done by applying the lips to the wound itself.

Bleeding is used as a remedy for bruises and swellings, and for internal
pain, also for acute attacks of rheumatism and articular pains. If it is
not sufficient, the branding cure is resorted to, and if this should also
fail, then the tinder cones, to be described later on, come into play
and, the seat of the pain being encircled with them, they are set alight.
When even this remedy proves inefficacious, and the patient survives it,
the illness is pronounced incurable!

Natural abnormalities and deformities are frequent enough in Tibet, and
some came under my notice in nearly every camp I entered. Deformities of
the spine were common, such as displacement of the shoulder-blades; and I
saw during my stay in Tibet many cases of actually humpbacked people.
There were frequent cases, too, of crookedness of the legs, and clubfoot
was not rare, while one constantly met with webbed fingers and
supernumerary fingers and toes, as well as the absence of one or more of
them. Malformations of the skull, such as the two sides being of marked
unequal shape or an abnormal distance between the eye sockets, were the
two most common deformities that came under my notice.

The ears of men of the better classes were much elongated artificially
by the constant wearing of heavy earrings, which sometimes even tore the
lobe of the ear.

The most frequent and curious of all was the extreme swelling of
children's stomachs, caused by the umbilical cord not being properly tied
at birth. The operation was generally performed by the mother and father
of the newly-born or by some friend at hand. The infants had such
enormous paunches that in some cases they were hardly able to stand; but,
as they grew older, the swelling seemed to gradually abate and the body
assumed its normal shape.

Deafness was common, but I never came across any dumb people, though I
now and then encountered cases of painful stammering and other defects of
articulation arising from malformation of the palate and tongue.

Occasionally, however, the difficulty of speech was caused by dementia,
which seemed very common in Tibet, especially among the young men.
Whether it was caused by cardiac affection subsequent to organic vices,
as I suspected, or by other trouble, I could not say for certain, but
presently I based my suspicions on certain facts which I happened to
notice, besides the presence of symptoms indicating great nerv