FROM MONGTSE TO SSUMAO 



Upon the 4th (April) we crossed the river, successfully 

 accomplished, and enlivened by a difference between Chantzeu 

 (Roux's man) and his steed, which ended in the quadruped having 

 the last word. Chantzeu led off by selecting the deepest spot in the 

 stream ; the horse, after nearly losing its footing, refused the 

 opposite bank, and bore its rider back to the starting-point. Again 

 they crossed, and again fell out ; this time Chantzeu came off in mid- 

 stream, and got a most desirable ducking. But his blood was now 

 up, and he started to drag his recalcitrant mount behind him. It 

 was no good : neither blows nor kicks nor a litany of " malepis " 

 availed ; and it was only by the intervention of the others that the 

 unvanquished combatants, a queer conglomerate of two creatures, — 

 I had almost said beasts, — with but half a brain between them, were 

 towed across together on the same bridle. 



We breakfasted in the midst of a charming landscape. Pine-clad 

 hills stood round in a semicircle, with villages clinging to their 

 curves. On the mound where we were a grove protected a hut, 

 within which was an altar built of three upright stones upon a bank 

 of earth. Feathers of fowls, and bamboo tubes containing half- 

 burnt joss-sticks, were stuck before it, relics of a former sacrifice. 

 This little temple was probably the common property of the 

 several hamlets in sight. The situation was a fine one, and as 

 much by its position as by its surroundings reminded me of the 

 locality in the outskirts of Hue, where may be seen the wonderful 

 tombs of the Emperors of Annam. This pleasant scenery continued 

 on the morrow ; the mountains, bare on their eastern, were wooded 

 on their western slopes, with a stunted growth of gnarled trees, like 

 oak and chestnut, on the heights, and a ranker, semi-tropical 

 vegetation of curtained creepers in the torrent beds below. We 

 rested for the night in Po-tso, an attractive place, where the 



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