The foot of the hill to be scaled was less than three miles from camp, but the intervening ground was extraordinarily broken.

It was, in fact, a series of hummocks from seventy to a hundred feet high; which were covered with boulders, and intersected by a river.

This main nullah was also broken, on both sides, by smaller nullahs almost every hundred yards.

Beyond this rugged ground there was a severe ascent.

The hill had two spurs; one wooded, especially towards the summit, the other bare.
The path wound up the latter, then crossed a ridge beyond, and yet another ridge behind that, with a sheer summit very like the Dargai cliff.
The force left camp at half-past seven.