we had been favoured. We had scarcely taken up a
cup of buttered tea before the horsemen made their appearance at the door
of the tent. So far from being brigands, they were worthy fellows who
came to sell us butter and fresh meat; their saddles were regular
butchers' stalls hung with joints of mutton and venison, which rested on
the sides of their horses. We purchased eight legs of mutton, which,
being frozen, were easily susceptible of transport. They cost us an old
pair of Peking boots, a Peking steel, and the saddle of our defunct mule,
which luckily could also boast of Peking origin. Everything coming from
Peking is highly prized by the Thibetians, more especially by that
portion of the population which has not advanced beyond the pastoral and
nomadic life. The merchants who accompany the caravan take care,
accordingly, to label every package "Goods from Peking." Snuff is
especially an object of earnest competition among the Thibetians. All
the shepherds asked us whether we had not snuff from Peking. M. Huc, who
was the only snuff-taker of our party, had formerly possessed a quantity
of the precious commodity, but it had all departed, and for the last
eight days he had been reduced to the necessity of filling his snuff-box
and his nose with a frightful mixture of dust and ashes. Those who are
devotees of snuff, will at once comprehend all the horrors to poor M. Huc
of this deplorable position.

Condemned for the last two months to live upon barley-meal, moistened
with tea, the mere sight of our legs of mutton seemed to fortify our
stomachs and invigorate our emaciated limbs. The remainder of the day
was occupied in culinary preparations. By way of condiment and
seasoning, we had only a little garlic, and that little so frozen and
dried that it was almost imperceptible in its shell. We peeled, however,
all we had, and stuck it into two legs of mutton, which we set to boil in
our great cauldron. The argols, which abounded in this blessed plain,
supplied ample materials for cooking our inestimable supper. The sun was
just setting, and Samdadchiemba, who had been inspecting one of the legs
of mutton with his thumb-nail, had triumphantly announced that the mutton
was boiled to a bubble, when we heard in all directions, the disastrous
cry, "Fire! fire!" (_Mi yon! mi yon_!) At one bound we were outside our
tent, where we found that the flame, which had caught some dry grass, in
the interior of the encampme