124 On the Road to Batang— 
Evremurus chinensis, sending up tall spikes of densely-packed 
white flowers from a rosette of bayonet-like leaves. 
Gan-ton and I were in excellent spirits as we rode along 
the narrow winding path by the light of the young moon, 
and in spite of nearly fourteen hours in the saddle he began 
to talk of Lhasa, five weeks’ journey west of us, and asked 
whether I would like to go there! Down below in the 
darkness the river could be heard booming over the rocks, 
and the raging wind from the south grew stronger and 
stronger, though it did little to cool our parched skins. 
At last after the moon had set, we saw lights ahead, and 
going now very slowly in the darkness we came upon a 
group of houses and quickly gained admittance. Every- 
body was asleep round the dying fire in the big kitchen, 
but Gan-ton turned them out, and they gave me a room 
and some hot milk, blinking and rubbing their eyes as the 
pine torches fizzled and blazed up. I turned in soon after- 
wards, but finding the sudden heat rather trying, I had no 
difficulty in getting up at half-past three next morning, when 
the air outside was deliciously cool. 
We were off at five, at which hour the deep valley was 
slowly filling with a sickly grey light ; the wind, which had 
gone on increasing in violence till midnight had then ceased 
abruptly, and everything was very still. The size of the 
Yang-tze now impressed me greatly; the Salween and 
Mekong looked puny compared with the storm of water 
which came smashing down over some immense boulders 
where a heavy landslip had choked its bed. In winter the 
river would certainly shrink a great deal, but even so its 
source must be many hundreds of miles from here, and it 
is undoubtedly as regards length the first river in Asia. 
Arid as the valley was, the herbaceous vegetation seemed 
richer than in the Salween and Mekong gorges. Species 
of Androsace, Eremurus, Allium and other Liliaceae, two 
species of C/lematzs, one a small erect shrub with white 
flowers (C. Delavayz), the other a twiner, but often growing 
erect or procumbent on the sand dunes where no support 
was available (C. splendens), were common, in addition to 
other plants peculiar to these semi-desert valleys. 
There being no rope bridges over the Yang-tze, we 
crossed in a big scow propelled by clumsy oars and a huge 
