All day in the most beautiful weather we marched across the flower-strewn desert, seeing nothing except bunches of game and one or two herds of wild asses which had come down from the mountains to feed upon the new grass.

As evening approached we shot an antelope and made our camp--for we had brought the yak and a tent with us--among some tamarisk scrub, of which the dry stems furnished us with fuel.

Nor did we lack for water, since by scraping in the sand soaked with melted snow, we found plenty of fair quality.

So that night we supped in luxury upon tea and antelope meat, which indeed we were glad to have, as it spared our little store of dried provisions.
The next morning we ascertained our position as well as we could, and estimated that we had crossed about a quarter of the desert, a guess which proved very accurate, for on the evening of the fourth day of our journey we reached the bottom slopes of the opposing mountains, without having experienced either accident or fatigue.

As Leo said, things were "going like clockwork," but I reminded him that a good start often meant a bad finish.