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Then they each in turn placed one hand above the other along a stick, until the end of it was reached; each man then passed it to his neighbor, who went through the same performance; a queer kind of drawing lots, common among the Shokas. Eventually the man selected by fate drew from a load a large Gourkha knife, and removed its scabbard.
Sulky and grumbling, the Shokas left the fortified corner and went below to the creek. They said they preferred sleeping down there. I suspected them. I sat up watching them and listening instead of sleeping. My Indian servant rolled himself up in his blanket, and, as usual, was soon asleep.
Among others was a Shoka trader from Buddhi, who promised to bring me, within an hour, a sufficient quantity of food to last us ten men twenty-five days. I noticed, when these men left, that two of my Shokas ran after them, and entered into an excited discussion with them. Some two or three hours later the traders returned, swearing that not an ounce of food could be obtained in the place.
I had given him one of my wrappers, but his circulation had been badly affected by the intense cold. His face was gray and cadaverous, with deep lines engraved upon it from suffering. His feet were so frozen that it took him some time before he could stand upon them. Again the Shokas would eat nothing because snow was still falling. We started toward the north-east.
Have we not yet reached it?" were the questions we asked one another. It seemed to me that, at the rate we were going, we should have been near the place, and yet after another hour's tramp we had not struck it. I was under the impression that we had gone about nine miles. I expressed the opinion that we had passed it, but the Shokas insisted that we had not, so we again proceeded.
Failure seemed inevitable, my position hopeless. A plan suddenly flashed across my mind. We, in camp, would remain hidden until they returned. I spoke to my followers, and, after some natural reluctance, four Shokas undertook to perform the daring duty. Discovery would mean to them the loss of their heads, in all probability preceded by cruel tortures.
It showed strongly defined ledges and terraces marking its stratification, and these were covered with horizontal layers of snow of brilliant white in contrast to the dark, ice-worn rock. The Tibetans, the Nepalese, the Shokas, the Humlis, Jumlis, and Hindoos, all had a strong veneration for this mountain, which was believed by them to be the abode of all the good gods, especially the god Siva.
The Shokas became alarmed, and immediately pronounced the folks to be brigands. I maintained that they were not. Kachi had a theory that the only way to tell brigands from honest beings was to hear them talk. The brigands, he declared, usually shouted at the top of their voices when conversing, and used language far from select, while well-to-do Tibetans spoke gently and with refinement.
There are no boats on the Devil's Lake, nor any way of constructing rafts, owing to the absence of wood. The hermit sleeps in a cave, but generally comes out in the open to pray to Buddha." During the following night, when everything was still, a breeze blowing from the north conveyed to us, faint and indistinct, the broken howls of the hermit. "What is that?" I asked of the Shokas.
Kachi and Dola, who knew Tibetan well, were now summoned to address the bandits for me; but these two Shokas were in such terror that they could hardly walk, much less speak. After a while, however, seeing how well I had these terrible people under control, they were able to translate. "I want them to sell me some yaks and some ponies," I said. "I will pay handsomely for them."
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