The dry sand had turned the corpse entrusted to its keeping into a yellow-brown mummy. I told Gunga Dass to stand off while I examined it. The body--clad in an olive-green hunting-suit much stained and worn, with leather pads on the shoulders--was that of a man between thirty and forty, above middle height, with light, sandy hair, long mustache, and a rough unkempt beard. The left canine of the upper jaw was missing, and a portion of the lobe of the right ear was gone. On the second finger of the left hand was a ring--a shield-shaped bloodstone set in gold, with a monogram that might have been either “B.K.” or “B.L.” On the third finger of the right hand was a silver ring in the shape of a coiled cobra, much worn and tarnished. Gunga Dass deposited a handful of trifles he had picked out of the burrow at my feet, and, covering the face of the body with my handkerchief, I turned to examine these. I give the full list in the hope that it may lead to the identification of the unfortunate man: 1. Bowl of a briarwood pipe, serrated at the edge; much worn and blackened; bound with string at the crew. 2. Two patent-lever keys; wards of both broken. 3. Tortoise-shell-handled penknife, silver or nickel, name-plate, marked with monogram “B.K.” 4. Envelope, postmark undecipherable, bearing a Victorian stamp, addressed to “Miss Mon--” (rest illegible)--“ham”--“nt.” 5. Imitation crocodile-skin notebook with pencil. First forty-five pages blank; four and a half illegible; fifteen others filled with private memoranda relating chiefly to three persons--a Mrs.L. Singleton, abbreviated several times to “Lot Single,” “Mrs. S. May,” and “Garmison,” referred to in places as “Jerry” or “Jack.” 6. Handle of small-sized hunting-knife. Blade snapped short. Buck’s horn, diamond cut, with swivel and ring on the butt; fragment of cotton cord attached. It must not be supposed that I inventoried all these things on the spot as fully as I have here written them down. The notebook first attracted my attention, and I put it in my pocket with a view of studying it later on.