CHAPTER XXII.

NAKO AND THE

NAKOWALLAH.

A MOUNTAIN POOL-PLEASURES OF CAMP-LIFE-A STRANGE FEELING INCLEMENT WEATHER FOOD — TIBETAN APPETITESHOUSES A WONDERFUL DOG-A REINCARNATION-PART FROM BRUDER PAGELL-CHANGO-SPITI MINSTRELS—LEAVE KUNAWAR -ITS CHARACTERISTICS-ITS PATHS.

AT Nako we camped close to the village, on the grassy bank of a small lake. The other side of this lake was lined with large poplar and willow trees, and in so desolate a region the place appeared exceedingly beautiful. Elsewhere it might not have appeared so striking; but there is nothing like slow difficult travelling and tentlife, or camping out, for enabling one to appreciate the scenery. I particularly felt this to be the case in the upper parts of Kashmir, where not only the scene of each night's encampment, but even every turn of the beautiful wooded valleys, was deeply impressed upon my memory. Nako is a little over 12,000 feet high; and though I had already slept at higher altitudes on the Kúng-ma Pass, the weather had become colder, and I here, for the first time, experienced a sensation which the head of the Yarkand expedition had warned me not to be afraid of. It consisted in being suddenly awakened at night by an overpowering feeling of suffocation and faintness, which one unaccustomed to it, or not warned about it, might readily mistake for the im

mediate approach of death. It is a very curious feeling -just as if the spirit were about to flit from the body; but a few more days of travelling along the line of 12,000 feet enabled me to get rid of it altogether.

At Nako we stayed two nights, and must have been in much need of a rest, for we enjoyed our stay there immensely in spite of the exceedingly inclement weather. It is in an almost rainless district, but it is occasionally visited by rain or snow, and we happened to hit on the time of one of these storms. Soon after our arrival about mid-day the thermometer sank to 50°, and next morning was at 47°, and rain fell, or chill raw mists swept over us. Occasionally the clouds would clear away, showing the mountain above us white with newfallen snow down to within a few hundred feet of our tent; and this sort of weather continued during the period of our stay at this highly elevated village. At night it was intensely cold; the wind carried the rain into our frail abodes wherever it could find admission; and though the canvas of our tents did not admit the wet exactly, yet it was in a very damp state, which added to the coolness of the interior.

Nevertheless we felt quite at home, and our servants also enjoyed themselves much. They amused themselves with various athletic games; and, to my astonishment, I found Silas, who had spent all his life within the tropics, swimming across the lake, which was a most dangerous thing to do, owing to the almost icy coldness of the water and the number of tangled weeds which it contained. This, and our general cheerfulness, said a great deal for the beneficial effects of high mountain air, and of a nourishing diet of milk, mutton, game, and wheat or barley flour, so superior to the rice, curries, vegetables, and pulse, with which the people of India. delight to stuff themselves. The piles of chuppattis, or girdle-cakes, which my servants baked for themselves,

were enormous; so were their draughts of milk; and I supplied them with a great deal of mutton, which they did not undervalue.

The people of all the Tibetan - speaking countries also eat enormously. They always had something before starting, however early the hour might be; and whenever we halted for a little on the way, they took out their suttú, or roasted barley flour, and if there happened to be any water accessible, kneaded this flour into large balls about the size of a cricket-ball, and so ate it with great gusto. On halting for the day, which was most usually about three in the afternoon, while the men assisted us in pitching the tents and making other arrangements, the women immediately fell to work in making chuppattis and preparing great pots of tea-broth, into which they put salt, butter, flour, sometimes even meat, and, in fact, almost anything. eatable which turned up. After they had done with this, the whole of their afternoons and evenings appeared to be spent in eating and supping, varied occasionally by singing or a wild dance. Sometimes they prolonged their feasting late into the night; and it was a mystery to me where all the flesh they consumed came from, until I observed that the Himalaya are very rich in the carcasses of sheep and goats which have been killed by exposure or by falling rocks. All this eating enables the Tibetans to carry enormous burdens, and to make long marches up and down their terrible mountains. Among the rice-eating Kashmirians I noticed that large-bodied, strong enough looking young men were grievously oppressed, and soon knocked up, by burdens which Tibetan women could have carried gaily along far more difficult paths, and which their husbands would have thought nothing of. But even in Tibet the heaviest burden did not always go to the strongest bearer. A very common way was

for my bigárrís to engage in a game of chance the night before starting, and so settle the order of selecting packages. Occasionally the strongest men used their strength in order to reserve for themselves the lightest burdens. I noticed also, as an invariable rule, that the worst carriers, those who had the most need of husbanding their breath, were always the most talkative and querulous, while the best were either silent or indulged only in brief occasional exclamations.

The houses I had met with hitherto had all slated roofs; but at Nako, as all through Spiti, and also in Zanskar, thorn bushes were thickly piled on the roofs, and in some cases actually constituted the only roofs there were except beams. This is done to preserve the wood below, and it probably does, from the effects of the sun in so dry a climate; and it must also assist in keeping out the cold; but it gives the houses a peculiar furzy look, and denies the people the great privilege of using the top of the house beneath their own as an addendum to their own abode. I purchased at this village a pretty large shaggy white dog, of a breed which is common all over China. We called it Nako, or the Nakowallah, after the place of its birth; and never did poor animal show such attachment to its native village. It could only be managed for some days by a long stick which was fastened to its collar, as it did not do to let it come into close contact with us because of its teeth. In this vile durance, and even after it had got accustomed to us, and could be led by a chain, it was continually sighing, whining, howling, growling, and looking piteously in the direction in which it supposed its birthplace to be. Even when we were hundreds of miles away from Nako, it no sooner found its chain loose than it immediately turned on its footsteps and made along the path we had just traversed, being apparently under the impression that it

was only a day's journey from its beloved village. It had the utmost dread of running water, and had to be carried or forced across all bridges and fords. No dog, of whatever size, could stand against it in fight, for our Chinese friend had peculiar tactics of its own which took its opponents completely by surprise. When it saw another dog, and was unchained, it immediately rushed straight at the other dog, butted it over and seized it by the throat or some equally tender place before the enemy could gather itself together. Yet Nako became a most affectionate animal, and was an admirable watch. It never uttered a sound at night when any stranger came near it, but quietly pinned him by the calf of the leg, and held on there in silence until some one it could trust came to the relief. The Nakowallah was a most curious mixture of simplicity, ferocity, and affectionateness. I left him with a lady at Peshawar, to whose little girls he took at once, in a gentle and playful manner; but when I said "Goodbye, Nako," he divined at once that I was going to desert him; he leaped on his chain and howled and wailed. I should not at all wonder if a good many dogs were to be met with in heaven, while as many human beings were made to reappear as pariahs on the plains of India.

Above Nako there is a small Lama monastery, and all the way up to it-a height of about 600 feet-there are terraced fields in which are grown wheat, barley, a kind of turnip, and pulse. Thus the cultivation rises here to almost 13,000 feet, and the crops are said to be very good indeed. There is some nearly level pastureground about the place, and yaks and ponies are bred in it for the trade into Chinese Tibet. The people are all Tibetans, and distinctly Tartar in feature. They are called Dúkpas, and seem to be of rather a religious turn. Accordingly they had recently been favoured by the incarnation, in a boy of their village, of the Teshú

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