TARTAR NOMADS. 103 



took good care not to let me kill many of them, even had 1 

 wished it. Close to the road I shot a hill-marten (Martes 

 flavigida), called " chitrola " by the hill-men. Its pretty skin 

 is dark glossy brown on the back, head, and legs, and 

 yellowish below. In length it is somewhat over two feet, 

 including the tail, which is rather long and almost black. It 

 was eating a dead bird, and even after being shot, it still 

 retained its grip on a wing it had in its mouth. 



We struck the route by which we had travelled upwards 

 at the wooden bridge where we had crossed the river Goree. 

 Here, as I had brought my rod with me, I tried with a 

 minnow for mahseer, but the water was far too big and dirty 

 to be in fishing order. I might just as well have wetted my 

 line in a soapy wash-tub. 



One day we came across an encampment of Tibetan Lamas 1 

 in their black blanket-tents. They were returning to their 

 homes in " Hundes," as that part of Tibet lying beyond the 

 mountain-passes of the Gurhwal and Kumaon provinces is 

 called. A wild, queer-looking lot these Tartars were, with 

 their flat, ugly, but good-humoured countenances, small eyes, 

 pig-tails, and peculiar dress. The latter generally consisted 

 of a loose garment of coarse woollen stuff of a dirty purplish 

 hue, confined at the waist by a girdle of cloth or a belt. In 

 this was stuck a tobacco-pipe, about 8 or 10 inches long, 

 with a very small brass bowl, and mouthpiece of the same 

 material. Depending from it was also a " chuckmuck." This 

 useful appendage which, together with the pipe, and a wool- 

 spindle, these people are never without is a steel attached 

 to a small leathern pocket containing a flint and tinder. It 

 is often ornamented with red cloth covered with open work 

 of silver or brass, and fastened to the girdle by a leather 

 thong or metal chain. The rest of their apparel consisted of 

 long woollen boots, fastened below the knee, and soled with 



1 The sacerdotal class of Tibetan Buddhists are called Lamas, many of whom 

 are engaged as much in their temporal as in their monastic pursuits. 



