ed to be as helpless when the caravan camped for the night
as when we first started, and he would stand vacantly staring until someone
directed him what to do. But he was a good cook, when he wished to exert
himself, and had the great asset of knowing a considerable amount of
English. While we were in Ta-li Fu Mr. Evans overheard him relating his
experiences on the road to several of the other servants. "Of course," said
the cook, "it is a fine way to see the country, but the riding! My
goodness, that's awful! After the third day I didn't know whether to go on
or turn back--I was so sore I couldn't sit down even on a chair to say
nothing of a horse!"

He had evidently fully made up his mind not to "see the country" that way
for the day after we left Ta-li Fu _en route_ to the Tibetan frontier he
became violently ill. Although we could find nothing the matter with him he
made such a good case for himself that we believed he really was quite sick
and treated him accordingly. The following morning, however, he sullenly
refused to proceed, and we realized that his illness was of the mind rather
than the body. As he had accepted two months' salary in advance and had
already sent it to his wife in Paik-hoi, we were in a position to use a
certain amount of forceful persuasion which entirely accomplished its
object and illness did not trouble him thereafter.

The loss of a cook is a serious matter to a large expedition. Good meals
and varied food must be provided if the personnel is to work at its highest
efficiency and cooking requires a vast amount of thought and time. In
Yuen-nan natives who can cook foreign food are by no means easy to find and
when our Paik-hoi gentleman finally left us upon our return to Ta-li Fu we
were fortunate in obtaining an exceedingly competent man to take his place
through the good offices of Mr. Hanna.

CHAPTER XII

LI-CHIANG AND "THE TEMPLE OF THE FLOWERS"

We left a part of our outfit with Mr. Evans at Ta-li Fu and with a new
caravan of twenty-five animals traveled northward for six days to Li-chiang
Fu. By taking a small road we hoped to find good collecting in the pine
forests three days from Ta-li, but instead there was a total absence of
animal life. The woods were beautiful, parklike stretches which in a
country like California would be full of game, but here were silent and
deserted. During the fourth and fifth days we were still in the forests,
but on the sixth we crossed a p