"If you will not come with me I cannot be responsible for you to the Governor. He has ridden day and night to talk with you. I beg you to come with me." "If Kamba Bombo has anything to say to us, he is welcome. We ask nothing from him, only to travel to Lhasa as peaceful pilgrims." Two hours later the Tibetans came back again in a long dark line of horsemen, the Governor riding on a large white mule in their midst. His retinue consisted of officials, priests, and officers in red and blue cloaks carrying guns, swords, and lances, wearing turbans or light-coloured hats, and riding on silver-studded saddles. When they came up, carpets and cushions were spread on the ground, and on these Kamba Bombo took his seat. I went out to him and invited him into our poor tent, where he occupied the seat of honour, a maize sack. He might be forty years old, looked merry and jovial, but also pale and tired. When he took off his long red cloak and his _bashlik_, he appeared in a splendid dress of yellow Chinese silk, and his boots were of green velvet. The interview began at once, and each of us did his best to talk the other down. The end of the matter was a clear declaration on his part that if we tried to move a step in the direction of Lhasa our heads should be cut off, no matter who we were. We did our best, both that day and the next, to get this decision altered, but it was no use and we had to yield to superior force. So we turned back on the long road through dreary Tibet, and eventually regained our headquarters in safety. THE TASHI LAMA Thus it was that we came back to the little town of Leh, the capital of Ladak, and again saw the winter caravans which come over the lofty mountains from Eastern Turkestan on their way with goods to Kashmir. Then several years passed, but in August, 1906, I was once more in Leh, having travelled (as has been described) across Europe to Constantinople, over the Black Sea, through Persia and Baluchistan, then by rail to Rawalpindi, in a tonga to Kashmir, and lastly on horseback to Leh. On this occasion the caravan consisted of twenty-seven men and nearly a hundred mules and horses, besides thirty hired horses, which were to turn back when the provisions they carried had been consumed. Our course lay over the lofty mountains in northern Tibet, and for eighty-one days we did not see a single human being. But when we turned off to the right and came to more southern districts of the country, we met with Tibetan hunters and nomads, from whom we purchased tame yaks and sheep, for the greater part of our animals had perished owing to the rarefied air, the poor and scanty pasture, and the cold and the wind. The temperature had on one occasion fallen as low as 40 deg. below zero.