76 CHINESE TURKESTAN 



not make it out at all ; but I found out the explana- 

 tion afterwards. The Duke of Kukturuk had been 

 complaining much of the hard work, saying that he 

 was losing all his fat, which was very bad business, 

 and expressing a desire to see his wife and family 

 once more. I had told him he might go if he would 

 provide a substitute, and this evening a poor re- 

 lation turned up, who was also supposed to be a 

 mighty hunter, so His Grace was free to depart, to 

 our mutual relief. 



The substitute turned ou: a better fellow, being 

 both able and willing to walk ; but he had a some- 

 what irritating habit of appealing to me as to which 

 way we should go. Now, the wapiti ground here 

 is very broken. Perhaps the easiest way of giving 

 an idea of it is to say that it is a plateau intersected 

 by valleys so numerous that of the plateau only the 

 dividing ridges remain, and they are all much the 

 same height. The valleys are very deep, very 

 heavily timbered, and their sides often precipitous, 

 so that it sometimes takes hours to reach a place 

 which is only a mile or so away as the crow flies ; 

 consequently, an intimate knowledge of the country 

 is absolutely necessary, and this I could hardly be 

 expected to possess. 



On the 25th we moved camp on a bit, as there 

 seemed to be nothing much where we were ; but in 

 the afternoon, and at dusk, just as I was thinking of 

 returning to camp, filled with blank despair, a good 





