THE YAK 301 



tablelands. From the bison like head of the animal spring 

 two horns, often each a yard long and with a girth of 

 eighteen inches at the base. It is a short-legged, massive, 

 shaggily-clothed animal, the black, silky hair being longest 

 on its shoulders, flanks, and thighs, ending in a bushy 

 white tail like that of a horse. In India the Yak's tail is 

 called a ' chowry/ and as a fly-switch it invariably figures 

 largely in the great ceremonial processions of the East. 



The wild Yak wanders about the desolate mountain 

 regions in herds of from ten to a hundred. It delights in 

 cold, and will thrive on the rough, wiry pasturage which 

 is obtainable at even an elevation of 20,000 feet. The 

 Tibetans are extremely jealous of the few foreign sportsmen 

 who enter their sterile country, and forbid the hunting of 

 the Yak under severe penalties. The French travellers, 

 Hue and Gabet, once encountered a herd of wild animals 

 that had been frozen in the ice while crossing a river. Only 

 the heads of the poor dead beasts appeared above the 

 glassy surface. If this animal tragedy had been followed 

 by a landslip, the preserved bodies of the Yaks might have 

 been dug up ages afterwards, just as in the case of the 

 mammoth remains in the north of the continent. 



The domesticated Yak is an animal of the greatest 

 economic importance in the Himalayan regions. It is the 

 only beast of burden that can traverse those high altitudes, 

 and it forms really the sole means of communication 

 between India and Tibet. In a temperature where quick- 

 silver freezes, along mountain tracks covered deep in snow, 

 the loaded Yaks, surefooted as goats, scramble along un- 

 complainingly where camels and horses would lie down 

 and die. Even when one of the beasts slips from the 

 treacherous path and rolls down the mountain-side it will 

 recover itself and clamber back to its companions. One 

 great disadvantage is that the Yak will not eat grain. For 

 the use of the pack-animals a large amount of fodder must 

 be carried, or a party has to go ahead to collect the 

 mountain pasturage that is perhaps far removed from the 

 sterile, rocky passes which form the only available roads. 



The Yak is sometimes crossed with ordinary cattle, and 

 the half-breeds are able to endure the heat of some of the 



