994 
THROUGH ASIA 
with them, except the three whom I had dismissed and 
given permission to return. The leader of the gang, 
a fellow about forty years of age, who had plotted the 
flight, was made to walk the whole way to camp, with his 
hands tied behind his back. 
It vras ten o’clock at night when the runaways, guarded 
by Islam of Keriya, arrived in camp, and my property 
was restored to me. But that did not give me back the 
two valuable days we had lost, and which we could ill 
afford to lose. 1 he leader of the Taghliks was brought 
forward to my tent, and the other culprits were made 
to stand in a semicircle behind him. I charged him with 
being a thief, and told him that, if he had fallen into 
the hands of a Chinese amban under circumstances 
similar to those in which he then stood, things would 
go queer with him. To teach him that neither he nor 
any other man could treat a European in the shameful 
way he had done, I adjudged that he should receive a 
dozen strokes of the rod, but not severe strokes, although 
my other men were urgent that he should get a good 
sound drubbing. Moreover I condemned the thieves to 
atone for their treacherous conduct by work, to be bound 
every night until we felt we could trust them, to pay 
Parpi, Hamdan, and Islam the three days’ wages they 
had lost, to accompany us as far as I thought fit to take 
them, and when I at length dismissed them, the payment 
they were to receive should depend entirely upon my good 
will, and upon how they had behaved themselves in the 
interval. 
It was a picturesque scene, that night court among the 
desolate mountains. The men stood silently round the 
tent-opening, wearing their furs, under the faint light of 
the moon and the gleam of my candle. It was no pleasure 
to me to be obliged to punish them. But they fully de- 
served punishment, and that it did them good was proved 
by their subsequent conduct, which was irreproachable. 
Both animals and men, that had taken part in the flight 
and pursuit, were of course completely exhausted by their 
forced marches, so that we were compelled to sacrifice yet 
