Our first days at Tchogortan were entirely devoted to the translation of the “Book of Buddha;” but we soon found ourselves compelled to devote a portion of our time to the occupations of pastoral life. We had remarked that every evening our animals had returned half-starved, that instead of growing fatter and fatter, they were daily becoming leaner and leaner: the simple reason was that Samdadchiemba took no sort of pains to find pasturage for them. After driving them out somewhere or other, he cared not whither, he would leave them to themselves on some arid hillside, and himself go to sleep in the sun, or stroll about chattering and tea-drinking in the black tents. It was to no purpose we lectured him; he went on, just the same as before, his reckless, independent character having undergone no modification whatever. Our only mode of remedying the evil, was to turn herdsmen ourselves. Moreover, it was impossible to remain pertinaciously and exclusively men of letters when all around seemed inviting us to make some concessions to the habits of this pastoral people. The Si-Fan, or Eastern Thibetians, are nomads, like the Tartar-Mongols, and pass their lives solely occupied in the care of their flocks and herds. They do not live, however, like the Mongol tribes, in huts covered with felt. The great tents they construct with black linen, are ordinarily hexagonal in form; within you see neither column nor woodwork supporting the edifice; the six angles below are fastened to the ground with nails, and those above are supported by cords which, at a certain distance from the tent, rest horizontally on strong poles, and then slope to the ground, where they are attached to large iron rings. With all this strange complication of sticks and strings, the black tent of the Thibetian nomads bears no slight resemblance to a great spider standing motionless on its long lanky legs, but so that its great stomach is resting on the ground. The black tents are by no means comparable with the tents of the Mongols; they are not a whit warmer or more solid than ordinary travelling tents. They are very cold, on the contrary, and a strong wind knocks them down without the least difficulty. [Picture: The Long-Haired Ox]