The Wonderful Mekong 147 
furnace in the room allotted to me that some of my clothes 
were burned and I was soon driven outside by the heat, 
and compelled to have supper on the roof. All night long 
it poured with rain, and shortly after starting on the fol- 
lowing morning we were as wet as ever. 
A few miles below, our stream entered the Chianca 
river not far south of Phula, and here our soldier left us to 
return to his home, while we, with another Tibetan lord as 
escort, followed down the Chianca river in a southerly 
direction. 
Gradually the valley deepened and high sandstone 
bluffs appeared here and there, one of which was decorated 
with a number of ancient Buddhist carvings of unknown 
antiquity; but unlike the high plateau valleys which only 
offer facilities for grazing, and are occupied by a nomadic 
pastoral people, there was here plenty of cultivation on the 
steep slopes. 
My second soldier proved willing to go to even greater 
lengths in my service than the first had done, for a certain 
woman having made some trouble about changing ponies, 
he rode straight at her with uplifted whip, prepared to lay 
it across her bare shoulders, a chastisement which she 
escaped by dashing into the house. 
For the second time I interfered, and dismounting, took 
the whip from him and threatened to beat him with it if he 
did not behave—though I am bound to confess that this 
was more because I wanted the whip myself than because 
I disapproved of his action. 
On general principles I consider it neither expedient 
nor of the slightest use for a traveller to interfere blindly 
with native customs, and I am sure the woman was far 
more astonished to see me tackle the headman than she 
would have been to feel the whip across her shoulders. 
Also I doubtless made myself very unpopular with the 
other villagers, who resent any form of interference with 
their ruling class. However I secured the whip, a very 
nice leather one, though I gave the man a rupee for it 
afterwards. 
Next day we recrossed the watershed between the 
Chianca river and the Mekong; quite a short climb, for we 
reached the latter river early in the afternoon. The weather 
I0o—2 
