at period, some exigency of field service
does not arise which requires you to leave all those preparations
regretfully, and postpone the bath to another day, you are lucky. Even
if you get through with your project without being disturbed, it is as
likely as not that the day for getting your clothes washed being a
movable feast, you will have nothing to put on that will not seem a
defilement to your freshly polished skin. Getting water hot enough was
sometimes difficult when you wanted as much as is necessary for a bath,
if the wind blew high and firewood was scanty. But this was nothing
compared with the difficulty experienced in such forms of cookery as
were associated with boiling water. The temperature at which water boils
at an altitude of, say, 15,000 feet is, I believe, some forty degrees
lower than boiling point on the sea-level. I wondered for a long time
why my tea never seemed to have been made with boiling water, and I am
afraid a certain faithful youth who used to make it for me got rather
harsh treatment till my scientific education was sufficiently advanced
to absolve him. Tea that is served up at a temperature of forty degrees
below the normal boiling point can never be very nice. And it got cool
very quickly, which of course was natural. When I returned to India the
other day, I could not make out why I was always burning my tongue over
my tea, till I remembered that of course the tea which I was now
drinking was made with water that boiled at an ordinary boiling
temperature, and so remained too hot to drink till it had been allowed
to stand for a decent interval.

It was in its effect upon rice as part of the natives' ration that this
low boiling point was really of serious import. Rice well boiled is a
good ration for natives, but there was many a case of indigestion and
colic attributed to the rice which had been spuriously boiled at one of
these high altitudes, but never really cooked.

CHAPTER XV

LAKE PALTI: DRAWING BLANK: PETE-JONG

We left Nagartse in very wretched weather, and for the next few days
marched in rain and camped in rain. A spell of bad weather like this,
bad enough as it is for every one, man or beast, is perhaps worst of all
for the mules who carry the tents, for a thoroughly soaked tent is
literally twice its normal weight; and ours on this occasion, after the
initial soaking, got no drier for several days in succession.

We were now marching alongside the Lake Palt