on, and therefore
did all he could to place our force between them and himself. Both at
Pingal and our next halting place, Cheshi, he managed to billet all our
small force in the villages, and no doubt our men were very thankful as
we were getting pretty high up, and the nights were decidedly cold.
Although it was a friendly district, we had regular pickets and
sentries, and a British officer on duty to see everything was correct.

CHAPTER III

THE SHANDUR PASS

Shortly after leaving Pingal, the character of the country changed
considerably, and instead of a continual alternation of cliff and river
bed, the valley became more open and level; we were, in fact, nearing
the upper end of the valley. Beyond Cheshi the road leads up a bluff and
down the other side on to the bed of the Pandur Lake. This lake had, at
the beginning of 1894, been a sheet of water some four and a half miles
long, but, the dam at its end having given way in July, it had drained
off rapidly; and when I had crossed it in November of the same year, the
mud of its bed was only just becoming firm and was cracked and fissured
in every direction. It was now covered with a sheet of snow, through
which the river twined dark and muddy.

We had now reached the snow line, and our green goggles were taken into
use. The march of our column churned the snow and mud into a greasy
slime, and the going was very tiring. However, we came in sight of the
Ghizr post by 2 P.M., and Gough, of the 2nd Gurkhas, who was in command,
came out to meet us. From him we learned that none of his messengers
that had been sent to Mastuj with letters had returned, and it was now
some ten days since the last communication had reached him; so it became
evident that the enemy were between Laspur and Mastuj. We knew that they
had not crossed the pass, or we should have seen them before this, so we
were pretty hopeful of a fight soon after crossing the pass, and we were
not disappointed. At Ghizr we also found Oldham, a Sapper subaltern, who
had preceded us by a few days. He had with him a party of Kashmir
Sappers and Miners, who were now armed with Snider carbines. The post,
which consisted of a block of isolated houses, had been fortified and
surrounded with a thorn zareba, and was only sufficiently large for the
garrison of Kashmir troops then holding it, so our men were billeted in
the neighbouring houses, one of which we turned into a mess and quarters
for ourselves.

We