i6 DISTURBED REST. SHIRETI-TSU. 



cloaks or sheepskin coverings, generally undressing 

 to sleep more comfortably. While asleep we were 

 warm enough, because our whole bodies, head and 

 all, were under the coverings, and we sometimes 

 added felts over all. My companion slept with 

 Faust, and was very glad of such a bedfellow. 

 Hardly a night passed quietly. Prowling wolves 

 often frightened our camels and horses, and the 

 Mongol or Chinese dogs would occasionally enter 

 the tent to steal meat, generally paying the penalty 

 of their lives for such unceremonious behaviour. 

 After such an episode, how long it was before 

 he whose turn it had been to quiet the startled 

 camels, or to shoot the wolf or thieving dog, could 

 get his blood a little warm again ! 



In the morning we all rose together, and shiver- 

 ing with cold, made haste to boil some brick tea ; 

 then we folded the tent, loaded the camels, and at 

 sunrise continued our journey in the sharp frosty air. 



One would have expected that in returning by 

 the same road we had come we should have avoided 

 many accidents, and might have reckoned before- 

 hand the length of our marches, but in this we were 

 deceived ; one more misadventure had yet to be 

 encountered. This occurred in the following way : 

 Late in the evening of the 1 2th December, we halted 

 for the night at the temple of Shireti-tsu, 53 miles 

 to the north of Kuku-khoto, on the high road 

 from that town to Uliassutai. The following morn- 

 ing all our camels, seven in number exclusive of a 

 sick one, were allowed to graze near the tent not far 



