276 WANDERINGS OF A 



gether with the oppression and sense of weariness consequent 

 on the elevation, soon obliged us to give up the chase. 

 Young fired at a herd of kiangs, which he calculated was 

 about 200 yards off, but found afterwards that they had been 

 nearly double that distance. There is unquestionably an 

 ocular deception on these plains, for I have been told by 

 hunters that at such high altitudes objects look much nearer 

 than they are in reality. Possibly the clear and cloudless 

 atmosphere may be the cause ; however, it is a fact that 

 sportsmen in these regions, at first, very seldom calculate dis- 

 tances correctly. One of our servants, a native of Koloo, 

 who had visited Chinese Tartary, assured us that he saw there 

 a kiang used as a beast of burden ; however, all the natives we 

 interrogated in Ladakh denied the possibility of any approach 

 at domestication, and that the young always died in confine- 

 ment. The chief food of this species appears to consist of the 

 stunted fescue grasses common on the plains and mountains, 

 together with a red-flowered vetch, possibly Oxytropis chilio- 

 phylla of Hooker.* The speed of the kiang is great. I did 

 not see it gallop : its action seems to consist of a long step 

 or trot, which is never varied. I was surprised to see the 

 agility with which a herd bounded down a steep hillside. 



The Tooskee Lake is about two miles long and half-a-mile 

 in breadth; its waters are higUy impregnated with soda. 

 No fish were obtained in the lake nor in the fresh-water 

 streams which run into it. I procured specimens of Tem- 

 mincFs sand-piper and the little sand-lark, both of which were 

 common along the shore. Halkett's mountain-barometer 

 made the lake 15,000 feet above the sea-level. This is pro- 

 bably a little under the mark. The hills around are said to 

 abound with large game ; but although I tried to ascend one 



* Himalayan Journals, vol. ii. 164. 



