, which measures 29,200 feet, is only eighty miles distant;
Kinchinjunga, which is forty-five miles distant, is 28,156 feet
high, and also, in the immediate vicinity, are the following:

Janu 25,304 Kabru 24,015
Chumalari 23,943 Pauhanri 23,186
Donkia 23,176 Baudim 22,017
Narsingh 22,146 Kanhenjhan 22,500
Chomaino 23,300

Between these mountain peaks is an almost continuous succession
of snow fields and glaciers beyond all comparison. The snow line
is 17,000 feet in midsummer, and in winter comes down to 12,000 and
15,000 feet, and when that altitude is reached snow is continuous
and impassable. This is the highest and the most extensive of
all mountain ranges. Along the northern frontier of India for
2,000 miles it stands like a vast hedge, the most formidable
natural boundary in the world, nowhere lower than 17,000 feet,
and impassable for armies the entire distance, with the exception
of two gateways: Jeylup Pass here and at the Khyber Pass of which
I told you in a previous chapter. There are passes over the snow,
but their elevation is seldom less than 16,000 feet; the average
elevation of the watershed exceeds 18,000 feet, and the great
plateau of Thibet, which lies upon the other side, is between
15,000 and 16,000 feet above the sea.

This plateau, which is sometimes called the "Roof of the World,"
is 700 miles long and 500 miles wide, and could not be crossed
by an army not only because of the winds and the cold, but also
because there is very little water, no fuel and no supplies. No
invading force could possibly enter India from the north if these
passes were defended, because the inhospitable climate of Thibet
would not sustain an army, and the enormous distance and altitude
would make the transportation of supplies for any considerable
force practically impossible. During the summer the plateau is
covered with flocks and herds, but when the cold weather comes
on the shepherds drive them into the foothills, where they find
shelter. The width of the main range of the Himalayas will average
about 500 miles between its northern and southern foot-hills; it
embraces every possible kind of climate, vegetation and natural
products, and is a vast reservoir from which four of the greatest
rivers of the world flow across the plains of India, carrying
the drainage from the melting snows, and without this reservoir
northern India