56 A-tun-tsi 
other shrubs maintaining the fight against drought, but 
there was at this season hardly anything in flower, a few 
Crassulas being all I noticed. The rosettes of Se/agznella 
envolvens grew in their thousands, most of them rolled up 
into balls like hedgehogs, showing the shimmering under- 
surface of their leaves, and the fern Chezlanthes farinosa, 
with leaves brilliantly silvered on the under-surface and 
also capable of curling up, was conspicuous. 
Looked at from a distance the arid valley now presented 
a series of desert mountain slopes and spurs, only relieved 
by an occasional oasis of green wheat-fields and shady 
walnut trees, from behind which peeped out here and there 
big white houses. These oases occur wherever a mountain 
torrent has built out an alluvial fan capable of being suc- 
cessfully irrigated, since there is practically no water avail- 
able for crops other than that brought down by the streams, 
which are few and far apart. 
During the halt for lunch on the third day an old 
Tibetan came out from the village, and besought me to go 
in and attend to a child who was very sick. I must admit 
I did not like prescribing for babies of such tender years. 
But the poor people had always such obvious faith in my 
powers, and begged so hard for help, bringing me eggs 
and milk as presents, and thanking me on their knees 
whenever I did anything for them, that to refuse seemed 
more cruel than to do the wrong thing. 
I found the baby, who was only three years of age and 
looked less, lying naked on a bundle of filthy rags in one 
corner of the spacious room, which however, being almost 
devoid of windows, was very dark. A number of men and 
women squatted round the fire in the middle, talking and 
eating. Never shall I forget the awful sight presented by 
the child as he lay limply on his back, his tiny fists clenched, 
his mouth half open. Naked did I say? This was hardly 
true, for asa matter of fact he was almost clothed with flies, 
which buzzed round in their hundreds as we approached. 
I counted five inside the child’s mouth alone, yet he seemed 
absolutely indifferent to what would have driven a white 
child crazy in half an hour. The room, indeed, swarmed 
with flies, for it was a hot day, and the filthy state in which 
these people live and keep their houses attracts millions of 
