Untitled

THE PATHS TO SUANETIA 201
flowers, and yellowing barley now occupies them. On a little
plain in the foreground rise the smoke pillars
of half a dozen
humble homesteads — birch-bark huts — raised by visitors, or
emigrants,
from Ushkul. These traces of man's handiwork serve
to emphasise the scale of the superb landscape, one of the most
perfect in the arrangement
of its lines and the combination of
sublimity and beauty in its details it is possible to imagine.
As the head of the valley is approached, Slikai'a sinks for a
time behind the nearer hills. The most prominent object is now
tlie rocky comb of Koi'eldash,' the Ailama of the north side, which
dominates the forked tongue of the glacier that falls into tlie
head of the glen. A broad and steep sledge-track leads away to
the left, and brings the traveller without further difficulty to the
Zagar Pass (8G80 feet), the lowest gap in the fence of momitains
that encircles Suanetia. The view of the snows obtained from its
grassy crest is soon lost, while of llie region in front nothing is
yet seen. A gentle descent over the pastures of a diill green glen
leads to the black towers of Uslikul, tlie first and liighest CDUimunify
of Free Suanetia.
' Dr. Kadde called Ailama, Konildu ; the new map gives
lower ridge.
the name Knrelilash tn a iiuuli
The word doubtless indicates to natives some pasture or hunting-ground they go
to at the head of the Zena Valley. This is huw, when a need for them arises, summits acquire
distinctive names.