ABSTRACT
I TOOK the road to the Krestovy Pass. The clouds lowered, and there was the promise of much snow. It was bitterly cold, and the mountains in front were dressed from head to foot in white robes. Two versts from Kobi an avalanche had fallen recently, so that the road would have been impossible but for an emergency tunnel that had providently been constructed at that point. Fifty men were at work shovelling snow into the river-valley, which was itself piled up in bergs of snow. I wondered what was in store for me at the higher points of the road.
