SUDDEN CHANGE OF TEMPERATURE. 445 



shop, every available tent-rope being hung with long strips of 

 raw meat drying in the sun. Cooking, too, was going on at a 

 great rate, there being an unusual amount of fuel about here 

 suitable for the purpose in the shape of a scrubby bush called 

 dama. Indeed the table-lands lying between here and the 

 Lai Daka were more scattered over with a scrubby sort of 

 vegetation than any other locality I had visited in Hundes. 

 Towards evening the sky, which had been cloudless since the 

 slight snowstorm we had experienced at Tazang, became over- 

 cast, and a shower of rain fell, which raised the temperature 

 in a most sudden and remarkable manner so much so that I 

 could dispense with many of my warm wraps at night. Just 

 after I had turned in to bed, a messenger arrived with a note 

 a surprising event in these inhospitable wilds. The epistle 

 was from a son of the late Mr F. Wilson (of Himalayan 

 hunting celebrity), intimating that he had just come over the 

 Chor Hoti pass, and that his baggage-animals being unable to 

 get as far as my camp that night, he (in a true sportsman-like 

 spirit) had therefore sent on a messenger to ask me the direc- 

 tion of my beat next day, in order that he might not interfere 

 by hunting over it. In reply, I told him I was leaving this 

 ground next morning, but hoped to see him at breakfast 

 before I started. Another note, however, arrived in his stead, 

 telling me that as the Tibetans had allowed him only seven 

 days in their territory, he was making the most of his short 

 time in hunting, and so was unable to come. My time would 

 in all probability have been equally limited had it not been 

 for the revolver I had presented to the Jongpen of Dapa, and 

 the whisky with which I had propitiated his messengers. 



As we intended hunting over the ground along our daily 

 stages towards the pass, they were necessarily made rather 

 short. The first day no game was seen, but a shot heard on 

 the ground we had left told of Wilson having found some- 

 thing there. Our camp was reached just in time to escape a 

 tremendous storm of hail, accompanied by much thunder and 



