had been marching for several hours our guard halted to have
their tea. A trader named Suna, and his brother and son, whom I had met
in Garbyang, halted near us. From them I heard that news had arrived in
India that my two men and I had been beheaded, and that thereupon Doctor
Wilson and the British Political Officer, Karak Sing, had crossed over
the frontier to ascertain the facts, and to attempt to recover my
baggage, etc. My joy was intense when I heard that they were still at
Taklakot. I persuaded Suna to return as fast as he could to inform
Wilson that I was a prisoner, and to tell him my whereabouts. I had
barely given Suna this message when our guard seized the man and his
brother and roughly dismissed them, preventing them from having any
further communication with us.

As soon as we were on the march again, a horseman rode up to us with
strict orders from the Jong Pen of Taklakot not to let us proceed any
farther toward the frontier by the Lippu Pass, which we could now have
reached in two days, but to take us instead by the distant Lumpiya Pass.
At that time of the year the Lumpiya would be impassable. We should have
to make a further journey of at least fifteen or sixteen days, most of
it over snow and ice, during which we, in our starved and weakened
state, would inevitably die. We asked to be taken into Taklakot, but our
guard refused. The Jong Pen of Taklakot had sent other messengers and
soldiers to insure the fulfilment of his orders, and to prevent our
further progress.

Our guard, now strengthened by the Taklakot men, compelled us to leave
the Taklakot track, and we began our journey toward the cold Lumpiya.
This was murder. The Tibetans, well knowing it, calculated on telling
the British authorities that we had died of a natural death on the
snows.

We were informed that we should be left at the point where the perpetual
snows began, that the Tibetans would give us no food, no clothes and no
blankets, and that we should be abandoned to cross over the frontier as
best we could. This, needless to say, meant sure death.

After travelling some two and a half miles westward of the Taklakot
track we declined to proceed any farther in that direction. We said
that, if they attempted to compel us, we were prepared to fight our
guard. Whether we died by their swords and matchlocks, or froze to death
on the Lumpiya, was quite immaterial to us.

The guard, perplexed, decided to let us halt there for the nig