Nyenyam, though more squalid and evil-smelling than any place in my experience, is of some importance as being the last Tibetan town before the frontier of Nepal is reached. It is well placed on a level terrace above the junction of the Poe Chu with an almost equally big river flowing from the glaciers of the great mountain mass of Gosainthan. Immediately below the town the river enters the stupendous gorge that cuts through the heart of the Himalaya to the more open country of Nepal, 8,000 feet below. To the West of Nyenyam rises a great range of mountains culminating in the beautiful peaks of Gosainthan, which we had hoped to visit, and somewhere to the East lay the mysterious sacred mountain of Lapche Kang. Our friends the Jongpens assured us that there was no direct route to Lapche, that we must go back the way by which we had come, and so on; but we were weary of their obstructions and made up our minds to find a way to the holy places. So far our transport animals had been the yak, or the cross-bred ox-yak, a stronger beast; we were now going through country where only coolies could carry loads. We retraced our steps a few miles up the valley to a village ruled over by a friendly woman, the widow of the late headman. True, she demanded for the coolies an exorbitant wage, which we cut down by about a half, but she pressed into our service every able-bodied person in the neighbourhood, young and old, men and women. They have a fair and simple way of apportioning the loads. All Tibetans, men and women alike, wear long rope-soled boots with woollen cloth tops extending toward the knee, where they are secured by garters, long strips of narrow woven cloth. When all the loads are ready, each person takes off one garter and gives it to the headman, who shuffles them well and in his turn hands them over to some neutral person who knows not the ownership of the garters. He lays one on the top of each load, and whose garter it is must carry the load without any further talk. It is amusing to watch the excitement in their faces as the garters are dealt out, and to hear the shrieks of delight of the lucky ones and the groans of the less fortunate. It makes one feel weak and ashamed to see a small girl of apparently no more than fourteen years shouldering a huge tent or an unwieldy box, until one remembers that they begin to carry almost as soon as they can walk and are accustomed to far heavier loads than ever they carry for us.