one of a band of irregulars sent by the Maharajah of Kashmir to garrison the fort at Leh.  From it they used to descend on the town, plunder the bazaar, insult the women, take all they wanted without payment, and when one of their number was being tried for some offence, they dragged the judge out of court and beat him!  After holding Leh in terror for some time the British Commissioner obtained their removal.  It was, however, at the fort at the Indus bridge, as related before, that the crime of murder was committed.  Still there was something almost grand in the defiant attitude of the fantastic swash buckler, as, standing outside the bungalow, he faced the British Commissioner, to him the embodiment of all earthly power, and the chief of police, and defied them.  Not an inch would he stir till the wazir gave him a coolie to carry his baggage.  He had been acquitted of the murder, he said, ’and though I killed the man, it was according to the custom of my country—­he gave me an insult which could only be wiped out in blood!’ The guard dared not touch him, and he went to the wazir, demanded a coolie, and got one!

Our party left Leh early on a glorious morning, travelling light, Mr. Redslob, a very learned Lhassa monk, named Gergan, Mr. R.’s servant, my three, and four baggage horses, with two drivers engaged for the journey.  The great Kailas range was to be crossed, and the first day’s march up long, barren, stony valleys, without interest, took us to a piece of level ground, with a small semi-subterranean refuge on which there was barely room for two tents, at the altitude of the summit of Mont Blanc.  For two hours before we reached it the men and animals showed great distress.  Gyalpo stopped every few yards, gasping, with blood trickling from his nostrils, and turned his head so as to look at me, with the question in his eyes, What does this mean?  Hassan Khan was reeling from vertigo, but would not give in; the seis, a creature without pluck, was carried in a blanket slung on my tent poles, and even the Tibetans suffered.  I felt no inconvenience, but as I unsaddled Gyalpo I was glad that there was no more work to do!  This ‘mountain-sickness,’ called by the natives ladug, or ‘pass-poison,’ is supposed by them to be the result of the odour or pollen of certain plants which grow on the passes.  Horses and mules are unable to carry their loads, and men suffer from vertigo, vomiting, violent headache and bleeding from the nose, mouth, and ears, as well as prostration of strength, sometimes complete, and occasionally ending fatally.

After a bitterly cold night I was awakened at dawn by novel sounds, gruntings, and low, resonant bellowing round my tent, and the grey light revealed several yaks (the Bos grunniens, the Tibetan ox), the pride of the Tibetan highlands.  This magnificent animal, though not exceeding an English shorthorn cow in height, looks gigantic, with his thick curved horns, his wild eyes glaring from under a mass of curls, his long