owing of the cows, the neighing of
the horses, the talking, bawling, laughing, singing of the travellers,
the whistling of the lakto to the beasts of burden, and, above all, the
innumerable bells tinkling from the necks of the yaks and the camels,
produced together an immense, undefinable concert, which, far from
wearying, seemed, on the contrary, to inspire everybody with fresh
courage and energy.

The caravan went on thus across the desert, stopping each day in plains,
in valleys, and on the mountain sides, improvising, with its tents, so
numerous and so varied in form and colour, a large town, which vanished
each morning, to reappear further on each evening. What an astonishing
thing it must have been for these vast and silent deserts, to find
themselves, all of a sudden, traversed by so numerous and so noisy a
multitude! When we viewed those infinite travelling tents, those large
herds, and those men, in turns shepherds and warriors, we could not help
frequently reflecting upon the march of the Israelites, when they went in
search of the Promised Land, through the solitudes of Median.

On quitting the shore of the Blue Sea, we directed our steps towards the
west, with a slight inclination, perhaps, southward. The first days of
our march were perfect poetry; everything was just as we could have
wished; the weather was magnificent, the road excellent, the water pure,
the pastures rich and ample. As to brigands, we lost all thought of
them. In the night, it was, indeed, rather cold; but this inconvenience
was easily obviated by the aid of our sheep-skin coats. We asked one
another what people could mean by representing this Thibet journey as
something so formidable; it seemed to us impossible for any one to travel
more comfortably, or more agreeably. Alas! this enchantment was not of
long duration.

Six days after our departure, we had to cross the Pouhain-Gol, a river
which derives its source from the slopes of the Nan-Chan mountains, and
throws itself into the Blue Sea. Its waters are not very deep, but being
distributed in some dozen channels, very close to one another, they
occupy altogether a breadth of more than a league. We had the misfortune
to reach the first branch of the Pouhain-Gol long before daybreak; the
water was frozen, but not thickly enough to serve as a bridge. The
horses which arrived first grew alarmed and would not advance; they
stopped on the bank, and gave the cattle time to come up