which soaked
our blankets and clothes. We were at 16,550 feet in a narrow marshy creek
in which we had descended _a pic_ from the last mountain range. From the
summit of the range we had seen many columns of smoke rising from the
neighbourhood of the Rakas Lake, and we judged that again we must proceed
with great caution.

We cooked our food, and in the middle of the night, for greater safety,
we shifted our camp on the summit of the plateau in a North-Easterly
direction, and continued our journey in the morning, high above the
magnificent blue sheet of the Devil's Lake with its pretty islands.

"Sahib, do you see that island?" exclaimed the Kutial, pointing at a
barren rock that emerged from the lake. "On it," he continued, "lives a
hermit Lama, a saintly man. He has been there alone for many years, and
he is held in great veneration by the Tibetans. He exists almost entirely
on fish, and occasional swan's eggs, and only in winter, when the lake is
frozen, is communication established with the shore, and supplies of
_tsamba_ are brought to him, for they have no boats in Rakastal, nor any
way of constructing rafts, owing to the absence of wood. The hermit
sleeps in a cave, but generally comes out in the open to pray to Buddha."
During the following night, when everything was still, a slight breeze
blowing from the North brought to us, faint and indistinct, the broken
howls of the hermit.

"What is that?" I asked of the Shokas.

"It is the hermit speaking to God. Every night he climbs to the summit of
the rock, and from there addresses his prayers to Buddha the Great."

"How is he clothed?" I inquired.

"In skins."

[Illustration: RAKASTAL AND ... MANSAROWAR LAKES]

Late in the afternoon we had an amusing incident. We came to a creek in
which were a number of men and women, hundreds of yaks and sheep, and
some thirty ponies.

The Shokas became alarmed, and immediately pronounced the folks to be
brigands. I maintained that they were not, and as Kachi expounded the
theory that the only way to distinguish Dakus from honest beings was to
hear them talk (the Dakus he declared usually shout at the top of their
voices when conversing, and use language far from select, while
well-to-do Tibetans speak gently and with refinement), I thought the
only thing to do was to go and address the people, when by the tone of
voice we should find out what they were. This, however, did not suit my
Shokas, and we were placed in rathe