Chari. vo 
A JOURNEY TO THE SALWEEN 
Tue return journey to Jsu-kou occupied just over 
three days and was uneventful. The Mekong gorge was 
becoming more and more parched now, for the warm 
summer winds were already blowing with daily increasing 
fury as the deep trench became heated up, and the cold air 
swept down from the overhanging mountains to take the 
place of that dancing up from the scorched rocks. 
The nights however were delightful. My tent was 
always pitched near some thundering torrent, which was 
music to me, and lying in bed I would watch the brilliant 
arc of the new moon set over the mountains. I was 
travelling with an w/a passport obtained from the yamen, 
my men commandeering from each village in turn the 
requisite number of animals and porters, who were bound 
to take me as far as the next village, the rate of pay 
being fixed by the yamen. This system of relay transport 
obtains on the main road across Tibet and in the Tibetan 
Marches for the convenience of Chinese officials travelling 
on business—the Tibetans, nominally in return for grants 
of land, agreeing to keep in readiness a certain number of 
transport animals at fixed posts. As far as cheapness and 
certainty of transport are concerned, the system has its 
advantages, but from other points of view it is often very 
unsatisfactory, an hour or two being sometimes wasted 
changing animals when others are not immediately avail- 
able. When this happens several times a day, it becomes 
exasperating. 
In the Mekong and Salween valleys the loads were 
generally carried by women and boys, and in all my 
