Untitled

200 THE EXPLORATION OF THE CAUCASUS
A new feature now appears in the landscape. Hitherto, since
leaving the Rion, the peaks and glaciei's have been subsidiary —
a gleam of white or a fantastic rock-tooth framed between the
branches of the beeches or the tall pine-stems. Looking up the
Zena, the view is closed by a great snow mountain. It is, indeed,
a great mountain, the loftiest on the Caucasian watershed, the
third in heiglit in the chain.'
In the curves of its long crest and continuous precipices Shkara
DWKLI.KKS IN THE WILDERNESS
curiously resembles Monte Ilosa, seen from Macugnaga. But here
there is none of the barren foreground which defaces the Alpine
view. The five peaks tower above downs that are great flower-
meadows. Forests bris^ht with the varied foliao-e that renews
itself eveiy spriug, beech and birch, alder and plane, climb the
hillsides. The nearest glades have been cleared of their gigantic
' Shkara has been allotted 17,038 feet by the last survey, IG feet less than Dykhtau.
Whether this relation between the summits is permanent, I doubt. The conditions of their
snowcaps nuist all'ect it ; and to Mr. C'oclun, the only man wlio has measured eaeh from the
other, Shkara seemed to have a slight advantage. It is safest, however, fir the jireseut to accept
the official figures.