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214 ADVENTURES IN TIBET.
ever spoke. He might very easily have passed for a convict,
but if he ever had been a rogue he successfully concealed
the fact. At all events, during the time he was with me,
his conduct was irreproachable. On the present occasion,
he, like the other men, was too tired to wash the corpse
as Mohammedan custom requires. The burial was the
simplest I have ever been present at. One of Aldat’s
skin-coats was placed under him, the other above him, and
he was buried with his clothes on, and his cap and his
boots. There were no ceremonies, no tears, no prayers,
save those I silently breathed for the eternal peace of
the dead man. After the grave was filled in an oblong
mound was made above it, and at the head end we fixed
a tent spar, fastening to the top of it one of Aldat’s own
hunting trophies, namely, a yak’s tail, according to a
custom common amongst the Mussulmans. Then on a
flat piece of wood I engraved, in Arabic and Latin letters,
the dead man’s name, together with the date and my own
name, in case destiny should lead any wanderer there before
all traces of the grave have disappeared.
Next morning the caravan was ready earlier than usual,
but just before we started the Mussulmans gathered at
the grave side and murmured a silent dua or " farewell
prayer," and so Aldat was left to his fate in the dreary
solitudes of Tibet.
The nearer we approached the Arka-tagh the more
desolate grew the highlands. One day Cherdon and I,
riding on in advance, crossed over a range that was 17,070
feet high, and when we stopped at dusk to wait for the
others, it was in a region where there was not a blade of
grass of any description. The caravan straggled up in
small detachments, utterly wearied out. A white horse,
which we had brought from Yanghi-kol, had been left
behind in a hopeless condition, while two camels and
another horse had something the matter with their eyes,
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