A chatter of conversation goes on, the neighbors drift in and out, and those of our _gir_, as the evening wears on, make excursions to the other huts and exhibit and drink more muddy tea for politeness’ sake. The hostess in each tent shakes your hand before feeding you. The formality makes you temporarily one of the tribe and family, to be treated with courtesy and hospitality. Thus you are taken into the social life of a simple affectionate people. We meet in one hut a traveling friar who has tramped sturdily from Tibet, pack on back and prayer-beads on arm, begging, praying, selling relics claiming to cure rheumatism, and the eye-diseases which the smoky huts induce. He carries on a pole an image of Gumbo and others of the _dokchits_, together with a hodge-podge collection of rosaries, strips of silk, bells, beads, pipe-picks, etc. These are jingled during parts of his prayer, where it is necessary to keep the god attentive. [Illustration: A MONGOL “BLACK MAN”] In one hut they are playing the age-old game of _tawarya_. A bag is produced containing hundreds of sheep’s-knuckles, colored blue. Everybody gets a handful. Then a girl holds out her fistful of them, and each man guesses the number. There is a rapid fire of shouted numerals,--“_niger, hayur, urbu, durbu!_” The one who guesses correctly gets the handful of knuckles. This person next holds out his fistful, and so it goes. It is an uproarious sport, interspersed with quite unnecessary grabbings of disputed handfuls,--part of the game that Amagallan is playing, even if not germane to _tawarya_. Finally through the darkness you make your way back to the _gir_ in which you are billeted. The wreathing smoke from its dome is illuminated to-night by the beams from the fire below. It rises in dimly bright convolutions, beautiful in its small way as the great Northern Lights. You spread your felt on the floor of the tent and roll up in your rugs. The teamster needs a timepiece to regulate his hour of harnessing, for you must start at daybreak. Leave your watch for him on the altar of the _dokchits_. It will be safe in this hut by the desert of Gobi, among the remnant of the Golden Horde. * * * * * The days’ marches have taken us well up among the ridges of the Kentei Mountains. To the eastward is the peak which, despite the claims of Urga’s Holy Mountain and of a site near Tibet, has the best authority for being the burying-place of Genghis Khan.