lped us to get fuel, and brewed tea for me in Tibetan
fashion. They professed to hate the Lamas, the rulers of the country, to
whom they took special pleasure in applying names hardly repeatable in
these pages. According to them, the Lamas took all the money that came
into the country, and no one else was allowed to have any. They were
unscrupulous, cruel, and unjust. Every man in Tibet, they said, was a
soldier in case of necessity, and every one a servant of the Lamas. The
soldiers of the regular army received a quantity of _tsamba_, bricks of
tea and butter, but no money. Usually they were provided with ponies to
ride. When travelling on duty they had a right to obtain relays of
animals at post-stations and villages, and they were also entitled to
claim supplies of food, saddles, or anything else they required, to
carry them as far as the next encampment. The weapons (sword and
matchlock) generally belonged to the men themselves, but occasionally,
in the larger towns, such as Lhassa and Sigatz, the Lamas provided them.
Gunpowder and bullets were supplied by the authorities. The weapons were
manufactured mostly in Lhassa and Sigatz. Although the Tibetans boasted
of great accuracy in shooting with their matchlocks, which had wooden
rests in order to allow the marksman to take a steady aim, I never saw
even the champion shots of the country hit the mark. For sporting
purposes and for economy's sake, the Tibetan soldiers hardly ever used
lead bullets or shot, but preferred to fill the barrels of their
matchlocks with pebbles. Gunpowder was so scarce that they seldom
practised firing at a target.

At sunrise the view of Gunkyo was magnificent, with the snow-covered
mountains tinted gold and red, and reflected in their smallest detail in
the still waters of the lake.

We loaded our yaks, the Tibetans giving us a helping hand, and started
toward the Maium Pass, following a river which throws itself into the
Gunkyo Lake.

The valley was narrow, and with many sharp turns. Although the elevation
was great, there was abundance of grass. The green was quite refreshing
to the eyes, tired as we were of snow and reddish barren mountains and
desert-like stretches of land. We came to a basin where, on the opposite
bank of the stream, was a large Tibetan camping-ground with a high wall
of stones. Behind it I could see smoke rising, which made me suspect
that there were people concealed.

Our Tibetan friends asked what were our int