"If you go another step we will cut off your head, or you will have to cut off ours!" cried two or three others, stretching their bare necks toward me. "_Taptih middu_" (I have not got a small knife), I replied, quite seriously, and with assumed disappointment, twirling my hand in the air in Tibetan fashion. The Tibetans did not know what to make of me. When I moved toward the pass, on which hundreds of flying-prayers flapped in the wind, I politely bade them good-bye with tongue out, and waving both my hands, palms upward, in front of my forehead in the most approved Tibetan style. The soldiers took off their caps and humbly saluted us by going down on their knees and putting their heads close to the ground. We crossed the plain, and slowly wended our way up the pass. Near the top we came to a track, the highway from Ladak to Lhassa _via_ Gartok, along the northern side of the Rakastal, Mansarowar, and Gunkyo lakes. On the pass itself were planted several poles connected by ropes, from which flying-prayers waved gayly in the breeze. _Obos_, or mounds of stones, had been erected. The slabs used in the construction of these _obos_ were mostly white, and bore in many instances the inscription "_Omne mani padme hun_." Yak, goat, and sheep skulls were laid by the side of the _obos_, the above four words being engraved on the bone, and stained red with the blood of the animals killed. Sacrifices are offered by Tibetans when crossing a high pass, especially if there is a Lama close at hand to commemorate the event. The meat of the animal killed is eaten by the people present. If the party is a large one, dancing and singing follow the feast. _Obos_ are found all over the country, generally on passes or summits of hills. No Tibetan ever goes by one of these _obos_ without depositing on it a white stone. CHAPTER XVI FIRST WHITE MAN IN THE SACRED PROVINCE The Maium Pass (17,500 feet), as far as which no white man had ever penetrated, is a great landmark in Tibet. Not only does one of the sources of the great Tsangpu, or Brahmaputra River, rise on its south-east slopes, but it also separates the immense provinces of Nari-Khorsum (extending west of the Maium Pass and comprising the mountainous and lake region as far as Ladak) from the Yutzang, the central province of Tibet, stretching east of the pass along the valley of the Brahmaputra and having Lhassa for its capital. The word _yu_ in Tibetan means "middle." It is applied to this province because it occupies the centre of Tibet. To the north of the Maium lies the Doktol province. I had taken a reconnoitring trip to another pass to the north-east of us, and had just returned to my men on the Maium Pass, when several of the Tibetan soldiers we had left behind rode up toward us. We waited for them. Their leader, pointing at the valley beyond the pass, cried: "That yonder is the Lhassa territory, and we forbid you to enter it!"