Mr. Karma asked me to read the Sacred Books for his family, and I readily consented, for a couple of days' rest was not disagreeable to me. While staying with him I bought an extra pair of boots, a precaution which I had foolishly omitted to take before, to my great inconvenience. I also purchased a sheep, to make it a beast of burden for me.
On July 18th I left Karma's, with about fifty pounds of luggage on my back and twenty-five more on that of the sheep. I led the sheep with a yak's tail rope tied to its neck. The animal proved docile enough for a couple of hundred yards, but not further. It wanted to go home, and tried to assert its right to do so with tremendous force. For my part, I stood on my own right, and there ensued a tug of war between the sheep and its master, and a very lively one it was. I argued with the animal, adducing various proofs of my determination, among which I may mention a rather free use of one of my staves. But the sheep showed that he had a stronger determination than mine, and I began to be dragged backward. My severe exertions even threatened to cause me some serious injury, and I finally gave in and allowed myself to be led back to Karma's, as I had a mind to find out the best way of managing the animal. On my second call on him, Karma expressed his opinion that my sheep was not yet broken sufficiently for travelling purposes, and that the purchase of a better-trained one as its companion might induce the refractory animal to obey my will. I followed the suggestion and paid one yen twenty-five sen for an additional sheep; seventy sen would have bought me a younger one, but I wanted a fully grown and fully broken one, and I was obliged to stay there that night, for all his sheep had gone to the plains. On that very evening I bought another, and tried putting on his back one half of my share of the burden
