For two hours before we reached it the men and
animals showed great distress. Gyalpo stopped every few yards,
gasping, with blood trickling from his nostrils, and turned his head
so as to look at me, with the question in his eyes, What does this
mean? Hassan Khan was reeling from vertigo, but would not give in;
the seis, a creature without pluck, was carried in a blanket slung on
my tent poles, and even the Tibetans suffered. I felt no
inconvenience, but as I unsaddled Gyalpo I was glad that there was no
more work to do! This 'mountain-sickness,' called by the natives
ladug, or 'pass-poison,' is supposed by them to be the result of the
odour or pollen of certain plants which grow on the passes. Horses
and mules are unable to carry their loads, and men suffer from
vertigo, vomiting, violent headache and bleeding from the nose,
mouth, and ears, as well as prostration of strength, sometimes
complete, and occasionally ending fatally.
After a bitterly cold night I was awakened at dawn by novel sounds,
gruntings, and low, resonant bellowing round my tent, and the grey
light revealed several yaks (the Bos grunniens, the Tibetan ox), the
pride of the Tibetan highlands.
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