Colonel Tanner, who arrived soon after me as survey officer to the Mission, had had long experience in travelling in the North-West Himalaya and Ladakh. He agreed with me that our best chance of doing any real work in surveying and collecting was to organise our own trans¬ port and supplies independently, so that we could see more of the country than would be possible in company with such a large party. So I set to work to buy ponies and engage servants suitable for a long and difficult journey. My old syce came to me as soon as he heard of my arrival, and Gammie recommended a young Nepalese from among his own men as a suitable bearer. Ponies were scarce and dear at this season, but there was a Bhutia horse dealer in the station, Ugyen by name, with whom I had rather an interesting deal. He came one day with a pony which he said was a lama’s pony and would carry me wherever a pony could go. tie was a raw-boned ugly beast with a head as big as a coffin; he had very good shoulders and loins, but he was so much out of condition that he did not look as if he was worth half the money which Ugyen asked. I had just bought a very good-looking pony from a planter for 200 rupees, but it seemed inclined to shy—a very bad fault on narrow mountain paths— and I asked Ugyen if he would swap. To this he replied that he should want money thrown in, as his pony was the better of the two. I laughed at him and he then offered to race me up to the bandstand in Darjeeling and back, owners up and the winner to take the two ponies, Ugyen was a big stout man, who, in the clothes he wore, looked as if he was two stone over my weight, and I thought it was good enough to accept his proposal. But when he returned to the back verandah to strip and had taken off three or four heavy Tibetan blanket coats and other garments, he appeared in a pair of English riding breeches about three stone lighter than I had thought before, and as my friends told me that he was a first- class jockey, I thought it best to pay forfeit and buy his pony.
“ The Lama ” as I called him, turned out the best hill pony I ever rode, and was so sure-footed that I could canter up and down the winding hill-paths about the station without fear of his coming down. The only time that he came to grief was when I was riding up from Mongpo. As we were crossing a wooden bridge over a small watercourse, the middle log of the three forming the bridge gave way and let the pony through, all but his head and one foreleg. After a few struggles he lay still, and I took off the saddle and sent my syce to look for help. On the inside of the bridge the stream below was about ten feet down, and the banks very steep and rocky, and I thought it impossible that a horse could climb out of such a place if he fell through the bridge. But after lying for a few minutes the Lama with a struggle managed to get one hind foot up and then jumped right over the bridge into the torrent, out of which he climbed like a cat on to the road again, quite unhurt.
When I left Darjeeling four months later, I gave the Lama to my friend Gammie on the understanding that he was not to sell him, or on any account to allow Sir Richard Temple to ride him. Sir Richard, then Lieutenant-Governor of Bengal, was very fond of coming up to Darjeeling and prided himself on the rapidity of his journey when riding relays of other people’s ponies. But as he was reputed to be utterly without con-
