CHAPTER VIII. 



Pack -ponies gone astray; replaced by Camels from the Kirghis — 

 Again in the Happy Valley — More Stalking — Letters at Last 

 Weather breaks up — Kosh-Agatch Plain — Antelope — Our Bag — 

 Start for Bashkaous Valley — Shooting Wild Fowl on the Kosh- 

 Agatch Steppe — My Wife kills a Wild Swan with the Rifle — In the 

 Altai Woodlands — Pine, Larch, and Birch — After Maral and Roe- 

 deer — Grayling Fishing in the Bashkaous River — The Zaissan's 

 Home — Kara Kodjur Stream — Unsuccessful Approaches — Wild 

 Scenery— Sorry-Kol Lake — Tracks of Maral and Moose— Littledale 

 Shoots a good Roe-buck — Our Camp at Vulientash— Absence of 

 Deer — September 6th — General Retreat to Ongoudai — Meeting with 

 Major Wissmann — Homeward Bound. 



Late in the morning of August 9th we struck camp. 

 The cause of delay was that eight of our pack-ponies 

 had somehow gone astray, and with this bad news 

 our demitcha met us as we stepped out of our tents. 

 His report implied that they might have been stolen 

 during the night by the Kirghiz, who, he said, were 

 addicted to such proceedings. Our opinion, however, 

 was that the Kalmuks themselves had concealed 

 them with the view of making us pay for them. The 

 demitcha, though an energetic man in every way, 

 who kept his followers in thorough good order, had 

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