A TARTAR BREAKFAST. 323 



To begin with, a very dirty copper vessel was put on the 

 fire and filled with some green weed like nettles, barley-flour, 

 and water. Whilst one of the men stirred this pottage round 

 and round with a wooden ladle, another produced some raw 

 meat a bit of the dong I had shot. This he proceeded to 

 tear up into small strips and throw them on the fire, every 

 now and then popping a raw lump into his mouth and masti- 

 cating it with the greatest apparent gusto. Even the bits 

 on the fire were quickly disposed of after being merely 

 singed. As soon as the pottage was considered ready, it 

 was ladled out into little wooden cups, like the whisky 

 " quaighs " of the Highlands, minus the handles, which each 

 man produced from inside the breast of his dirty woollen 

 coat, and gulped up from them with a prodigious amount 

 of noise. After being replenished again and again until 

 the pot was emptied, the cups were carefully licked clean, 

 and redeposited in the place whence they had been taken. 

 Another course of flesh was about to be partaken of, after 

 the manner of the first, but a regard for my own appetite for 

 breakfast prevented my waiting to see it discussed. These 

 hardy Tartars are quite independent of any other dishes 

 beyond their little wooden bowls. In these they mix their 

 " suttoo " (meal made from barley) with a little water and 

 salt, and make an expeditious repast of it whenever they 

 feel hungry. Indeed this kind of uncooked porridge seems 

 to be their staple food. 



In the forenoon the sun broke forth, and some idea of its 

 power up here may be formed when I say that by evening 

 the ground about our camp was nearly free from snow, and 

 next morning we were able to proceed without inconvenience 

 over the almost bare earth, which was frozen as hard as iron. 

 This time I felt no uncomfortable sensations from the rarefied 

 air on the pass, nor did I again suffer from them on this trip, 

 even when at considerably higher elevations, beyond the usual 

 feeling of extra weight and lassitude about the legs, and the 



