eaks which group around K2--the noblest cluster in the
whole Himalaya.

There are here no inviting grassy slopes and no enticing forests. The
mountain-sides are all hard rock and rugged precipices. And the
summits are of ice or with edges sharp and keen direct from Nature's
workshop. But the sight, though it awes us, does not depress us or
deter us. We are keyed up by high anticipation when we arrive on
the threshold of this secluded region, and a fierce joy seizes us as we
first set eyes on these mountains. We know we have before us one
of the great sights of the world--something unique and apart,
something the like of which we shall never see again. And awed as
we are by the mountains' unsurpassed magnificence, we do not bow
down in any abject way before them. We are not impressed by our
littleness in comparison. They have, indeed, shown us that the world
is something greater than we knew. But they have shown us also that
_we_ too are something greater than we knew. The peaks in their
dazzling altitude have set an exacting standard for us. They have
incited us to rise to that standard. Their call is great, but a thrill runs
through us as we feel ourselves responding to the challenge,
collecting ourselves together and gathering up every stiffest bit of
ourselves to rise to their high standard. We feel nerved and steeled;
and in high exhilaration we plunge down into the valley to join issue
with the mountains.

Arrived on the Oprang River we can turn either to the left or the
right. If we turn to the left we get right in under a knot of stupendous
peaks. Towering high and solitary above the rocky wall which
bounds the valley on the south is a peak which may be K2, 28,250
feet in height, which must be somewhere in the neighbourhood. But
the investigations of the Duke of the Abruzzi throw a doubt as to
whether this can be K2 itself. If it is not, it must be some unfixed
and unnamed peak. At any rate it is a magnificent, upstanding peak
rising proud and steep-sided high and clear above its neighbours.
Then beyond it, farther up the Oprang Valley, we catch glimpses of
that wondrous company of Gusherbrum Peaks--four of them over
26,000 feet in height, with rich glaciers flowing from them.

But if we turn to the right on descending from the Aghil Pass, and if
we turn again in the direction of the Mustagh Pass, we come to an
icy realm which has about it, above every other region, the impress
of both extreme remoteness and