SPITI VALLEY, &c. 247 



They are remarkable for size, and the quality of their wool and flesh, 

 and a long and very small black head, with legs and feet of the same 

 colour. These immense animals are used for the transport of grain, 

 salt, tincal, &c. &c. Tliey pasture upon the leafless plains of Chumurti, 

 and the high table land, all along the forks of the Indus, being 

 indigenous to the whole of Thibet from the limit of Yarkand to the 

 east of Lhassa. They come down in vast flocks to Sp'iti in the autumn 

 for grain, but though here in a tract of country arid and desolate to the 

 last degree, they cannot be reared with any advantage. In the deserts 

 occupied by the Nomade tribes, both the animal and its fleece reach a 

 finer standard, and there the climate is drier, and vegetable productions 

 more scanty. Horses alone undergo the transition from their elevated 

 pastures, but they lose the woolly covering that invests the roots of their 

 long hair: the wild animal has never been domesticated in any situation. 

 Both would appear a priori to have a common origin, yet the circumstance 

 of their eluding every attempt to tame them when caught, and their uniform 

 speckled colour of fawn and white, and their wild agility, demonstrate 

 them to be distinct species. 



The inhabitants of Spil'i aff"ord even ampler traits of distinction than 

 the animals ; a community of condition arising from individual penury has 

 generated reciprocal ties of social attachment. Though poor in those 

 resources which denote easy existence, there is nevertheless a degree of 

 comfort in the necessaries of life amongst the lowest classes unknown to the 

 natives of the southward hills, where indolence and insulated habits have 

 alienated those feelings of concord which make even poverty agreeable. 



The common repast of the Thihelans consists of a greasy soup, called 

 Lappi, and buttered tea: anim;il ibod is also natiiially ahiiiulant in 

 a region where pasturinu ilocks arc almost in a state of nature, and in 

 every house may be seen the diicd carcasses of sheep ami yaks, and skins 



