CH..l'CVI ON COL OF KUN-LUN WATERSHED 479
and the hypsometrical reading subsequently confirmed this. But it would have sufficed to look at the snowy grandeur of the peaks and ridges close to us on the west and northwest to make me realize how high was the col on which we stood. Though many of the exposed slopes faced south, huge masses of permanent snow covered them everywhere. It was a picture of Alpine majesty such as I had nowhere beheld so close in the Kun-lun. Some miles on our left the crest-line of the main range took a sharp bend to the north, and thus much increased the array of great snowy heights visible from our position. Within a mile to the west rose a beautiful snow dome to a height manifestly over 21,000 feet. But it was overtopped by the huge crest flanking our col and glacier from the east. The highest visible part of this could only be got within the panorama by raising the lens considerably, though it seemed distinctly farther off than the more shapely dome west.
We could not see the northern slope of this culminating massif of the range, nor make sure whether the top of the ridge as we saw it was really its highest point. Subsequent consideration of topographical points has convinced me that we stood here below the western shoulder of the great peak which rises at the head of the Nissa valley's largest glacier, and for the highest point of which our triangulation of 1900 indicated an elevation of 23,071 feet.
To the south-east and just by the slope of the great ridge referred to, there showed a well - defined snowy pyramid, in which, by the indication of the plane-table, we thought we could recognize the peak K1 triangulated long ago from the Ladak side with an accepted height of 21,750 feet. It was clear now that the route to the Yangi Dawan lay in one of the narrow valleys of which the lowest parts were just visible from our col, leading up to a part of the watershed situated north of K1 and hidden from us by the great ridge. This would agree with the relative bearing indicated by Johnson's sketch map between the pass and K1, while the considerable correction in distance which our survey demonstrated would help to solve the main puzzle as to the line followed
IIIFカラー高解像度
