CHAPTER XVI.
A Foretaste of distressing Experiences.
After parting with the Kham bonze, I had not proceeded far before I began to feel a shortness of breath which increased in intensity as I went along, and was followed by nausea of an acute type. I made a halt, took down my luggage (which, by the way, had by this time produced very painful bruises on my back) and then took a dose of hotan — a soothing restorative. The result was that I brought up a good mouthful of blood. Not being subject to heart disease, I concluded that I had been affected by the rarity of the atmosphere. I think, as I thought then, that our lung-capacity is only about one-half of that of the native Tibetan. Be this as it may, I felt considerable alarm at this, my first experience of internal hemorrhage, and thought it would be ill-advised to continue my journey that day. I had made only eight miles, five up and three down, over undulating land; but I was so greatly fatigued that, without courage enough to go and search for yak- dung, I fell fast asleep the moment I laid me down for a rest. I do not know how long I had slept, when something pattering on my face awoke me. As soon as I realised that I was lying under a heavy shower of large-sized hail-stones, I tried to rise, but I could not; for my body literally cracked and ached all over, as if I had been prostrated with a severe attack of rheumatism. With a great effort I raised myself to a sitting posture and endeavored to calm myself. After a while my pulse became nearly normal and my breathing easier, and I knew that I was not yet to die. But the general aching of the body did not abate at all, and it was out of the question for me to resume the journey then, or to
