96 Through the Lutzu Country to Men-kong 
wild and lifeless. We did not reach our destination till 
nine o'clock, but it was a brilliant star-lit night, delightfully 
warm. 
La-kor-ah consists of three huts and a temple, in the 
shadow of which the tent was pitched. It was a sanctified 
spot, and dozens of prayer-flags made it look larger than 
it really was, while on each side of the temple stood a row 
of big leather prayer-drums, much the worse for wear, 
containing probably hundreds of yards of the everlasting 
prayer. Each passer-by set them revolving one by one, 
the rusty spindles groaning fearfully in their sockets. 
Immediately below, a grey glacier torrent came booming 
through a deep sword-cut in the mountains and sweeping 
down into the mighty Salween was instantly engulfed in 
a surge of yellow waters. Up this narrow rift lay the 
pilgrims’ road to sacred Doker-la. Here Gan-ton learnt 
from the residents that the French traveller M. Bacot was 
at Men-kong with a large number of mules, and I looked 
forward to meeting him; but in this country one rarely 
hears the truth of a story the first time of asking. 
Next day’s march through a terribly arid and totally 
uninhabited stretch of the valley was a tiring one, though 
the track was surprisingly good. The river swept in huge 
S-shaped curves round colossal buttresses, smashed its way 
through deep gorges, and roared over the boulders. Im- 
mense screes, sometimes smoking with the dust of falling 
rocks, rose bare and lifeless on either hand, and the ceaseless 
scorching wind, which seemed to suck the vitality from 
everything, blew throughout the day with ever-increasing 
violence. Once in crossing a scree, I narrowly escaped 
being hurled into the river by a small avalanche, but 
hearing a peculiar noise I glanced upwards in time to see 
a cloud of rocks whizzing through the air, whereupon I 
turned and ran, reaching safety just as they hummed past. 
Under that incandescent sky, stretched like a tongue 
of fire up the valley, the place became an oven, but the 
mountains to east and west were as usual buried in cloud. 
However from the village of Chia-na we watched the sun 
sink in a wild blaze of colour behind Men-kong, now only 
a few miles distant. Above Chia-na a narrow stony valley 
to the east led to another pass across the watershed. The 
