At Atdza we changed our oulah, although we had only fifty lis to go before we reached the residence of Lha-Ri. We required fresh animals accustomed to the dreadful road we had below us. One single mountain separated us from Lha-Ri, and to cross it it was, we were told, necessary to set out early in the morning, if we wished to arrive before night. We consulted the Itinerary, and we found there the following agreeable account of the place: “A little further on you pass a lofty mountain, the summits of which rise in peaks. The ice and snow never melt here throughout the year. Its chasms resemble the declivitous shores of the sea; the wind often fills them with snow; the paths are almost impracticable, the descent is so rapid and slippery.” It is obvious that this brief but emphatic sketch did not hold out to us any very agreeable pleasure trip for the morrow. Oh, how readily we would have given up our places to some of those intrepid tourists, whom the love of ice and snow, of rocks and precipices, leads every year amidst the Alps, those mountains of Thibet in miniature. Another thing, very little calculated to encourage us, was, that the people of the caravan, the villagers, everybody seemed anxious and uneasy. They asked one another whether the snow, which had fallen in abundance for five days, and had not had time to settle, would not render the mountains impassable; whether there was not a danger of being buried in the chasms, or of being overwhelmed by the avalanches; whether, in a word, it would not be prudent to wait a few days, in the hope that the snow would be dispersed by the wind, or partly melted by the sun, or consolidated by the cold. To all these questions, the answers were anything but encouraging. In order to guard against the effects of mere pusillanimity of presumption, we held, before going to bed, a council, to which we summoned the old mountaineers of the country. After long deliberation, it was decided first, that if, on the morrow, the weather was calm and serene, we might set out without temerity; secondly, that in the supposition of departure, the long-haired oxen laden with the baggage, and conducted by some people of the district, should precede the horsemen, in order to trace out for them, in the snow, a more easy path. The matter being thus determined, we tried to take a little rest, relying little on the advantages of this plan, and much on the Divine protection.