l Nullah
from Tronkol. Far away down the valley the Sind River gleamed like a
silver thread in the afternoon light, and beyond, the Wular lay a pale
haze in the distance.

To the northward rose the fantastic range of peaks that overhang the
Wangat gorge, and almost below my feet, at a depth of some 1500 feet, lay
a sombre lakelet, steely dark and still, in the shadow of the ridge upon
which I sat.

The sun was going down fast into a fleecy bed of clouds, amid which I knew
that Nanga Parbat lay swathed from sight. To see that mountain monarch had
been the chief object of my climb, so, recognising that the sight of him
was a hope deferred, I made haste to scramble down to the tarn below,
stopping here and there to fill my pith hat with wild rhubarb, and to pick
or admire the new and always fascinating wild flowers as I passed.
Large-flowered, white anemones; tiny gentian, with vivid small blue
blossoms; loose-flowered, purple primulas, and many strange and novel
blossoms starred the grassy patches, or filled the rocky crevices with
abundant beauty.

By the lake side the moisture-loving, rose-coloured primula reappeared in
masses, and as I followed down its outgoing stream towards the camp, I
waded through a tangle of columbine, white and blue; a great purple salvia,
arnica, and a profusion of varied flowers in rampant bloom.

_Saturday, July_ 8.--An early start homewards yesterday, in the cold dawn,
rewarded us by the sight of the first beams of the rising sun lighting up
the threefold head of Haramok with an unspeakable glory, as we crossed the
open boulder-strewn uplands, before descending into the nullah, which lay
below us still wrapped in a mysterious purple haze. The downward zigzags,
with their uncompromising steepness, proved almost as tiring as the ascent
had been, and we were more than ready for breakfast by the time we reached
the ruined temples of Vernag.

These temples, built probably about the beginning of the eighth century,
are, like all the others which I have seen in Kashmir, small, and somewhat
uninteresting, except to the archaeologist. They consist, invariably, of a
"cella" containing the object of veneration, the lingam, surmounted by a
high-pitched conical stone roof. In structure they show apparently signs
of Greek influence in the doorways, and the triangular pediments above
them. Phallic worship would seem to have been always confined to these
temples, with ophiolatry--the nagas or water-sna