70 ON THE TAGHDUMBASH PAMIR [CHAP. IV.
waist, we got safely across, and leaving the care of the baggage to the village headmen who had assisted me in the passage, I gallopped over the rich meadows towards the foot of the cliffs on which the fort stands.
M. Sher Muhammad awaited me near the comfortable Kirghiz ` Yürt ' (felt hut), once belonging to Major F. E. Younghusband, which he had pitched for my accommodation, and which in the meantime had proved useful for my fellow-traveller of the previous days. The news that the Chinese Anibal' of the Sarikol district raised no objection to my proceeding westwards of Murtagh-Ata was a welcome piece of intelligence. Less so that Mr.. Macartney's Dak for Gilgit, with which I had hoped to post my Europe mail, had already started by the route on the left river-bank, and had consequently missed me. Fortunately it is easier to rectify such postal mishaps in Central Asia than in civilised Europe, and after an evening busily spent in writing, a special messenger rode off with my own mail bag, which was to catch up the Dak courier before he had started from his first night's quarters.
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