ng and fatiguing. For us, there were plenty of nettles to fall back
upon.

[Illustration: BEHIND OUR BULWARKS]

I carefully instructed the four Shokas how to enter the Tibetan fort one
by one in their disguises, and purchase, in small quantities at a time,
the provisions we required. When a sufficient amount was obtained to make
a load, a man should immediately start towards our camp, and the others
were to follow separately for a few marches, when at a given spot, they
would all four meet again and return to us. It was exciting work to
prepare the different disguises and arrange for everything, and at last,
after repeated good-byes and words of encouragement, the four messengers
left on their perilous errand. All seemed very quiet round us, so quiet
that I unburied my sextant and artificial horizon, and was taking
observations for longitude as well as for latitude (by double altitudes,
as the angle was too great to be measured at noon), when, to our dismay,
a herd consisting of over a hundred yaks appeared on the pass, North of
our camp, and slowly advanced towards us. Were we discovered? Were the
Tarjum's men coming, preceded by their animals? No time was to be lost;
instruments and blankets were quickly cleared away and hidden, and then,
crawling up towards the animals, who had stopped on perceiving us, we
threw stones at them in order to drive them down the next creek. As
luck would have it, we were just in time to do this, for from our
hiding-place on the summit of the pass we could see, on the other side, a
number of Tibetans following the yaks we had driven away. They passed
only a couple of hundred yards below us, evidently quite unconscious of
our presence. They were singing, and apparently looking for somebody's
tracks, for they often stooped to examine the ground. Later in the
afternoon I went to reconnoitre down the Gyanema road, and in the hope of
watching, unseen, the Tibetans who passed on their way to and from
Taklakot. I saw no soldiers, but a strong band of Jogpas (brigands),
driving before them thousands of sheep and yaks, was an interesting
sight. They all rode ponies, and seemed to obey their leader very
smartly, when in a hoarse voice, and never ceasing to turn his
prayer-wheel, he muttered orders. They went briskly along in fine style,
women as well as men riding their ponies astride. The men had matchlocks
and swords, and each pony carried, besides its rider, bags of food slung
behind the saddle