of his head, the curve of his horns,
and in coloration, he is as individual as a human being.

While we were examining the sheep, Harry and his hunter appeared
upon the rim of the ravine. They brought with them, on a donkey, the
skin and head of a fine two-year-old ram which he had killed an hour
earlier far beyond us on the uplands. It fitted exactly into our
series, and when we had another big ram and two ewes, the group
would be complete.

Poor Harry was hobbling along just able to walk. He had strained a
tendon in his right leg the previous morning, and had been enduring
the most excruciating pain all day. He wanted to stay and help us
skin the sheep, but I would not let him We were a long way from
camp, and it would require all his strength to get back at all.

At half-past four we finished with the sheep, and tied the skins and
much of the meat on the two donkeys which Harry had commandeered.
Our only way home lay down the river bed, for in the darkness we
could not follow the trail along the cliffs. By six o'clock it was
black night in the gorge.

The donkeys were our only salvation, for by instinct--it couldn't
have been sight--they followed the trail along the base of the
cliffs. By keeping my hands upon the back of the rearmost animal,
and the two Mongols close to me, we got out of the canyon and into
the wider valley. When we reached the village I was hungry enough to
eat chips, for I had had only three pears since six o'clock in the
morning, and it was then nine at night.

Harry, limping into camp just after dark, had met my cousin,
Commander Thomas Hutchins, Naval Attache of the American Legation,
and Major Austin Barker of the British Army, whom we had been
expecting. They had reached the village about ten o'clock in the
morning and spent the afternoon shooting hares near a beautiful
temple which Harry had discovered among the hills three miles from
camp. The boys had waited dinner for me, and we ate it amid a gale
of laughter--we were always laughing during the five days that Tom
and Barker were with us.

Harry was out of the hunting the next day because his leg needed a
complete rest. I took Tom out with me, while Barker was piloted by
an old Mongol who gave promise of being a good hunter. Tom and I
climbed the white trail to the summit of the ridge, while Barker
turned off to the left to gain the peaks on the other side of the
gorge. Na-mon-gin was keen for the big ram which I had missed the
da