208 Through the Land of the Cross-bow 
occasion to do so would have struck them as so entirely 
novel a proceeding that they would have spent quite a 
long time explaining elaborately that as we required food 
and happened to have found it in a deserted hut, and as no 
one was there to accept payment in return, the only just and 
reasonable course was to take what we could find and be 
thankful ; and furthermore that the villagers would be only 
too pleased and proud to give the English excellency what- 
ever he required—and incidentally of course whatever his 
men required also. The uneducated Chinaman can never 
see further than the end of his nose; sufficient for the day 
is the profit thereof. 
We had not proceeded fifty yards from the hut when I 
remarked that one of the soldiers was carrying in his hand 
a copper kettle, which, though I had never previously 
noticed it as part of his personal luggage, looked strangely 
familiar. Feeling suspicious, I asked him where it came from, 
and somewhat crestfallen, he replied that he had brought 
it away from the hut. I was so annoyed at this brazen 
confession that I hit him in the face with my fist, where- 
upon clumsily tripping over his rifle he fell ina heap to the 
ground, and lay like a half-empty sack of corn, bleeding 
from a cut lip. I now ordered him to take it back to the 
hut immediately, and convinced that he would only help 
himself to something else by way of compensation if he 
could, I escorted him myself, prodding him in the back 
with my gun and threatening to shoot him if he ever did 
such a thing again. Meanwhile he was plaintively apolo- 
gising for his conduct and making ridiculous excuses, the 
chief of which was that he did not think I would mind! 
It was indeed owing to this very fact that the soldiers 
always endeavoured to take advantage of the immunity 
which they fondly imagined my presence gave them to get 
something for nothing, that I refused escorts on every 
possible occasion when travelling amongst the Tibetans 
and tribesmen. The Tibetans, I believe, hate and fear 
the Chinese soldier, and consequently look with suspicion 
upon anyone travelling under his protection ; the Chinaman 
in turn fears the Tibetan, man to man, but he also despises 
him, and lets slip no opportunity of showing it. 
A tribesman would hate me far less for looting his 
