I 



SUCCESS 299 



they had mounted to the high alp of Tungu, where friendly 

 Tibetans from across the frontier were camped for the summer 

 in their black horsehair tents, pasturing yaks. The journey 

 to the pass and back was the best part of thirty miles. The 

 ground was level enough for riding on the hardy Tartar ponies, 

 stubborn, intractable, unshod, which never missed a foot among 

 the sharp rocks, deep stony torrents and slippery paths, even 

 in the pitch darkness of the final way back. Sorry-looking 

 beasts, nothing could tire them, not even the sixteen stone 

 burden oi the Soubah. Hooker himself walked some thirteen 

 miles of the way, botanising ; but ' at dusk,' he confesses, * I 

 took horse, for alas ! I am quite blind in the dark.' 



Peppin, the Soubah, was as good as his word ; going and 

 coming they were most graciously received by his squaw and 

 family. 



The whole party squatted in a ring inside the tent, the 

 Soubah and myself seated at the head, on a beautiful Chinese 

 mat. Queen Peppin then made tea (with salt and butter), 

 we each produced our Bhotea cup, which was always kept 

 full. Curd, parched rice, and beaten maize were handed 

 hberally round, and we fared sumptuously, for I am very 

 fond both of Brick Tea and curds. 



Nature reserved an impressive setting for the last act of the 

 serio-comedy. As they sat round Peppin's hospitable fire, a 

 tremendous peal like thunder echoed down the glen. The 

 men started to their feet and cried to Hooker to be off, for the 

 mountains were falhng and a violent storm was at hand. So 

 for five or six miles they pursued their way up the river bed, 

 shrouded in fog and deafened by the unseen avalanches that 

 thundered down unceasingly from the great mountains on 

 either side. Only the low hills which flanked the river fended 

 off the falling rocks. Gradually, as they ascended, the valley 

 widened ; at 15,000 feet they emerged on a broad, flat table- 

 land, and 500 feet higher reached a long flat ridge, where 

 stood the boundary mark — a Cairn ! This was their goal. 

 The storm lifted its curtains. Beyond showed the blue and 

 rainless skies of Tibet ; behind, were revealed the two snow 



