Horse Thieves Again. 



them on the edge of the pine forest. During the night an attempt 

 was made to stampede our horses, but it met with no success, 

 for we pursued the would-be thieves, and they, doubtless sup- 

 posing us to be armed to the teeth, took to flight, preferring not 

 to risk an untimely fate at the hands of the exasperated ones 

 from out of the back of beyond. All the horses were on parade 

 the following morning, so I marched at 8 o'clock for the Agiass 

 Valley, now only some twenty miles further east. If anything, 

 the going was more up and down than it had been the previous 

 day, but it was certainly very picturesque country, well stocked 

 with pine and fir, and the usual pasturage. 



A HERIJ OK HORSES IN THE THIAN SHAN. 



I again halted for a brief tiffin by the edge of a tiny rivulet, 

 some Kazaks in an aul near by providing milk, which Manas Bai, 

 the man I had brought with me thus far, boiled, and I enjoyed 

 some cocoa. I camped the night by some auls down in a nullah off 

 the path I had been following from Kok Terek, and not far from 

 the Muntai stream, here emerging from the hills and joining the 

 Tekkes River out in the valley to the north. The ponies I then 

 had with me were a poor lot, and quite done up with march- 

 ing, work to which they were not accustomed at this season of 

 the year, when the herds are usually turned out to graze. 



205 



