into two parties, the one
contending that it would be better to start forthwith, the other
insisting that we ought, by all means, to wait till the morrow.

To extricate themselves from this embarrassment, they had recourse to the
Lamas, who had the reputation of being diviners. But this expedient did
not combine all minds in unity. Among the diviners there were some who
declared that this day would be calm, but that the next day there would
be a terrible wind, and there were others who announced an exactly
contrary opinion. The caravan thus became divided into two camps, that
of movement and that of non-movement. It will at once be understood that
in our character of French citizens, we instinctively placed ourselves in
the ranks of the progressists; that is to say, of those who desired to
advance, and to have done with this villainous mountain as soon as
possible. It appeared to us, moreover, that reason was altogether on our
side. The weather just then was perfectly calm; but we knew not what it
might be on the morrow. Our party, therefore, proceeded to scale these
mountains of snow, sometimes on horseback, but more frequently on foot.
In the latter case, we made our animals precede us, and we hung on to
their tails, a mode of ascending mountains which is certainly the least
fatiguing of all. M. Gabet suffered dreadfully, but God, of his infinite
goodness, gave us strength and energy enough to reach the other side.
The weather was calm throughout, and we were assailed by no avalanche
whatever.

Next morning, at daybreak, the party who had remained behind, advanced
and crossed the mountain with entire success. As we had had the
politeness to wait for them, they joined us, and we entered together a
valley where the temperature was comparatively mild. The excellence of
the pasturage induced the caravan to take a day's rest here. A deep
lake, in the ice of which we dug wells, supplied us with abundance of
water. We had plenty of fuel, too, for the embassies and pilgrimages
being in the habit of halting in the valley, after the passage of the
Bayen-Kharat, one is always sure to find plenty of argols there. We all
kept up great fires throughout our stay, burning all the burnable things
we could find, without the smallest consideration for our successors,
leaving it to our 15,000 long-haired oxen to supply the deficit.

We quitted the great valley of Bayen-Kharat, and set up our tents on the
banks of the Mour