Page:Mongolia, the Tangut country, and the solitudes of northern Tibet vol 1 (1876).djvu/341

 their last desperate extremity. They slipped down the side of the cliff, and jumped from a ledge eighty feet high.

Besides the Ala-shan mountains, the mountain sheep are found in great numbers in the range bounding the valley on the left bank of the northern bend of the Hoang-ho, but they do not inhabit the Munni-ula, or the other more northerly mountains of Mongolia. Towards the south this animal is very often met with in the mountains round Lake Koko-nor and in Northern Tibet, but here it assumes a different shape, and may be a separate species.

After a fortnight's stay in the Ala-shan mountains, we returned to Din-yuan-ing; here we determined to retrace our steps to Peking, in order to obtain fresh supplies of money, and other necessaries for a new journey. Unpleasant as it was, we were obliged to give up our intended journey to Lake Koko-nor, which was only 400 miles distant, i.e. less than a month's journey. Notwithstanding all our care, amounting almost to stinginess, we had less than a hundred lans (20l.) left in money on entering Ala-shan, and it was only by selling our merchandise and two guns that we could get enough money for the return journey; our Cossacks, too, proved untrustworthy and lazy, and with such a staff we could not undertake a new journey more difficult and dangerous than the one we had accomplished. Lastly, my passport from Peking only allowed me to gо as far as Kan-su, and we might, therefore, be refused admittance to that province.