160 LEH. 



had seen neither animals nor their traces throughout the 

 wide tract he had examined. 



There was no use remaining here, so I gave directions 

 for moving on to-morrow to Hemschi, a place reported to 

 be good for shikar. But we have information of a saheb 

 being there, who has come from Simla by the Roopschoo 

 road. 



After dinner Subhan and Mooktoo came to chat ; and 

 as we discussed the demerits of this miserable country, 

 Subhan hinted the advantage of a trip to the Karakorum 

 mountains on the road from Leh to Yarkand, provided 

 we could procure authentic information of the shikar 

 being as abundant there as travellers reported. A friend 

 of Mooktoo, a merchant whom he met in the Wurdwan, 

 had recommended him to take me there, assuring him that 

 animals of several kinds were not only very abundant but 

 tame. I readily entertained this project; and we re- 

 mained considering and planning a long time, all three 

 quite elated by the glowing pictures of successful sport 

 we conjured up. We set down Phuttoo as too old and 

 unsound for this arduous enterprise, strengthening this 

 disqualification by a strong suspicion we all held of his 

 bad luck, as, somehow or other, my failures always 

 take place when he is present, my successes during his 

 absence strong presumptive evidence of his kizmet not 

 being prosperous. 



I turned in, excited by the visions of the mighty 

 yaks I should encounter in this field unexplored by 

 European hunter. 



18th July. A long, tedious ascent of some six or 

 seven miles, and then a moderate descent brought us to 

 Hemschi, a straggling village in a wilderness of stones 

 covering a valley through which a stream wanders 

 to the Indus. The fields have been cleared with 



