tasks does them by his own request! Stamping the snow down in this way, we got out of that afflicting place (_ānjūkān yīr_) in three or four days to a cave known as the Khawāl-i-qūtī (Blessed-cave), below the Zirrīn-pass.