THE PULSE OF ASIA
THE PULSE OF ASIA
A JOURNEY IN CENTRAL ASIA ILLUSTRATING
THE GEOGRAPHIC BASIS OF HISTORY
BY
ELLSWORTH HUNTINGTON
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
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COPYRIGHT 1907 BY ELLSWORTH HUNTINGTON
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED .
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TO
WILLIAM MORRIS DAVIS
FIRST OF MODERN GEOGRAPHERS
INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION
PULSATORY CLIMATIC CHANGES
A HIS book is primarily the record of a journey of explora-
tion in a remote and unique region — the heart of Asia. It
is more than that, however, for scattered through the narra-
tive there runs a description of the physical features of the
great central basin of Asia and a discussion of their effect
upon the life and habits of two contrasted types of people.
One type lives in the mountains around the basin. It is
nomadic and obtains its support chiefly from sheep, horses,
and cattle, and its life is full of movement and excitement.
The other type lives in the oases of the basin itself amid vast
desert wastes of sand, gravel, clay, and salt. Its life is
hemmed in by the narrow circle of the irrigated land and of
the reedy poplar brakes roundabout, and so it is monoto-
nous, unstimulating, and yet to the traveler most fascinat-
ing. Shot through the narrative and the description of the
land and people there is yet another phase of this book.
It takes the form of an attempt to state clearly and im-
partially the evidence which ultimately led to what I have
called the hypothesis of pulsatory climatic changes. Among
the mountains as well as in the deserts there are abundant
indications that at some time the climate was different from
now, the country more densely populated, and the civiliza-
tion higher. Much of the narrative takes its color from the
fact that my main object was to visit the ruins that lie far
viii INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION
out in the sand, or to study the shores of dried-up lakes
where to-day no one travels save when the bitter cold of
winter makes it possible to carry water in the form of cakes
of ice that will not speedily evaporate.
So far as concerns the narrative, the descriptions, and the
statement of the facts bearing on the climatic hypothesis,
little comment is needed in this introduction to a new edi-
tion. I should like, indeed, to rewrite them more vividly
and forcibly, but that hardly seems wise at present, for there
is nothing of great importance that I wish to unsay. There
is, however, much in addition that I would gladly say. The
hypothesis of climatic changes and the idea of their relation
to history and to human evolution has developed as I never
dreamed would be possible. While the reader of this book
will, I believe, gain wrong ideas in only minor particulars,
his views will be incomplete and one-sided unless he knows
what has happened during the twelve years since the book
was first written. Therefore, for the sake of the scientific
reader, I shall show how one after another of the ideas ex-
pressed in these pages has been amplified, improved, and in
some cases set aside for something better. I shall follow the
chronological method, and shall discuss only my own writ-
ings because they form a connected series and embody all
that it has been possible to gather from other writers who
have either criticized or upheld my original conclusions. It
must be understood that many of the new viewpoints men-
tioned in succeeding paragraphs have been due to the com-
ments of critics, and there is no doubt that further and per-
haps still greater advances will thus be brought about during
the next few years. Hence the reader must scan these pages
INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION ix
with the thought that he is watching a theory in process of
construction, and that if he turns his eyes away for a bit he
may come back to find that certain phases of it already wear
a new aspect.
After The Pulse of Asia was finished in 1907 the next step
was obviously to carry the investigation into new fields.
Palestine was chosen, partly because that country is geo-
graphically unique, and partly because there and in the
neighboring regions the course of history can be traced far
into antiquity. As the result of a journey in 1909, under
the auspices of Yale University, Palestine and its Trans-
formation was published in 1911. The evidence discussed
in that book shows that Palestine and Syria are full of proofs
of climatic changes quite as convincing as those in Central
Asia. Moreover, the indications of pulsations are even
stronger than appears in The Pulse of Asia. The curve
shown on page 349 of the present book indicates dry periods
from four to six hundred years after Christ and possibly
about 1200 a.d. The evidence from Palestine and Syria in-
dicates a marked dry period not only at both of these times,
but about 1200 B.C., while there are indications of minor
periods at earlier times and also about 800, 600, and 100 B.C.
and 300 to 400 a.d.
The complexity of the climatic curve on page 403 of Pales-
tine and its Transformation caused some critics to feel as if
pulsations were being piled up indefinitely and without due
warrant. Moreover, certain historians deemed it wholly
inadmissible that historical evidence as to migrations and
famines should be used as proof of dry periods which were
supposed to be the cause of those same migrations and
s INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION
famines. The most notable case of this kind was the thir-
teenth century B.C. Future investigations, as will shortly
appear, have confirmed this in a way that strongly upholds
the value of the method. In Palestine and its Transformation
a fuller attempt was made than in the present volume to in-
terpret history in the light of climatic changes, but the mat-
ter was rendered difficult partly by the disagreement of his-
torians as to the dates of many early events, partly by the
difficulty of obtaining precise data as to the number and in-
tensity of climatic changes, and partly by the absence of
any definite standard by which the climate of the past might
be measured for decade after decade.
The next step in the study of climatic changes was to
transfer the field of effort from the Old World to the New.
I cannot be too grateful to my good friend Dr. D. T. Mac-
Dougal, of the Desert Laboratory of the Carnegie Institu-
tion of Washington, for persuading me to do so. When he
invited me to cooperate with him in Arizona I consented
largely as a matter of conscience. I knew that having stud-
ied the climatic problem in Asia I ought to study it in simi-
lar parts of America. I supposed, however, that the ab-
sence of historic records, the relative scarcity and insignifi-
cance of ruins, and the smaller size of the American deserts
would be such a handicap that no important results could be
expected. It was a great surprise to find myself wrong in
all these respects, as is fully set forth in The Climatic Factor
(1914).
The chief forward steps represented by that book are
briefly as follows: Innumerable ruins and many enclosed
salt lakes present evidence almost exactly like that described
INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION xi
in the present volume. Many a time in the deserts of Ari-
zona and New Mexico I reasoned just as in Central Asia.
Looking at the map I concluded that there ought to be a
ruin in approximately such a location even though none had
been described, and in nine cases out of ten the ruin was
there along some now dry water-course.
The study of ruins and of lakes in the United States, how-
ever, was unsatisfactory because of the impossibility of as-
certaining exact dates. Something else was needed, and
most fortunately it was supplied by another good friend,
Dr. A. E. Douglas, of the University of Arizona. Before I
made his acquaintance he conceived the brilliant idea of
measuring the climate of the past by means of the thickness
of the annual rings of growth in trees. At his hands this
method has reached such a pitch of perfection that he can
identify the date of a given ring with an error of only a
small fraction of one per cent. Following his lead and with
the assistance of the Carnegie Institution, I was able to
measure the rings of about 450 giant sequoias, or redwoods,
among the Sierra Nevada Mountains. These measure-
ments, when properly corrected, give a climatic curve ex-
tending back more than three thousand years. This curve
is highly important because it forms, as it were, the only defi-
nite yardstick by which to measure the climate of historic
times. With the final corrections, which Dr. Douglas has
now perfected, it will ultimately be possible to determine
from this curve the approximate climatic conditions of any
part of the world at any time during the last three thousand
years. This is because the whole trend of modern climatic
studies is to show that a given change in one part of the
xii INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION
world is correlated with definite and predictable changes in
other parts.
For our present purpose the most significant feature of
the California tree curve is that its main features agree with
those inferred in Asia. To be sure, it adds many minor
fluctuations of which no inkling had been gained in the Old
World, but each marked change that had been definitely
determined in Asia is also strongly marked in California, for
the two regions he in the same climatic zone. The dry period
in the thirteenth century B.C. is particularly prominent.
Two other facts about the tree curve deserve notice. The
first is that the modern growth of the trees shows a pro-
nounced correlation with modern records of rainfall in Italy
and Palestine, so that we are warranted in using the curve
as a record of the climate in those regions as well as in Amer-
ica. The second is that Dr. Antevs, of Stockholm, who has
made a most exhaustive study of all that has been written
on tree-growth as a measure of climate, believes that in cor-
recting the California curves I have gone too far in smooth-
ing out irregularities during the earlier centuries. Thus, the
trees, in conjunction with the ruins and lakes, and aided
by historic records of famines and migrations, seem to fur-
nish unassailable evidence that climatic pulsations of con-
siderable magnitude have actually taken place at corres-
ponding times in the Old World and the New.
Still another new line of evidence is described in The Cli-
matic Factor. After studying the desert ruins of the United
States I turned to tropical countries, and examined the won-
derful ruins in Oaxaca in southern Mexico, and the still
more remarkable Maya ruins in Yucatan and Guatemala.
INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION xiii
Many of these are located in regions where the heavy rain-
fall and dense vegetation, aided by malarial fevers, now
render agriculture and civilization impossible. The only
satisfactory explanation of the facts seems to be that when
the ruins were built the climate was drier and more bracing
than at present, so that agriculture was easier and diseases
less prevalent. An examination of the history of the Mayas
shows that they rose to power at times when the deserts
farther north became moist. In other words, dry condi-
tions on the borders of the tropics seem to occur contempo-
raneously with moist conditions in the deserts. Soon after I
reached this conclusion the German geologist, Penck, who
is recognized everywhere as one of the chief authorities on
the glacial period, announced that on grounds quite differ-
ent from mine he, too, had reached the conclusion that
when some zones become rainy, others become dry. More-
over, many students of present climatic conditions have re-
cently shown that exactly opposite changes of temperature
or of rainfall take place in different parts of the earth, and
that the chief centers of changes of one type or the other are
well defined.
What has just been said indicates a great change from the
assumption of this book that similar climatic variations
take place synchronously all over the world. That mis-
taken assumption was not based on my own work, but on
the generally accepted but now fast vanishing ideas of geolo-
gists as to the uniform cooling of the earth during glacial
periods. Another such change of opinion is set forth in a
paper entitled "The Solar Hypothesis of Climatic Changes,"
published in 1914 in the Bulletin of the Geological Society of
xiv . INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION
America. This was intended partly as an answer to various
critics of The Pulse of Asia. To one of those critics, Pro-
fessor J. W. Gregory, I am especially indebted for compel-
ling me to reexamine the question of temperature in relation
to climatic changes. This led to the conclusion that there is
no good evidence of any appreciable change in mean tem-
perature during the last three thousand years. At most
the change amounts to only two or three degrees and per-
haps less. There seems, however, to be abundant evidence
that the paths and intensity of storms, as well as their fre-
quency, are subject to constant changes. This apparently
is the cause of most of the climatic pulsations with which we
have to deal in this book. If this is so, the probability that
climatic changes are largely due to solar changes is greatly
increased, for as Kullmer and others have clearly shown,
storms are most intimately connected with variations in the
activity of the sun's atmosphere. Although the matter is
still subject to fierce debate, it seems possible that these
variations in the intensity and course of storms are largely
due to variations in the sun's magnetic or electrical activity.
The reasons for this are given in a series of papers entitled
"Solar Changes and Terrestrial Weather," which appeared
in the Monthly Weather Review, 1918. Perhaps one of the
next great subjects of study may be the effect of electrical
variations upon man's own activity. It is well known that
electricity is a great stimulant, but whether the little electri-
cal variations occurring naturally in the air are important in
this respect no one yet knows.
To Dr. Kullmer I am indebted not only for his illuminat-
ing work on the relation of the sun to storms, but for a sug'
INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION xv
gestion which crystallized in my own mind a plan that I had
long been considering. He suggested that there appears to
be a most remarkable connection between storms and civili-
zation. Where storms are frequent, civilization is high, and
where they are lacking, it is low. This idea led me to under-
take an extensive investigation, in order to determine ex-
actly what effects are produced upon the human body by
different kinds of weather. The result was a volume en-
titled Civilization and Climate (1915), which seems to supply
a new clue to the relation of climatic pulsations to history.
When the present book was written, and for some years
thereafter, I supposed that by far the chief effect of varia-
tions in climate was the increase or diminution of the food
supply. Then in studying Central America and Greece it
became evident that diseases like malaria must be carefully
considered. Not until Civilization and Climate was being
written, however, did it become clear that the direct effect of
climatic conditions upon man's energy and will power, as
well as upon his health, is of the most vital importance. In
that volume it appears that factory operatives do their best
work with a mean temperature a little above 60° F., while
students seem to work most profitably when the average
outside temperature is not much above 40°. Moreover,
both operatives and students work fastest on days when the
thermometer falls somewhat. These facts and others made
it possible to construct a map of climatic energy. That
map agrees to a remarkable extent with a map of civilization
based on the opinions of about fifty experts from fifteen
diverse countries. Moreover, when allowance is made for the
climatic pulsations which are the thread of our whole prob-
xvi INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION
lem, it appears that not only now but throughout history,
civilization has risen to high levels only in regions blessed
with a stimulating climate marked by frequent changes of
temperature. While high temperature and low are both
harmful to human activity, a few months of either appear to
be much less harmful than uniformity. Hence storms or
other agencies, such as winds, which bring variety, are one
of the prime factors in enabling a people to preserve the
vigor and determination essential to an advancing civili-
zation.
This study of the effect of temperature and of variability
made it possible to apply our climatic hypothesis to history
on a broad scale, as has been done in the last chapter of Civ-
ilization and Climate. As soon as that book was finished,
however, further study of the optimum or most favorable
conditions of climate was evidently necessary, together with
an investigation of the differences between races in their re-
lation to climate. Such a study is described in World Power
and Evolution (1919). There nine million deaths in the
United States, France, and Italy are minutely analyzed in
their relation to temperature and humidity. About fifty
million more are studied less thoroughly, but with sufficient
detail to show that they agree with the nine million. From
this vast body of data pertaining to nearly a score of coun-
tries certain great conclusions stand out. The health of the
human race is best when the temperature averages about
64° for night and day together, and when the relative hu-
midity averages about 80 per cent. This is almost the same
for all races, whether they be the Finns of the north or the
Sicilians of the south. Even the negroes appear to be at
INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION xvii
their best when the average temperature is not over 68°.
Constant changes, however, are needed. A study of the
daily deaths in New York City for eight years shows that at
all seasons, summer and winter alike, a drop in temperature
is beneficial, while a rise causes weakness. Continued low
temperature, indeed, is harmful, but the change from high to
low is valuable. Moreover, a study of the variability of the
weather for these same years shows that the stimulus de-
rived from a fall of temperature more than overbalances
the inertia resulting from a rise. To this must be added the
fact that the greatest mental activity appears to occur when
the average outside temperature is about 40°. Thus the
climate that the world most needs is one where the summer
average is about 64°, and the winter average about 40°, and
where a constant succession of storms brings frequent al-
ternations of cold and heat, moisture and dryness, cloud
and sun.
Looking back now to our solar studies, we find that when
the sun's atmosphere is active, stormy and variable weather
tends to occur in certain well-defined belts which apparently
vary in location according to the intensity of the solar activ-
ity. One of these belts lies well to the north and influences
the northern United States, southern Canada, southern
Greenland, Iceland, and northwestern Europe. The other
belt traverses Arizona, the Gulf of Mexico, the Mediterra-
nean region, Persia, and other parts of Central Asia as well
as northern India. Let us briefly review what happened in
these places near the beginning of the fourteenth century of
our era. As to the northern United States and Canada we
have no knowledge, but the sequoia trees of California grew
xviii INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION
phenomenally fast, and the Maya civilization of Yucatan
apparently made its last great spurt. In northwestern
Europe there is abundant evidence of great storminess with
consequent poor crops and other disasters in England and
Scandinavia, and floods and droughts in France and Ger-
many. At that same time Italy showed extraordinary ac-
tivity in the advancement of civilization, for there the storm-
iness was not so great as to bring disaster, but apparently
served as a stimulant both to man and to agriculture. Far
away in Central Asia the Caspian Sea and Lop-Nor ex-
panded as explained in this book. Moreover, at about that
time the sun's surface seems to have been unusually active,
although of course the data are extremely scanty. The
outstanding fact is that the fourteenth century furnishes
an example of all the phenomena which would be expected
to accompany a period of intense storms. In earlier peri-
ods, such as the time of Christ and especially the fifth and
fourth centuries B.C., the same thing seems to have been
even more true. Thus scattered here and there through
the course of history periods of climatic extremes appear to
be associated with corresponding periods of human extremes.
Still another apparent effect of climatic changes remains
to be considered. The evidence of geology and paleontology
shows that life of all kinds has tended to evolve with great
rapidity during times of climatic stress. Such times ap-
pear to have been like the more stormy historic periods ex-
cept that they were more severe. They were marked by
wholesale destruction of old species, genera, and families.
Still more important is the fact that they were also marked
by the sudden rise of many new forms of life. Modern ex-
INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION xix
periments are beginning to indicate that cooling and to a
less degree heating of the eggs or young during a short
critical period tend to cause mutations whereby the off-
spring differ from any of the normal forms of their species.
Such mutants are a possible source of new species. Among
mankind some of them are the world's great minds. Thus
we are confronted by the suggestion, which is as yet no
more than a suggestion, that at times of climatic instability
and storminess, or in places where great storminess and fre-
quent changes of temperature abound, the human race is
more likely to produce extreme types than under less varia-
ble conditions. Hence we should look for a great display of
intellect during such periods.
Now at last we are ready for an attempt which was made
in the last chapter of this volume twelve years ago, but
which was largely a failure. I mean the attempt to see how
the course of history has responded to climatic changes.
All the factors have by no means been weighed as yet, nor
do we know exactly how to go about the matter. We are
merely ready for the first real experiment. This has been
made in World Power and Evolution. Two trials are made.
The first concerns the United States during the period from
1870 to 1910. Strange as it may seem, the general health of
the country appears to vary greatly from year to year on
account of climatic conditions, and this seems to have a
marked effect on the course of business. When good health
prevails, men are apparently optimistic and ready to engage
in new enterprises. WTien bad health prevails widely, so
that many people suffer from colds, indigestion, headaches,
and other minor ailments as well as from the major diseases
xx INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION
which cause death, a feeling of conservatism comes over the
community and business is injured. If this conservatism be
intensified by bad crops, which are often due to the same
climatic conditions which cause poor health, the country
suffers seriously. It is impossible here to tell the whole
story, and I must confess that thus briefly told it sounds
improbable. Nevertheless, the facts seem strongly to sug-
gest that the course of business in the United States is pro-
foundly influenced by conditions of health, and that, except
during great epidemics like that of 1918, the general health
of the community depends largely upon the weather.
The second attempt to correlate history and climatic
changes takes us back to Rome from the days of the early
Republic to the time of Christ. There we use the curve of
the California trees as our line of reference. When the
trees grew fast we assume that storms were abundant just as
they have been during the years since records have been
kept. When storms were abundant there were frequent
stimulating cold waves which kept the Romans in good
health and thus helped to give them vigor and will power.
At the same time the crops were better than now and there
was much less danger of poverty and famine. Moreover,
malaria, which has been one of the scourges of the country
during all its later history, was comparatively rare and did
little harm, as we know from actual records, and as we
should infer from the climatic conditions. Finally, although
it seems almost incredible, the variable climate may possibly
have helped to cause great variability among the people,
thus giving rise to an unusual number of minds above the
average. When we trace the history of Rome step by step
INTRODUCTION TO NEW EDITION xxi
for five centuries there appears an extraordinary agreement
between human affairs and the conditions of climate. I
realize that the whole subject is still in its infancy, and
many of the ideas here advanced will need drastic revision.
Yet the correspondence between human and climatic events
is too close and too striking to be wholly set aside.
The Pulse of Asia ends with these words: "With every
throb of the climatic pulse which we have felt in Central
Asia, the center of civilization has moved this way or that.
Each throb has sent pain and decay to the lands whose day
was done, life and vigor to those whose day was yet to be."
Sometimes, during the twelve years since these words were
printed, I have wished that I had not written them.- They
certainly were not proved at that time. Now, however, I
deliberately repeat them. I am not so positive about them
as I was then, but I am confident that they at least contain
a germ of truth.
E.H.
Washington, May, 1919
PREFACE
J. HIS book is the record of a journey in Central Asia, and
its aim is to illustrate the geographic relation between physi-
cal environment and man, and between changes of climate
and history. Most of the individual hypotheses advanced
are already familiar, although the facts presented in support
of them are new. If the book possesses any claim to recog-
nition, it lies in the combination of various hypotheses, hith-
erto unrelated, into a single consistent geographic theory of
history. The theory harmonizes a vast array of facts derived,
not from one branch of science, but from the varied fields of
geography, meteorology, archaeology, folk-lore, and history.
It will doubtless require modification, but if it shall advance
the scientific as opposed to the empirical study of geogra-
phy and history, the purpose of this volume will have been
accomplished.
In the following pages, the name of Professor Davis, to
whom the book is dedicated, appears frequently. He has
raised geography from an empirical to a rational science.
To him half the geographers of America, myself among the
number, owe their instruction in the new science which,
when it comes to its own, bids fair to be the most fascinating
of all. I owe him far more than this, however, for it was
through him that I had the opportunity to spend three years
in Central Asia in addition to the four which I had previously
spent in Asia Minor. Since my return to America, the liberal
terms of a Hooper Fellowship in the Graduate School of
xxlv PREFACE
Arts and Sciences of Harvard University have enabled me
to devote an uninterrupted year to the preparation of this
volume and of several technical papers. During six years
of intimate association with Professor Davis, I have ever
found him the most inspiring of teachers, the most thought-
ful of fellow travelers, and the most severe and helpful of
critics. He has read the manuscript of this volume, and has
suggested important modifications. The many faults of the
book are mine; to him is due a large share of whatever in it
may be valuable. I cannot here give adequate expression
to my deep appreciation of all his help and kindness.
Two other friends have read the manuscript — Mrs.
Charles L. Ziegler and Mr. Herbert R. Gibbs. Both have
made most valuable suggestions, especially as to matters of
literary form, where the scientist is apt to be weakest; and
to both I render hearty thanks. My indebtedness to Mr.
Robert L. Barrett, whose companion I was during the first
part of the journey here described, is great, as appears in the
Introduction. In India we were treated with the utmost
courtesy by the government through Lord Curzon, to whom
we would express our gratitude. The American traveler
expects kindness from his English cousins, and is never
disappointed. It is less common to be treated with unfailing
courtesy and consideration by Chinese officials. It is there-
fore with peculiar pleasure that I put on record my thanks to
the Chinese government for its genuine and ready help at
all stages of my journey in China. In Russia and Siberia,
through which lay my hasty homeward way, similar official
courtesy was shown. The best was placed at my disposal;
and although it was the midst of the revolutionary crisis,
PREFACE xxv
my passport was not once asked for until I was about to
cross into Germany at Warsaw.
In conclusion, I wish to make special mention of the kind-
ness of George Macartney, Esq., British Political Agent at
Kashgar in Chinese Turkestan. Though personally unac-
quainted with Mr. Barrett and myself, he took charge of our
mail, procured currency for us, and sent men to us, bringing
our letters and purchases. To the stay-at-home these things
sound small, but when a man's mail and money reach him
once in three or four months, after being carried five or six
hundred miles by a special messenger on horseback or afoot,
he feels extremely grateful to the man at the other end who
sees that things go straight. One of the greatest pleasures
in looking back at a journey in unknown lands is the mem-
ory of the chain of kindly deeds performed by missionary,
consul, official, traveler, or native.
E. H.
Milton, Mass., July, 1907.
LIST OF REFERENCES
A HIS list comprises the books and articles to which specific
reference is made in the following pages, and also a few not so
referred to, but important. Other books have been read in the pre-
paration of this volume, but need not be mentioned here. I have
included my own articles, because they elaborate more fully the
subjects treated of in this volume.
Beal, Samuel (trans.). Si-Yu-Ki. (An account of the journeys of
Hwen Tsiang.) 2 vols. London, 1884.
Life of Huien-Tsiang (Hwen Tsiang). By the Shamans
Hwui Li and Yen-Tsung. London, 1888.
Bellew, H. W. Kashmir and Kashgar. London, 1875.
Bruckner, E. Klimaschwankungen seit 1700. Vienna, 1890.
Church, P. W. Chinese Turkestan with Caravan and Rifle. Lon-
don, 1901.
Clayton, H. H. Influence of Rainfall on Commerce and Politics.
Popular Science Monthly, vol. 60. 1902.
Clough, H. W. Synchronous Variations in Solar and Terrestrial
Phenomena. Astro-phys. Journ., vol. 22. 1905.
Crosby, O. T. Tibet and Turkestan. New York, 1905.
Davis, W. M. A Journey across Turkestan, in "Explorations in
Turkestan." Washington, 1905.
Deasy, H. H. P. In Tibet and Chinese Turkestan. New York, 1901.
De Guignes. Histoire General des Huns. 5 vols. Paris, 1766.
Dexter, E. G. Weather Influences. 1904.
Drew, F. The Jummoo and Kashmir Territories. London, 1875.
Dunmore, Earl of. The Pamirs. 2 vols. London, 1893.
Dutreuil de Rhins and F. Grenard. Mission Scientifique dans La
Haute Asie. 3 vols. 1898.
Fraas, O. Aus dem Orient. Stuttgart, 1867.
Klima und Pflanzenwelt.
Gibbon, Edw. Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. 8 vols.
London, 1825.
xxviii LIST OF REFERENCES
Grenard, F. See Dutreuil.
Grum-Grschimailo. Forschungen in Turfan. Abstract in Globus,
vol. 63. 1893.
Hann, J. Climatology, trans, by R. D. Ward. New York.
Hedin, Sven. Through Asia. 2 vols. London, 1899.
Central Asia and Tibet. 2 vols. London, 1903.
Scientific Results. 6 vols. 1904-07.
Henderson, Geo., and Hume, A. O. Lahore to Yarkand. London,
1873.
Himly. Ein Chinesisches Werk. (See Hedin's Scientific Results,
vol. 2, etc.)
Humboldt, A. de. Asie Centrale. 2 vols. Paris, 1843.
Hume, A. O. See Henderson.
Huntington, Ellsworth. Valley of the Upper Euphrates River.
Bull'n Am. Geog. Soc. vol. 34. 1902.
The Mountains of Turkestan. Geog. Journ., vol. 25. 1905.
Reconnaissance in Central Turkestan, pp. 157-216, and Basin
of Eastern Persia and Sistan, pp. 217-317, in "Explorations in
Turkestan." Washington, 1905.
Depression of Sistan, and Mountains and Kibitkas of Tian
Shan. Bull'n Am. Geog. Soc, vol. 37. 1905.
— Rivers of East Turkestan and Desiccation of Asia. Geog.
Journ., vol. 27. 1906.
— The Vale of Kashmir. Bull'n Am. Geog. Soc, vol. 38. 1906.
— Lop-Nor: A Chinese Lake. Bull'n Am. Geog. Soc, vol. 39.
1907.
— Pangong: A Glacial Lake in the Tibetan Plateau. Journ. of
Geol. 1906.
— The Depression of Turfan. Geog. Journ., vol. 28. 1907.
Hwen Tsiang. See Beal.
Kropotkin, Prince. The Desiccation of Asia. Geog. Journ., vol. 23.
1904.
Lansdell, Henry. Chinese Central Asia. 2 vols. London, 1893.
Lowell, Percival. Mars and its Canals. New York, 1906.
Macartney, Geo. Ancient Kingdom of Lau-lan. Geog. Journ.,
vol. 21. 1903.
LIST OF REFERENCES xxix
Maiden, J. H. Forests in Relation to Rainfall. Proc. Roy. Soc.
N. S. Wales, vol. 36. 1902.
Malcolm, Napier. Five Years in a Persian Town. London, 1905.
Murchison, Robert. Note on the Oxus River. Proc. Roy. Geog.
Soc, vol. 11. 1866-67.
Polo, Marco. Travels.
Prjevalski, N. From Kulja across the Tian Shan to Lop-Nor,
with appendix by Von Richthofen. London, 1879.
Rawlinson, H. C. Note on the Oxus River. Proc. Roy. Geog. Soc,
vol. 11. 1866-67.
The Road to Merv. Proc Roy. Geog. Soc, vol. 1. N. S.
1879.
Shaw, Robert. High Tartary, Yarkand, and Kashgar. London,
1871.
Stein, M. A. Ancient Geography of Kashmir. Journ. Asiatic So-
ciety of Bengal, vol. 68. 1889.
Preliminary Report on . . . Exploration in Chinese Turkestan.
London, 1901.
Sand-Buried Ruins of Khotan. London, 1903.
Ward.R.DeC. Changes of Climate. Pop. Sci. Mo., vol. 69. 1906.
Climatology. See Hann.
Wood, Herbert. Shores of Lake Aral. London, 1876.
Workman, W. H. Sources of the Chogo Lungma Glacier. Geog.
Journ., vol. 25. 1905.
Younghusband, F. E. Heart of a Continent. London, 1896.
CONTENTS
Introduction: The Significance of Central
Asia 1
I. The Vale of Kashmir 17
II. Ladakh and the Influence of the
Himalayas 47
III. Lake Pangong and the Karakorum
Plateau 66
IV. The Heart of Asia 91
V. Khirghiz Nomads and the Influence
of the High Plateaus 106
VI. The Slope from the Plateau to the
Basin Floor 133
VII. Among the Chantos at the Base of the
Mountains 153
VIII. The Sand-Buried Ruins of Chira . . 169
IX. Keriya and Niya 191
X. The Land of Withering Rivers . . . 210
XL The Chantos 223
XII. The Unexplored Salt Desert of Lop . 239
XIII. The Dry River and the Dry Moun-
tains 262
XIV. The Waxing and Waning of Lop-Nor . 280
XV. The Depression of Turfan 295
XVI. The Ancient Climate of Iran . . . 315
XVII. The Caspian Sea and its Neighbors . 329
XVIII. The Geographic Basis of History . . 359
Appendix 3S7
Index 389
THE PULSE OF ASIA
INTRODUCTION
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CENTRAL ASIA
IN the progress of human knowledge the marked ad-
vances in each science have been made under the stimulus
of a great fundamental principle. Astronomy could pro-
ceed but little beyond astrology until Newton discovered
the law of gravitation; physics remained empirical until the
conservation of energy was recognized; chemistry was
merely alchemy until its pioneers worked out the unfail-
ing law of the replacement of atom by atom; and geology
would still be miner's lore, if scientists had not seen that in
the course of ages the earth as we know it has been slowly
evolved by processes identical with those still in action.
So, too, in the biological sciences, botany, zoology, and phy-
siology, all was confusion until Darwin touched the key of
evolution and a vast number of apparently unrelated facts
fell into their appointed places, and the way was open
for the wonderful advances of the last half century.
The anthropological sciences are also bound together
by the unifying principle of evolution. Geography, an-
thropology, history, and sociology form an anthropological
group possessing a unity as great as that of the biological
sciences, although this has been perceived only within a few
years. The average man thinks of geography, the oldest of
all the sciences, as a schoolboy study of maps and of em-
pirical descriptions of places and people. He forgets that
2 INTRODUCTION
the leaders of geographic thought have gone far beyond
this, and are beginning to see that their science deals not
only with the distribution of organic and inorganic forms
in space, but also with the relation, both direct and indirect,
of the entire group of organic forms inhabiting any part
of the earth's surface to the inorganic forms in the same
region. Geography, according to the new view, tells us
not only what forms of plants and animals live together in
mutual dependence, but also why the human inhabitants of
a given region possess certain habits, occupations, and men-
tal and moral characteristics, and why they have adopted
a certain form of social organization. Among primitive
people the relation of inorganic causes to organic results
is universally recognized. Literature is full of references
to the nearness of the Red Man to Nature, and to the com-
plete dependence of primeval man upon her. Among
highly civilized people, the relation is lost sight of because
of the mixture of races, the growing control which man ex-
ercises over nature, and the rise of great religious or ethical
ideas, racial hatreds, and dominant personalities. Never-
theless, it is there, and a patient untangling of the snarled
threads of history will bring it to light.
In searching out the foundations upon which to build
the new sciences of anthropology and sociology, students
are turning more and more to geography in its broader
sense. The anthropologist finds that the development of
civilized man from the savage state is inextricably bound
up with the various types of physical environment in
which successive generations have lived. The sociologist
discovers that the conditions of human society to-day are
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CENTRAL ASIA 3
in part the result of racial characteristics due to past
environments, and in part the result of present geographic
conditions. Climate, the relation of land and sea, the pre-
sence of mountains, the location of trade routes, and the
suitability of a region for agriculture, mining, or manu-
facturing are all potent factors in determining sociological
conditions. The dependence of history upon geography
is equally great. In recent years there has arisen the so- .
called "bread and butter school" of historians, who hold
that the deepest cause of historical events is the necessity of
mankind to subsist. The ambition of kings, the hatred of
race for race, the antagonisms of religion, may agitate the
surface and cause the waves which seem to us so porten-
tous; but far down below all these there is the unending
struggle for bread. It is this primarily which makes men
work. It manifests itself in the discontent of the poor
peasants of Russia, in the disputes between labor and capi-
tal in America, and in the bitter cry of the famine-stricken
millions of India and China against the foreigners who
seem to rob them of bread. An increasing supply of food
has made Egypt contented and prosperous during the
last few decades. Scarcity of food, present or prospective,
for its increasing population has brought Japan into con-
flict with Russia, and is bringing it face to face with the
United States in California, where the Japanese coolie is
said to take the bread from the mouth of the native-born
American laborer. According to this view, geography is !
clearly the basis of history, for the productivity of a country
depends upon geographic facts, especially upon climate.
In saying that geography is the basis of the anthro-
4 . INTRODUCTION
pological sciences, it is not meant to imply that physical
processes explain all the qualities of man. They do not
explain life, or mind, or ideals. At present we can only
confess that we do not understand what these are, or how
we came to possess them. We can only ascribe their origin
to the same great Intelligence which framed the material
universe and gave it immutable laws. We know, however,
that they are the greatest forces in the world, the motive
power which moves mankind. In the past, men have sup-
posed that the human race either progressed blindly, or
was led onward by the direct interposition of some unseen
divine power. Now, we begin to see that man's course
has been guided by his physical surroundings, just as a
railroad winds here and there at the command of river,
hill, or lake. To carry the analogy farther, the living mind
of man, with its ideals, its love, and its pain, is the motive
force to which is due the progress of human institutions;
and history is the track along which man has advanced.
Sometimes his course has been straight, sometimes devious,
and at times it has doubled back on itself; but on the
whole, it has led toward a dimly seen goal of uprightness,
freedom, justice, and love.
We have studied the energizing mind, and know some-
thing of how it acts, though not of what it is. We have
examined the human institutions of the home, the church,
the state, and the social organization of industry; and
our knowledge of them is large. The track, too, has been
scrutinized minutely by historians ; and we know its curves
and grades, both up and down. One thing alone has been
neglected: we have not looked at the country through
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CENTRAL ASIA 5
which we have passed. To-day we are beginning to study
our surroundings, and to see that we have reached our
present position because of certain geographic facts. His-
torians have been slow to accept this view. When they
found a piece of downgrade in the track, they looked at
the cars and the engine to find its cause. They have failed
to see that the swift descent of the United States into a
financial panic and the hard pull out of it may be due to
the fact that the train is crossing a valley, and not to over-
loading of the cars in the shape of over-production, or to
poor couplings in the shape of a weak financial system,
though these may precipitate disaster. It may be, as we
shall see, that panics are due to the regular recurrence of
periods of deficient rainfall, causing poor crops and fluctu-
ating prices. If this is so, we must not only look to our
couplings and our load; we must bridge the next valley,
or cut and fill the road-bed so as to diminish the grades.
Again, as we look at the past, we see the track of history
double far back on itself at the time of the fall of Rome
before barbarian invaders. At present we are facing a
similar, albeit peaceful invasion on the part of the starving
millions of China: the fear that our track may again turn
back is before us. The relapse of Europe in the Dark Ages,
as future chapters will show, was due apparently to a rapid
change of climate in Asia and probably all over the world,
— a change which caused vast areas which were habitable
at the time of Christ to become uninhabitable a few cen-
turies later. The barbarian inhabitants were obliged to
migrate, and their migrations were the dominant fact in
the history of the known world for centuries. We of to-day
6 INTRODUCTION
shall do well to ascertain whether we too are not facing the
problem which faced the Romans. Parts of China have
been growing drier and less habitable during recent centu-
ries, and if the process continues, we are in danger of being
overrun by hungry Chinese in search of bread. We cannot,
perhaps, prevent their migration; but if we understand the
cause, we can profit by the lessons of the past and avoid
the danger, as a railroad engineer avoids turning back by
choosing a place where he can tunnel through the mountains
to the broad uplands on the other side.
The importance of climate and of changes of climate in
history and the allied sciences has never been fully realized.
It is climate which causes the Eskimo to differ so widely
from the East Indian; it is climate which almost irresist-
ibly tempts the Arab to be a plunderer as well as a nomad,
and allows the Italian to be an easy-going tiller of the soil.
And, if Percival Lowell is right, it is the dry climate of
Mars which has caused the inhabitants of that planet to
adopt an advanced form of social organization, where war
is unknown, and each man must be keenly conscious of
the interdependence of himself and the universal state.
Four years of life in Asiatic Turkey and three years of
travel in Central Asia have impressed upon me the impor-
tance of the geographic basis in the study of the anthro-
pological sciences. Hence this book. It is an attempt to
describe Central Asia in such a way as to show the relation
of geography to history and the related sciences, and to
show the immense influence which changes of climate have
exerted upon history.
From the Caspian Sea on the west to Manchuria on the
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CENTRAL ASIA 7
east, Central Asia is largely a country of deserts. It is po-
litically divided into the countries of Persia, Afghanistan,
Baluchistan, northern India, Tibet, China, and Asiatic
Russia. It varies in elevation from the low depression of
the Caspian Sea and the small basin of Turfan, lying
three hundred feet below sea-level in the very heart of
Asia, to the plateaus of Tian Shan, Tibet, and the Pamirs
at an elevation of from 10,000 to 20,000 feet above the
sea. Although usually the mountainous parts are com-
paratively rainy and are often well covered with vegeta-
tion, the lowlands, which comprise most of the country, are
intensely dry and almost absolutely desert. The people are
equally varied, the fierce Afghan being as different from
the sycophant Persian, as is the truculent Mongol from
the mild Chanto of Chinese Turkestan. Yet in spite of all
this, not only the physical features of the country, but the
habits and character of its inhabitants, possess a distinct
unity; for all alike bear the impress of an arid climate.
Central Asia, more fully perhaps than any other part of
the world, exemplifies the great geographic type in which
the topography, vegetation, animal life, and human civili-
zation have developed along the lines characteristic of
prolonged aridity. We all know something of arid countries,
empirically or from observation. We need, however, a
more general concept, so that the term " arid " shall bring
to mind the essential features of a definite geographic type,
just as the term "bovine" brings to mind the spreading
horns, large eyes, heavy body, cloven hoofs, cud, and other
essential features of a definite zoologic type. If once the
geographic type is well understood in its highly developed
8 INTRODUCTION
form in Central Asia, it will be easy to comprehend how
similar conditions of climate in other parts of the world
give rise to similar topographic features, and how the two
combine to determine the distribution and nature of life
of all forms.
The rainfall of Central Asia is so small that the rivers
fail to reach the sea. Hence the whole of a vast region,
stretching three thousand miles east and west, and having
an area nearly equal to that of the United States, is made
up of enclosed basins, from which there is no outlet. Each
consists essentially of a peripheral ring of higher land, —
usually mountainous, but sometimes merely a broad, gentle
arch, — within which a desert plain of gravel, sand, and
clay, brought from the mountains by rivers, surrounds a
salt lake, or the saline beds whence the waters of an ancient
lake have evaporated. Where the peripheral ring of higher
land is at all mountainous, it is flanked, and often half
buried, by vast slopes of barren rock-waste — typical pied-
mont deposits of gravel, washed out from the uplands by
floods. Because of the aridity, vegetable life is scanty except
along the courses of streams and in the rainy plateaus. Far
less than a tenth of the country is permanently habitable:
the rest is either absolute desert, or mitigated desert which
supports vegetation part of the year, but is too dry among
the plains, and too cold among the mountains, to allow
permanent occupation. Hence the inhabitants must either
live in irrigated oases along the rivers, or wander from
place to place in search of pasture for their flocks. There
are no manufacturing communities, either large or small ;
no commercial centres except local bazaars ; and no con-
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CENTRAL ASIA 9
tinuous agricultural population, such as that of the Mis-
sissippi Valley, dependent on rain for its water supply.
Two main types of civilization prevail: the condition of .
nomadism with its independent mode of life, due to the scat-
tered state of the sparse population, and the condition of
intensive agriculture in irrigated oases with its centralized
mode of life, due to the crowding together of population
in communities whose size is directly proportional to that
of the streams. Because of the arid climate and the conse-
quent physical characteristics of Central Asia, its types of
civilization have been, are, and probably must continue
to be fundamentally different from those of well-watered
regions such as most of America and Europe.
My acquaintance with Central Asia began in 1903, when
I was appointed by the Carnegie Institution of Washington
to assist Professor William M. Davis of Harvard Univer-
sity in the physiographic work of an expedition to Rus-
sian Turkestan, under the lead of Mr. Raphael Pumpelly.
I remained in Central Asia from May, 1903, to July, 1904,
spending most of the time in Russian Turkestan. I crossed
into Chinese Turkestan for a month, however, the first
summer, and spent four months in eastern Persia during
the winter. The results of the expedition are recorded in
"Explorations in Turkestan," a volume published by the
Carnegie Institution. The following year I had the good
fortune to be invited by Mr. Robert L. Barrett to accom-
pany him on an expedition to Chinese Turkestan. Arriving
in India in February, 1905, we proceeded north to the Vale
of Kashmir among the Himalayas, crossed them in May,
and reached Chinese Turkestan in June. There we worked
10 . INTRODUCTION
together for two months, and then undertook independent
expeditions, Mr. Barrett going east from Khotan to China
Proper, while I went east by another route to Lop-Nor,
and then, turning north, arrived at Turfan in March, 1906,
and reached home the following May via Siberia and
Russia.
The journey through Chinese Turkestan from India to
Siberia forms the main theme of this book, but I shall de-
vote a few chapters to other parts of Central Asia. This
volume, like the majority of so-called "geographical " books,
is a description of a journey; but, as I have already said, it
is also an attempt to describe certain parts of Asia as illustra-
tions of the great principles of geography. My conception
of that science, as stated above, is the one which has been
spread abroad in the world at large, and especially in Amer-
ica, during the last few years by the persistent labors of
Professor Davis. According to his definition, geography
is primarily the study of the various natural divisions or
provinces of the earth's surface as illustrations of the re-
lations between the inorganic physical facts of the earth,
air, and water on the one hand, and the organic facts of
the vegetable, animal, and human world on the other. To
illustrate: The investigation of the structure, origin, form,
and climate of a lofty plateau and a neighboring arid plain
is not geography, but geology, physiography, or meteorology.
Neither can the study of the methods of plant growth and
animal nutrition rightly be called geography, but botany
or zoology. When, however, we consider the fact that be-
cause of the elevation of the plateau its climate is such that
grass grows abundantly in summer; while the plain, being
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CENTRAL ASIA 11
lower, has less rainfall, and bears only a sparse growth of
grass in the early spring, we at once bring in the element
of relation between the organic and the inorganic, and the
study becomes geography. For the purposes of geography, it
is only necessary to understand enough of the plateau, the
plain, and the grass to gain a clear conception of how the
one acts on the other. If animals inhabit the country, they
must be such as can live on grass, or can prey on their grass-
eating companions. Further, if the plain is waterless in
summer, and the plateau is deeply buried in snow in winter,
the animals must perforce migrate, and a new geographic
factor is introduced. When man enters the region, he finds
it too dry in one part and too cold in another for agricul-
ture. Hence he must live upon animals, either as a hunter,
or, when the population becomes a little denser and the wild
animals diminish in number, as a shepherd. In either case
he must wander from place to place. Such a nomadic life
induces certain habits as to cleanliness, eating, traveling,
sleeping, working, resting, and the like. The habits in
turn develop certain moral qualities, such as gluttony al-
ternating with abstemiousness, hardihood under physical
difficulties, laziness, hospitality, and others. Thus the phy-
sical features of the region give rise to certain kinds of
vegetation, which in turn determine the species and move-
ments of animals, and so cause man to adopt the nomadic
life. And man, because he happens to be a pastoral nomad,
develops certain habits, physical, mental, and moral,
which, taken together, constitute character. Geography, ,
it seems to me, cannot logically be content, as many geo-
graphers would have it, with the mere description of physi-
12 INTRODUCTION
cal features and of their influence on the distribution of
living species. It must deal with a given region, or natural
province, as a whole; and must describe the entire assem-
blage of organic forms which result from a specified group
of inorganic controlling features. The description is not
complete unless it includes the highest and most inter-
esting realm of geography, — the influence of physical
environment, directly or through other forms of life, upon
the mental and moral condition of man.
In accordance with this view of geography, I shall de-
scribe some of the chief and most typical physical features
of Central Asia, not for their own sake, but as a preparation
for the study of their relation to life. Then I shall set forth
certain events, conversations, and scenes which fell within
my own experience, and shall show how they illustrate
the influence of the physical environment already described
upon the habits, thought, and character of the people.
The descriptions centre in five basins located in northern
India, western China, eastern Persia, and Asiatic Russia.
The first basin, that of Kashmir, lies among the Himalaya
mountains. Unlike the others, it has sufficient rainfall, so
that it is not self-contained, but is drained by the Jhelum
River, which flows out through a gorge in the surrounding
mountains and reaches the sea. Hence the conditions of
life are different from those of Central Asia in general, and
resemble those of moister countries, such as Italy. The next
three basins, those of Lop and Turfan in China, and Seyis-
tan (Sistan, or Seistan) in Persia, are so arid that their
rivers either dwindle to nothing in the desert, or end in
shallow salt lakes. They closely resemble one another, and
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CENTRAL ASIA 13
when the main features of one have been comprehended,
but little need be added as to the others. The last basin,
the so-called Aralo-Caspian depression, possesses many of
the characteristics of its more arid neighbors, but its great
size and the absence of mountains to the north give it a
diversity of climate unknown to the others. I shall not con-
sider it except in relation to the problem stated in the next
paragraph.
In the study of the five basins along the lines of the
definition of geography given by Professor Davis, I dis-
covered a number of facts which lead to a new application
of the geographic principle of cause and effect. In order
to understand the present condition, that is the geography,
of Central Asia, we must look upon it not as the result of
the long-continued action of fixed physical conditions, but
as the result of changing conditions. During the recorded
occupation of the country by man there appear to have
been widespread changes of climate. It has long been sur-
mised by historians that certain parts of Asia have been
growing more arid, but the surmise has lacked scientific
confirmation. Indeed, meteorological data seem to stand
directly opposed to it, for they show that there is no evi-
dence of any appreciable change since records have been
kept instrumen tally. The oldest records, however, date back
little more than a hundred years, and hence cannot be con-
sidered as proving anything in regard to antiquity. The .
data which I obtained in Central Asia, on the other hand,
confirm the surmise of the historians. There is strong: rea-
son to believe that during the last two thousand years there
has been a widespread and pronounced tendency toward
14 INTRODUCTION
aridity. In drier regions the extent of land available for
pasturage and cultivation has been seriously curtailed ; and
the habitability of the country has decreased. In certain
moister districts among the mountains, on the other hand,
the change has been beneficial : they have become less damp
and snowv, and hence more habitable. Moreover, in both
the drier and the moister regions the change of climate does
not appear to have been all in one direction. After a period
of rapidly decreasing rainfall and rising temperature during
the early centuries of the Christian era, there is evidence of
a slight reversal, and of a tendency toward more abundant
rainfall and lower temperature during the Middle Ages.
In relatively dry regions increasing aridity is a dire ca-
lamity, giving rise to famine and distress. These, in turn,
are fruitful causes of wars and migrations, which engender
the fall of dynasties and empires, the rise of new nations,
and the growth of new civilizations. If, on the contrary,
a country becomes steadily less arid, and the conditions
of life improve, prosperity and contentment are the rule.
There is less temptation to war, and men's attention is left
more free for the gentler arts and sciences which make for
higher civilization.
The main outlines of the history of Central Asia agree
with what would be expected from a knowledge of the
changes of climate through which the country has passed.
The favorable changes coincide with periods of prosperity
and progress; the unfavorable with depression and depopu-
lation. My own investigations show that the parallelism
between climatic changes and history applies to an area
extending at least three thousand miles, from Turkey on
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF CENTRAL ASIA 15
the west to China Proper on the east. Other evidence, which
has not as vet been investigated in detail, indicates that
the parallelism applies to all the historic lands of the Old
World and possibly to the New. As we look back into the »
past, we are forced to the conclusion that whatever the
motive power of history may be, one of the chief factors
in determining its course has been geography; and among
geographic forces, changes of climate have been the most
potent for both good and bad.
In the last chapter of this book I shall consider this
conclusion in its broader outlines as part of the philosophy
of history. For the most part, however, I shall confine my-
self to a statement of the phenomena which have led to its
adoption. Briefly restated, the fundamental idea of this »
volume is that geography is the basis of history. The phy-
sical features of the earth's surface limit the organic inhab-
itants of a given region to certain species of plants and
animals, including man, which live together in mutual de-
pendence. The world is naturally divided into geographic
provinces characterized by definite organic and inorganic
forms. Among primitive men the nature of the province
which a tribe happens to inhabit determines its mode of
life, industries, and habits ; and these in turn give rise to
various moral and mental traits, both good and bad. Thus
definite characteristics are acquired, and are passed on
by inheritance or training to future generations. If it be
proved that the climate of any region has changed during
historic times, it follows that the nature of the geographic
provinces concerned must have been altered more or less.
For example, among the human inhabitants of Central
16 INTRODUCTION
Asia widespread poverty, want, and depression have been
substituted for comparative competence, prosperity, and
contentment. Disorder, wars, and migrations have arisen.
Race has been caused to mix with race under new physical
conditions, which have given rise to new habits and char-
acter. The impulse toward change and migration received
in the vast arid regions of Central Asia has spread outward,
and involved all Europe in the confusion of the Dark Ages.
And more than this, the changes of climate which affected
Central Asia were not confined to that region, apparently,
but extended over a large part of the inhabited earth.
Everywhere they were the most potent of geographic influ-
ences, working sometimes for progress and sometimes for
destruction. Such in brief is the broad conclusion to which
we are led by a study of Central Asia as an example of
the influence of geography upon history. Before accepting
it, it behooves us to examine with the closest scrutiny all
the evidence in relation to climatic changes which may
have been so momentous in the world's history.
CHAPTER I
THE VALE OF KASHMIR
" Who has not heard of the vale of Cashmere,
With its roses the brightest that earth ever gave.
Its temples, and grottos, and fountains as clear
As the love-lighted eyes that hung over their wave ? "
Thomas Moobe.
W E had expected to find Kashmir idyllic, a green sunny
vale full of rivers, and surrounded by the grand scenery of
the snowy Himalayas. Imagination conjured up a smooth
plain of soft green turf covered with a network of winding
canals and rivers, dotted with shady orchards and bright
with gardens of rare flowers. We expected to see groves of
stately chenar trees sheltering mossy thatched cottages, the
homes of a gay, happy people, with dark eyes, dark hair, fair
olive skins, and handsome features. The picture included
clear blue lakes, and a ring of enclosing mountains, green
and heavily forested on the lower slopes, with deep, myste-
rious gorges, where vine-covered ruins of ancient temples
stood beside the cascades of laughing brooks tumbling down
in sheets of spray. Far above the forests of Himalayan pine
and of the deodar, with the almost naked central stalks of
its cones pointing straight upward like brown Christmas
candles, we looked for the superb cold heights of the lofty
Himalayas, where snow and winter reign eternally.
Our picture was not wrong, but it presented only one,
and that the loveliest, of the many aspects of Kashmir.
The scene was very different on the 18th of March, 1905,
18 THE PULSE OF ASIA
when Mr. Barrett and I gained our first view of the famous
mountain-girt vale. As we stood on a snowy hill-top and
looked out over the plain, nearly as large as the state of Con-
necticut, a cold wind made us shiver. There was no sun-
light, and no verdure; no forested mountains or prosperous
villages could be made out; the whole plain, far below us,
was dull brown, save where it was broken by the slaty
streaks of rivers and the leaden expanse of Wular Lake.
Ominous, low-lying clouds hid the sun, the sky, and the
mountains; and the plain, snow-flecked on the edges, was
as bare as an Illinois prairie in December. We turned away
in disappointment, and began to descend toward the village
of Baramula on the Jhelum River.
As we came down the hillside to the lower slopes, from
which the snow had disappeared, half a dozen natives sprang
up from the dead brown grass, where they had been squat-
ting on their heels, each by himself. Evidently they had been
lying in wait; and now from all sides they converged upon
us with alarming eagerness. I thought of two occasions
when the pursuit of geographic knowledge had led to my
arrest as a spy in Turkey, and of the disagreeable enforced
ride of two days under guard to the provincial capital the
first time. I remembered a fierce Russian colonel who had
tried to arrest me in Transcaspia, simply because, as the
guest of a civilian official, I had dared to travel on a mili-
tary railroad where foreigners are not allowed. I recalled
the company of nondescript Afghan soldiers who had been
called out to prevent me from entering their country. For-
getting that we were under the British flag, I said to myself,
"There come the police. How have they found out so
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 19
quickly that we are geographers ? Do they think that we
have come to spy out the land ? "
Meanwhile they had reached us. One brandished an
official-looking document suggesting a warrant; a second
waved a photograph; a third held a drawing like the plan
of a ship; and the others carried open letters. They all
thrust their papers into our unwilling hands, and in the
broken English now spoken by many natives of Kashmir,
shouted in rivalry: —
" Master ! Master ! read this ! " — " This my boat ; very
best boat." — " Master, you looking my boat. Twenty
rupee." — "I got best boat. I am six men." — "Come,
master, see my boat ! "
In spite of protests they escorted us to the village; helped
us through the mud, which was six inches deep; led us be-
tween the two-story houses of wood, covered with pyrami-
dal thatched roofs green with grass; and brought us to the
collection of house-boats on the muddy river. We thought
of the jolting of the two-story, two-wheeled carts in which
we had been traveling, and of what would await us at our
destination, Srinagar, the capital of Kashmir, either a poor
and expensive hotel, or its alternative, a wet camp with no
proper servants. As speedily as dignity would allow, we
yielded to our captors, engaging Subhana Benares, the boat-
man who claimed to be six men, together with his father,
four brothers, a sister, two wives of some of the family, a
modest house-boat with four small rooms roofed with reed-
matting, a smaller kitchen-boat where the natives were to
live and cook, and a rowboat, — for all of which, including
people and boats, we were to pay thirty-five rupees (eleven
20 THE PULSE OF ASIA
dollars and twenty cents) per month. Other expenses were
correspondingly low, even though Subhana considered it
necessary for his two " Sahibs " to have five or six pounds
of "soup-meat" a day and other articles in correspond-
ing amounts. There always seemed to be great quantities
to "throw away," as Subhana carefully phrased it, when
he carried things off to the crowded kitchen-boat. Never~
theless, our seventeen days in a house-boat proved economi-
cal. They also, I regret to say, proved cold and uncom-
fortable, because of the time of the year.
We had come to Kashmir from Bombay. On leaving
the railroad at Rawal Pindi in northern India, our plan
was to cross the Himalaya mountains to the vicinity of
Lake Pangong, three hundred miles to the east, at the ex-
treme western end of Tibet. There we proposed to turn
to the north, and traverse the lofty western extension of
the Tibetan plateau to the Kwen Lun mountains, a hun-
dred miles away on its northern edge. If we could cross a
favorably located pass over the mountains, a further march
of seventy-five miles as the crow flies would bring us to the
Chanto oasis of Khotan in Chinese Turkestan, where the
most important part of our work would begin. We followed
this plan as closely as the circumstances would permit, but
the exigencies of travel, combined with the demands of
geographic investigation, caused us to journey twice as far
as the distances specified above. The main features of our
route appear on the map at the end of this volume. Leaving
Rawal Pindi March 13, 1905, we reached Srinagar March
21, and remained there till April 4, when we started for
Leh, the capital of Ladakh, where we arrived April 24.
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 21
Between this date and May 15, Mr. Barrett remained in
Leh, while I visited Lake Pangong. Then, starting north
across the great plateau, we reached Sanju, on the border
of the plain of Chinese Turkestan, June 22, and Khotan
July 11.
The part of the Himalayas which we crossed trends
northwest and southeast in three parallel ranges. The
front or southwestern range rises from the warm, low
plains of northern India to an altitude of 15,000 feet in
many places. Beyond it, toward the northeast, the basin
of Kashmir, at an elevation of from 5000 to 6000 feet above
the sea, interposes a smooth plain between the front range
and the higher middle range. Still farther in the same
direction, the narrow valley of the Indus, which here flows
to the northwest, lies at an elevation of from 8000 to 13,000
feet between the middle range and the still more remote
and lofty main or Ladakh range on the southwestern bor-
der of the great plateau of Tibet and Karakorum.
In order to reach Kashmir, we crossed the front range
by the only low pass, that of Abbotabad, 5000 feet above the
sea, and came up the Jhelum River in the " ekkas," shown
at page 19, two-wheeled native carts, drawn by one horse.
We put our baggage in the lower story and sat in the upper,
sometimes cross-legged behind the taciturn, dark-skinned
Mohammedan drivers, and sometimes beside them. Often
the men got out to walk with their horses, and to feed them
with great sticky lumps of crude sugar with bits of cane
still in it. We, too, walked much of the time, and acquired
keen appetites for the remarkably delicious omelets and
desserts which some of the native cooks managed to pre-
22 THE PULSE OF ASIA
pare at the " dak bungalows " where we spent the nights.
We had not been able to find a satisfactory servant to act
as interpreter, so we talked by signs much of the time, and
found it surprisingly easy.
Kashmir is an excellent example of a kind of warped
basin found in many parts of the world. It is like an el-
liptical tray, a hundred miles long from southeast to north-
west and forty or fifty wide. The rim consists of the front
and middle ranges of the Himalayas, which merge at either
end. The slopes of individual mountains are very steep,
but the rim as a whole is about two miles high and ten
times as wide. During the course of ages, the bottom of
the tray has been warped downward and the rim has been
warped up. The Jhelum River has sometimes, perhaps,
been checked by the rising rim; and the lower part of the
tray has been converted into a lake. In general, however,
the river has been able to cut its way across the gradually
rising mountains just as a circular saw cuts its way into a
piece of wood thrust against it. The result is the deep gorge
of the Jhelum, the peculiar course of which to the southwest
of Kashmir appears on the map. The gorge is so narrow
and impassable in its lower portion that the famous Murree
road, the chief exit from Kashmir, is obliged to leave it and
climb five thousand feet over a pass in order to reach Rawal
Pindi, a few miles west of the point where the river emerges
on the main plain of India. While the Jhelum has been
cutting its gorge, the basin of Kashmir has been receiving
vast deposits of gravel and silt, brought down by the numer-
ous swift streams from the mountains, and deposited on
the flat basin floor to a depth of hundreds or thousands of
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 23
feet. The coarser materials have been laid down on the
edges near the mountains, and have been terraced, which
shows, as we shall see, that the region has been subject to
great variations of climate in the not far distant past. The
finer materials have been carried toward the centre of the
basin, where they form a smooth plain, free from pebbles,
very fertile, easily tilled, and easily watered by canals from
the countless mountain brooks and rivers.
We are apt to think of Kashmir as part of India, and
therefore as necessarily warm. As a matter of fact, it lies
thirty-four degrees north of the equator, in the same lati-
tude as the northern part of South Carolina. In altitude
it stands over 5000 feet above the sea. Consequently the
climate is comparatively cool. From November to March,
it is so cold as to be not only bracing, but even rigorous.
The spring and fall are mild and delightful, and the sum-
mer is warm. The great amount of water spread over the
plain for irrigation, and the summer storms on the moun-
tains, make; that season damp, though but little rain falls
on the plain. The precipitation of Kashmir itself, about
twenty-five inches a year, mostly snow, is not much more
than half as much as that of the eastern and central parts
of the United States. On the mountains the snowfall is
heavier, and hence the rivers and canals of the smooth plain
are always abundantly supplied with water for irrigation.
The temperate climate of the region, combined with the
beautiful scenery, makes Kashmir a most attractive summer
resort for the people of India, especially the English.
From the dawn of history, Kashmir has been occupied by
a single race, Indo-Europeans, allied in blood and language
24 THE PULSE OF ASIA
to the people of the plains south of the Himalayas. The wall
of mountains encircling the Vale has not only made invasion
a rare occurrence, but has restricted external trade and
migration. Hence the Kashmiris, as the inhabitants are
called, have been left largely to work out their own destiny
undisturbed by outside influences. Three religions have
prevailed successively, — Buddhism, Brahmanism, and Mo-
hammedanism; and each has doubtless had its appropriate
effect. Nevertheless, according to Stein, the chief authority
on the historv of Kashmir, the character of the mass of the
people seems to have changed but little since the Buddhist
days, thirteen centuries ago, when the keen Chinese pil-
grim, Hwen Tsiang, described the Kashmiris as " light and
frivolous, and of a weak, pusillanimous disposition; hand-
some in appearance, given to cunning, fond of learning,
and well instructed." Apparently, the character of the
Kashmiris of to-day is largely the result of modifications
produced by physical environment upon the racial traits
which the original settlers brought with them.
Because of the difficulty of crossing the mountain passes,
Kashmir has always been isolated; strangers have rarely
visited the country; the natives have not often gone out.
Hence, as has been often said, the Kashmiri has become
cowardly, exclusive, and suspicious. Until lately he has
hated and feared the few foreigners whom he has seen,
has suspected them of designing evil against himself, and,
naturally, has tried to keep them out. The cowardice of
the Kashmiri outside Kashmir is proverbial; and at home
it is laughable. Several times in the street, when I met men
and unexpectedly turned on them, or asked them questions,
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 25
no matter how mildly, they started and trembled as though
threatened with a pistol; and this is said to be a common
occurrence. Mr. C. E. Biscoe, head of the large schools
of the Church Missionary Society, which even the natives
generally recognize as the best in Kashmir as to both educa-
tion and character-building, introduced compulsory exer-
cise into the curriculum a few years ago. At first the boys,
chiefly Brahmins, with a smaller number of Mohamme-
dans, were abjectly afraid of the water, though they had
lived near it all their lives. In order to make them learn
to swim, it was actually necessary to throw them into the
canals. Now, however, they have learned to do fine work
both in and on the water, and during the last great flood,
which half submerged Srinagar, saved much property and
some lives. To be sure, they are still cowardly; but there
has begun to be a school spirit, which makes them ashamed
to show their fears. Similarly, in football, the boys at first
ran away from one another; but now many of them stand
up pluckily and run the risk of getting hurt, which shows
that though isolation mav have made the Kashmiris cow-
ardly, they have a certain amount of moral fibre capable
of cultivation.
Exclusiveness was carried so far in Kashmir in the Middle
Ages that practically all foreigners were kept out, just as
has been the case more recently in Tibet, perhaps for simi-
lar physical reasons. Even to-day, in spite of the incorpora-
tion of Kashmir in the British Empire, the old ideas prevail
so far that no foreigner can remain in the Vale without a
permit — renewed, I believe, annually; nor can a foreigner
buy or build a house or own land. Natives, or the nat""
26 THE PULSE OF ASIA
government, build to order. That is one reason why house-
boats are so common ; for in a boat, not only does the land-
lord become one's servant, but one can move about freely.
To people who are on the outside and want to get in, the
seclusion of Kashmir seems a bad quality; but it has at least
one advantage. Drew relates how, on the Pir Panjal pass,
to the south of Kashmir, at an elevation of 11,400 feet,
he " found the ground and the snow for two or three miles'
distance strewn with dead locusts [a pest on the plains to
the south], which about the middle of May had been de-
stroyed by the cold in an attempted invasion of Kashmir."
The climate of Kashmir is comparable in some respects
to that of the northeastern part of the United States, al-
though the sun is hotter because of the more southerly
latitude; the summers are more trying because the heat
is more rarely interrupted by showers and cool storms ;
and snow falls earlier in the autumn because of the great
altitude, so that the crops are sometimes ruined by it. The
second day of our stay in Kashmir (March 19) was warm
and clear. Our boat was being towed slowly eastward up
the river by the boys and girls of our native family, who
trudged barefoot along the towpath at the rate of less than
two miles an hour. A stroll on shore in the bright sun among
thatched houses surrounded by orchards, or beside broad
pools, with glimpses of hunters shooting waterfowl with
huge blunderbusses, and a clear view of the wonderful
ellipse of snowy mountains encircling the plain made us
realize that Kashmir can be idyllic. Most of our twenty-
two days in the basin, however, were cold and raw, with
several frosts and a little snow, so that we sympathized
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 27
with the natives, who went about with "gungris " under their
long, dirty, white cotton gowns. The "gungri" resembles
a large flower-pot made inside a wicker basket, with a
protective wicker handle, like the arches of a half dome.
Y\ hen filled with live coals it serves to warm the hands —
or, oftener, the whole body — by being put under the loose
outer robe of either man or woman and held over the
stomach, whether the people are walking or sitting. It is
essentially a lazy man's device; for no one can hold it and
work, and it reflects the habits of the Kashmiri, especially
of the farmer, who in the snow and mud of winter has
nothing to do.
The abundance of the water supply of Kashmir and
the smoothness and softness of the fine soil of the plain
have led to the formation of an intricate network of deep,
slow-moving waterways, partly natural and partly artificial,
difficult to ford but easy to navigate, and often overflowing.
Hence, as Stein points out, the roads are very bad; and as
outside traffic is largely shut out by the mountains, beasts
of burden are rare, wheeled vehicles are practically confined
to the single new thoroughfare down the Jhelum, and traffic
is carried on in boats, the loads being usually borne for
short distances on men's backs. Almost every village is
said to have its landing-place, either close at hand or a
mile or two away; and in Srinagar the crowded river and
the larger canals are the main thoroughfares.
Another effect of the abundant water and fine soil, to-
gether with the hot summer sun, is great fertility. There-
fore food is plentiful and cheap. Rice is naturally the chief
crop ; and though other grains grow well, they are of second-
28 THE PULSE OF ASIA
ary importance. The water-chestnut, shaped like a pair
of stocky cow's horns and dredged from the bottoms of
the streams ; many kinds of greens and vegetables, of which
great quantities are eaten; and fruit, especially apples
and pears, are other profitable crops. Cheap food may be
a blessing, but in Kashmir one is inclined to doubt it. It
seems as though the ease with which a living can be made
were the chief cause of the reputed idleness and laziness
of the people; and laziness, aided, perhaps, by the oppor-
tunities for dishonesty afforded by the large amount of local
traffic and barter which the abundant waterways foster,
may be responsible for much of the untrustworthiness
which is said to be so prominent a trait of the Kashmiris.
In this respect the latter are like the people of many parts
of India; though they are not so lazy, perhaps by reason of
the invigorating winter climate of their mountain home.
Our own life during the two weeks which we spent in
Srinagar in our house-boat was a direct response to the
abundance of water, the smooth plain, the fertility of the soil,
and the consequent cheapness of the necessaries of life. Like
most travelers to Kashmir, we lived in a leisurely fashion.
The snow on the passes delayed our start across the moun-
tains, and the slowness of the people prevented haste of any
sort. We were not eager to get away, for the houses of wood
or brick, with their green grassy roofs, were most quaint;
and the orientalism of the narrow, dirty streets and the busy
life of the pleasanter canals were always of fresh interest.
We went sight-seeing in our own " shakari," or flat-bottomed
boat, with three or four oarsmen. Brahmins squatted
naked on frosty mornings while they bathed at the foot of
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 29
steps leading to little temples with high, top-heavy silvered
domes; market-women passed down the canal with boat-
loads of spinach and turnips from the floating gardens in
the Dal Lake, mere rafts of water-plants strewn with a
little earth ; merry children in twos or threes sang musically
at the tops of their voices; and men clothed in dirty white
walked briskly along the embankments beside the canals,
under the fine bur-covered chenar trees, just as old Hwen
Tsiang reports them to have done long ago. Except for
the fast walking, — fast compared to that of India, — the
general appearance was leisurely. The Kashmiris, as has
been said, have a reputation for laziness ; but when I watched
them working, they seemed to show a good deal of energy
and steadiness, though perhaps it was only to keep warm.
Along the canal where we anchored, at least a dozen house-
boats were being built for the accommodation of summer
visitors. All the timber was sawed into planks on the spot
by hand. The men who worked the big saws, one at either
end, kept at work steadily, though the labor is tiresome,
and twice during ten minutes I noticed that when one of
a pair had to stop for something, his comrade went and
helped some one else.
Within the last few decades, a new factor has entered
into the geographic development of Kashmir — namely,
the attraction exercised by its climate and scenery upon the
British sojourners in India. The Aesthetic element of love
of scenery and the rational element of choosing a place
for a home for the sake of its favorable climate, though
strictly geographic factors, exist only in highly civilized
communities. Therefore, in the past they have been of
30 THE PULSE OF ASIA
small importance; but as their significance is more and more
appreciated, it is probable that they will exert a growing
and even a preponderating influence upon the distribution
of intelligent people in countries not blessed in general with
the invigorating climate of the cool temperate zone. To-
day, for instance, India is governed from the small hill-
station of Simla rather than from hot Calcutta; and retired
Indian officers and civil servants who cannot return to
England are beginning to see in Kashmir a place where
it is possible to settle permanently in spite of the restric-
tions imposed by the native government. Already the great
influx of summer visitors has caused a considerable number
of Kashmiris to become servants or keepers of house-boats ;
a distinct impetus — not always beneficial, because it en-
courages the use of cheaper, less durable dyes — has been
given to the highly developed native arts of rug-weaving,
shawl-making, and embroidery; and the merchant class,
though always noted for their habit of fastening on a victim,
have become more rapacious than ever. Indeed, the mer-
chants are the bane of the foreigner's life in Srinagar.
They come in boats and on foot; in the guise of beggars
and of princes; before sunrise, at noon, and at night; they
dog one if he goes for a stroll ; they sit on the bank and wait
for hours to pounce upon the chance visitor. When we
first tied up to the bank of the canal in Srinagar, Subhana,
our factotum, suggestively laid by the door a little willow
cane which might have served as a whip, and, in answer
to our inquiries, remarked laconically, "For merchant."
He evidently appreciated two national traits — the choleric
temperament of the British officer from India and the
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 31
impudent persistence of the otherwise timorous Kashmiri
merchant. A typical specimen of the latter stood on the
muddy shore one day as I sat on deck in the rare sunshine,
and, holding up a gaudy red felt, began: "See, master,
here numda [felt] very cheap. Master buy him cheap."
No reply from the traveler.
"Only look, master. No buy; only look." A pause.
'You wanting other kind felt? I bringing him, very best."
Still no reply.
"I good man, master, honest man. Read my letter"
(holding out a well-thumbed bunch wheedled out of a score
of foreigners whom he had cheated). "Only read, master.
I not like other man. I good man."
"No, put them up; I don't want your felts," I answered
at last.
" I got boots, master," — trying a new tack. " I am leather
man. I new man. I no been here before, master." He had
been there an hour a day for three days, had tried to inter-
cept us as we went to make a call, and had shouted to us
from the bank as we rowed down the main canal.
Long interval, broken only by such remarks as "Very
good," "Cheap," "Only look," "Oh, master, look!"
At last a new effort. " What time you say I coming to-
morrow morning? Eight o'clock? Very well. I brino--
in£ many shoe."
Half an hour of this sort of thing made me regret that
the cane had been put away.
The problem of transportation furnishes another illus-
tration of the influence which the invasion of Europeans
in summer is having upon Kashmir. On leaving Srinagar
32 THE PULSE OF ASIA
on our way to Ladakh or Little Tibet, two hundred miles
eastward across the main range of the Himalayas, we first
spent a delightful spring day in floating slowly ten miles
westward down the Jhelum, and in being towed still more
slowly seven miles northward up the tributary Sind to the
head of navigation at Gunderbal. There we dismissed
the house-boat ; and then, for two short stages, shaggy little
ponies, secured as a right from the villagers by means of a
pass from the British Resident at Srinagar, carried us east-
ward up through the lovely scenery of the Sind valley —
among spreading walnut trees (often used as haystacks),
among mossy rocks, dashing brooks, and straw-thatched
houses. On April 6, at an elevation of about 7000 feet,
we encountered snow too deep for horses, and were obliged
for nine days to walk and have the loads carried by coolies.
When the first detachment of men was being procured at
Gund, a great uproar in the muddy courtyard called us
out from our smoky, windowless room to the second-story
balcony, among the cows which had ambitiously mounted
the broad flight of stone steps. In their usual fashion, the
chief men of the village were delaying matters because snow
was falling and the road might be bad. Our headman, a
remarkably trustworthy and energetic Mohammedan from
Ladakh or Little Tibet, had knocked down one village
official into the mud, and had beaten another with a stick.
Nobody seemed resentful, and nobody stopped talking.
Apparently, they looked upon violence as the logical result
of their obstructiveness ; but not enjoying it, they speedily
gathered the necessary band of thirty-five coolies. The
latter did not want to go. Who would, if he had to carry a
i
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 33
sixty-pound load over roads where even the unloaded " Sa-
hib " grows weary ? For six days the same band of coolies
trudged through the deep snow. The first day rain fell,
and our pathway was full of slush. The coolies wore no-
thing on their feet except grass sandals, a pair of which
only last a day or two. At the end of our day's journey we
stopped at one of the little " bungalows," or rest-houses,
built by the government. The men sat down by a fire in
a dark room full of pungent smoke, dried their feet and
clothes, ate their supper of bread, and set to work to repair
their sandals, or to make new ones from the bundles of grass
which they had brought with them. The next day was
clear, and the hot sun, reflected from the fresh snow, burnt
our faces in a way troublesome even to the hardened coolies.
By ten o'clock the snow had begun to melt, and to thunder
into the narrow valley-bottom in avalanches. More than
once the men began to run, thinking that the snow was
about to overwhelm them. Fortunately, no avalanche quite
reached us, although toward noon the roar was almost con<-
tinuous as the snow plunged down on every side. The finest
avalanches were those which came down little gullies in the
steep mountain side, and at the bottom cascaded into the
main valley. The precipices, over which they fell in spray,
were due apparently to the steepening of the lower part of
the valley sides by ancient glaciers which have now retired.
The third day, like the second, was clear and painfully
sunny. As we were now above Sonamarg, where the valley
has been much broadened by glacial erosion, all danger
from avalanches was at an end. Nevertheless, we could see
and hear them on every side; and long white streaks among
34 THE PULSE OF ASIA
the pines showed where unusually large avalanches had
swept away all the trees. It was colder now, for we were
at an elevation of over 8000 feet. As the snow was dry,
the men swathed their feet and legs in crude "putties,"
mere strips of woolen cloth, wound round and round and
tied with strings. We spent the night in a so-called rest-
house, a mere shed, where no one could rest because of
the smoke. A tremendous wind swooping down the valley
woke us at two o'clock, and at three we were under way.
In the clear light before sunrise we tramped through the
cold blue shadows on the hard crust to the top of our first
great Himalayan pass, Zoji La, 11,300 feet above the sea.
The men's wages, according to the official scale, were
eight cents a day, except for especially hard stretches,
where they got ten. As nothing is ever paid for the return
journey, four or five cents a day was all that they were
entitled to for the most exhausting labor; but the means
of supporting life in Kashmir are so cheap that with this
they were able not only to pay for their own food, chiefly
bread and rice, but to support their families. In spite of
their unwillingness to go, the men seemed cheerful in their
stolid way, and chattered like magpies when they came in
for the night. A present of a little tea all around made
them quite jovial.
The bearing of burdens by coolies is a necessity, if com-
munication is to be kept up among the snowy mountains
of Kashmir; but its influence is distinctly bad, encouraging
brutality and violence on the part of employers, and engen-
dering deceit, laziness, and selfishness in the men-of -burden.
Our coolies engaged in regular fights for the lightest load,
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 35
and some of the more clever ones constructed mock loads
by wrapping a rope or some other light, bulky thing in
cloth and staggering off with it. Nothing but government
compulsion could make them do the work except for exor-
bitant hire, although they are accustomed to carry their
own loads on their backs. If the people should become
more educated or more independent, they would refuse to
act as coolies, and some new means of transport would be
necessary. Among the changes which will in time come to
Kashmir, the introduction of a new system of transportation
among the snowy mountains may perhaps be reckoned;
for on the one hand, education is beginning to spread,
though as yet it is limited largely to the cities, and on the
other, the demand for coolie labor and the disinclination
of the people to perform it are increasing with the growing
invasion of Kashmir by English tourists and sportsmen.
The old order is passing away in the Vale of Kashmir,
and it may not be long before the simple geographic con-
ditions produced by the long and undisturbed residence
of a homogeneous race in the seclusion of their mountain-
girt basin will give place to the complexity arising from a
mixture of races and the invasion of new habits and ideas.
Since the opening of the new wagon-road down the Jhelum,
external trade and intercourse of all kinds have received
a powerful impetus; and when the projected electric rail-
road from Srinagar to Rawal Pindi, run by power from
the Jhelum, is completed, the isolation of Kashmir will
be almost destroyed. Pronounced changes in trade, and
in the distribution, habits, industries, and even character
of the natives, together with the development of a new
36 THE PULSE OF ASIA
and comparatively permanent English element of popu-
lation are likely to follow.
From prophecies of the future to legends of the past
is a far cry, but the two are closely related. Both alike
depend largely on climate. The earliest description of
Kashmir is that of Hwen Tsiang, a pious Chinese priest
of Buddhist faith, and a most keen observer. Being dis-
turbed by the discrepancies in the holy Buddhist books,
he traveled far and wide in China in order to consult
the most reliable manuscripts, but found no satisfaction.
Accordingly, he resolved on a pilgrimage to India, the
home of Buddha, where he hoped to learn the truth.
After many difficulties, occasioned first by the law prohib-
iting any Chinese from leaving their country and later by
the frightful deserts of western China, he reached India.
There he remained some years, making a pilgrimage to
all the holy places, much as certain Buddhists of high
rank from Japan have recently done. On his return to
China in 645 a. d. with many precious manuscripts, he
wrote a lively account of his journey, full of miracles and
wonders, but, nevertheless, verv reliable. One of his stories
relates the traditional history of Kashmir. According to this
story, — which is repeated with fuller details by Kalhana,
a native historian of the twelfth centurv, whose works have
been translated by Stein, — Kashmir was long ago covered
by a lake, in which lived the demon Jalodbhava (Water-
born). The demon caused great distress to all neighboring
nations by devastations, the nature of which is not stated.
Finally Kasyapa, the father of all fountain-gods, heard of
this from his son Nila, the king of the Kashmir fountain-
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 37
gods, and promised to punish the offender. He proceeded
to the seat of Brahma to implore his aid and that of
the other gods. His prayer being granted, the whole host
of heaven took up their position on the lofty peaks about
Kashmir, and ordered Jalodbhava to leave his watery
home. This the demon, who was invincible while in the
water, refused to do. Vishnu thereupon called on his bro-
ther, Balabhadra, to drain the lake by piercing the moun-
tain with his weapon, the plowshare. When the lake had
become dry, Jalodbhava was attacked by Vishnu, and,
after a fierce combat, slain with the god's war-disc.
Kasyapa then settled the land of Kashmir, which had
thus been produced, the gods as well as the fountain-spirits
taking up their abodes in it, while the various goddesses
adorned the land in the shape of rivers. At first men in-
habited the land only during the six summer months, and
withdrew to warmer regions each winter, leaving Kashmir
during the cold season to the Pisacas, the vilest and most
malignant of Hindu demons. At length, however, after
four yugas or ages, the Brahman Caandradera learned cer-
tain rites which freed the country from the Pisacas and from
excessive cold; and Kashmir became habitable throughout
the year. Stein and Drew, two of the most careful writers
on Kashmir, regard this tradition as founded not on his-
torical fact, but on inference from the lake-like appear-
ance of the basin, and from the fact that during floods Lake
Wular is subject to considerable fluctuations in size. It is
possible that the legend of an ancient lake, drained by the
plowshare of a god, might originate in this way, but there
is nothing in the physical features of Kashmir to give rise
38 THE PULSE OF ASIA
to the circumstantial details of the great cold of antiquity,
the long prevalence of winter, the occupation of the coun-
try by nomads at first during only half the year, and the
later change to conditions adapted to agriculture. The cir-
cumstantial character of the legend and the agreement of
the details with physiographic facts in Kashmir and else-
where, as will shortly appear, give ground for believing that
the story is founded on fact.
Another legend, also quoted by Stein, relates how, after
the drying up of the lake, the site was occupied by a town
called Candrapura. A certain holy man, coming to the
town and being refused entertainment, cursed it, and fore-
told its destruction by water. Later, a fountain-god, who
visited the country in the guise of an old Brahman, asked
and obtained permission to settle in the town, and then out
of gratitude revealed himself in his true form and warned
the king of the prospective submersion of the city. The
king and his people accordingly migrated a short distance
westward and, under the god's direction, founded a new
town. Then the god took up his residence in the lake, which
soon overwhelmed the old city. The natives say that ruins,
supposed to be those of this city, have been seen at the
bottom of Lake Wular.
Turning from legend to attested history, it appears that
Kashmir, now and always, has suffered more or less from
famine, due, not to drought, as in so many countries, but
to floods, which drown the rice crop. In the time of King
Avantivarman, a. d. 855-883, as Stein, on the authority
of Kalahana, relates, Kashmir had long been suffering
from peculiarly disastrous floods of this sort, and from
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 39
the general water-logged condition of the country. Many
attempts had been made to mend matters, and at last, to
quote Stein, "Suyya, a man of conspicuous talents but
low origin, offered to remedy the troubles. The operations
commenced at Yaksadara, where large rocks, which had
rolled down from the mountains lining both river-banks,
obstructed the Vitasta (Jhelum). . . . Yaksadara, the pre-
sent Dyaragul, is a spur projecting into the river-bed some
three miles below the commencement of the Baramula
gorge. Its rocky foot forms the first rapid of the river [after
it leaves the Kashmir plain]. By removing the obstruct-
ing rocks, the level of the river was lowered. Then a stone
dam was constructed across the bed of the river, and the
latter thus blocked up completely for seven days. During
this time the river-bed was cleared at the bottom, and
stone walls constructed to protect it against rocks which
might roll down. The dam was then removed, and the river
flowed forth with increased rapidity through the cleared
passage. I must leave it to competent engineering opinion
to decide to what extent and at which point of the Bara-
mula gorge the operations so far described were practicable
with the technical skill of that age. What follows in Kal-
hana's account is so matter-of-fact, and so accurate in
topographical points, that a presumption is raised as to the
previous statements, also resting, partially at least, on his-
torical facts."
Yaksadara, the seat of the operations, lies directly oppo-
site the mouth of a large stream which, in the ten miles from
its source near Gulmarg, descends seven thousand feet. It
appears as though, at the time of Avantivarman, the large
40 THE PULSE OF ASIA
fan-delta deposited by this stream where it enters the narrow
main valley had encroached upon the Jhelum and raised
its level, just as has happened at many other places lower
down — for instance, at Uri, where the front of the fan
was in later times cut off by the river. The process of cut-
ting off the front of the Yaksadara fan, though begun arti-
ficially under the direction of Suyya, probably continued
naturally during later centuries; for the level of the Wular
Lake appears to have fallen steadily, as though the river were
slowly deepening its channel by cutting away the fans and
other material in the bottom of its valley, thus forming a
terrace. In proof of this fall of the lake-level, Stein cites
certain villages which Kalhana, 1148 a. d., seems to indi-
cate as having been actually reclaimed from the lake, and
which Jonajara, circa 1450 a. d., still places on its very
edge, although now they are three miles from its border.
Similarly, Srivara, circa 1480 a. d., speaking of the neigh-
boring villages stretching from Sudarkoth (Sadykoot) to
Andarkoth (Andykoot), places them along the shore of the
lake, although they are now from four to six miles away.
Stein attributes the change in the relation of the villages
to the lake to the building up of the delta of the Jhelum,
where it enters Lake Wular. This cause, however, though
doubtless operative, is inadequate to produce results so
great, especially when it is considered that some of the
marshy regions to the south of the lake away from the delta
have also become drier. The chief cause is probably the
lowering of the level of the lake by the deepening of the
outlet channel — a process which appears to be still in
operation, as may be inferred from the " winding but well-
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 41
defined bed" which the river has cut in recent times, and
is evidently still deepening, from the outlet of the lake to
the head of the gorge.
Putting aside all unnecessary details, the following out-
line of events appears to fit the legends and facts related
in the last few paragraphs. Long ago, in prehistoric times,
the basin of Kashmir contained a lake much larger than
that of to-day. The lake was partially drained by the deep-
ening of the channel at the head of the gorge of Baramula,
where, it should be remembered, the river would encoun-
ter only unconsolidated deposits. After this, or at this very
time, the climate was so cold, or the winter snows were so ,
abundant and lasted so long, that the country could be
inhabited only in summer by nomads who migrated south-
ward in winter. In time, however, the climate moder-
ated, and Kashmir became the abode of a permanent and
prosperous agricultural community. At the height of its
prosperity, a new difficulty appeared. By reason of the
building up of the bottom of the gorge near Baramula, the
lake began to expand again, and to overwhelm inhabited
villages. Many attempts were made to remedy matters,
and success was finally attained, after which the river itself
w T as able to deepen its channel, instead of letting itself be
checked by the waste brought in by its tributaries.
The size of the legendary lake of the earliest traditions ,
suggests at first thought that the water supply then was
larger than at present. This is not necessarily so; the
lake would be most likely to expand in a dry epoch. It
is not a question of water supply, as in the case of salt
lakes in enclosed basins, but simply of how the Jhelum
42 THE PULSE OF ASIA
River came to be so checked that a small portion of its
superabundant water was detained in a lake. At present
Wular Lake is about twelve miles long north and south
by about six east and west, and, according to Stein, has a
maximum depth of fifteen feet. It is surrounded on all
sides by alluvial deposits, which have been built up in such
a way as to leave at the base of the northern mountains
the faint hollow in which the lake lies. The formation of
the broad dam, so to speak, which holds back the lake,
is due largely to the deposition of alluvial fans by the trib-
utaries which come in from the north and south near
the mouth of the Baramula gorge. In a moister epoch the
forces of erosion would be less active upon the mountain
slopes because of the thicker cover of vegetation; the
streams, though large, would not be very heavily loaded
with detritus, and the tendency would be to cut away the
fans and similar deposits which had previously been laid
down, and to drain the lake. On the advent of a drier
epoch, on the other hand, the forces of erosion would be
more active upon the mountain slopes, and the average size
of the fragments carried away would be greater because of
the diminution in vegetation and in the number of roots
which would hold the soil in place; the streams, especially
the shorter, steeper tributaries, would be not only more
heavily loaded, but also smaller; and the valley bottoms,
with their comparatively gentle slopes, would become areas
of deposition. Where the swifter tributaries joined the
slower main stream, they would tend to build up fans which
the main stream, also diminished in volume and bearing
a greater load, might not be able to remove. Thus the fans
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 43
would form dams; and, paradoxical as it may seem, lakes
would be formed in drier epochs and drained in moister
epochs.
From a study of the moraines and terraces of the moun-
tains and valleys around Kashmir, it appears that during
the so-called " Glacial " period this part of Asia underwent
the same series of climatic changes as did Europe and
America. There were at least five complete oscillations from
the colder, moister climate of glacial epochs to the warmer,
drier climate of inter-glacial epochs like the present. This
does not mean, however, that the whole country was shrouded
in ice. The glaciers in the mountains expanded somewhat, *
but the chief characteristic of the colder epochs was the
great abundance of moisture manifested especially in the
large size and constancy of the rivers. Hence the term
" fluvial " is more fitting than "glacial," and I shall use it in
referring to the period of great rivers and lakes which forms
the Asiatic equivalent of the period of enormous glaciers in
Europe. As I have elsewhere considered the fluvial period
of Asia in detail, it will suffice here to show how the physio-
graphy of Kashmir confirms the legendary account of the
country, and how the two are in complete harmony with the
evidences of changes of climate which are found in other
parts of Asia. 1 As has been already said, many facts in west-
ern and central Asia suggest that during the past two or three
1 For a full discussion of the fluvial period in Asia, see Explorations in
Turkestan, vol. 1, Publication No. 26 of the Carnegie Institution of Wash-
ington, 1905. Later investigation has led me to believe that the five epochs
described in that book and referred to alxrve were really postglacial stages
representing the pulsatory steps by which the last glacial climate passed
away. Similar moraines indicate what are probably synchronous post-
glacial stages in Europe and North America.
44 THE PULSE OF ASIA
thousand years the climate of those regions has passed
through four successive phases. Up to the first or second
century of our era, it appears to have been distinctly colder
and moister than at present. Then, for several hundred
years, it grew rapidly warmer and drier, until in the fifth
or sixth centuries the desert regions were even more arid
than to-day. During the succeeding mediaeval epoch, the
climate again became slightly cooler and moister; while
during modern times, there is a general, though slight
tendency toward aridity. The earliest legend demands a
large lake. Physiographic evidence shows that such a
lake was probably formed during the dry interfluvial epoch
preceding or possibly synchronous with the occupation of
Kashmir by man.
Evidence as to the succeeding epoch is more definite and
more completely harmonious. The legend points to a cold
period, during which Kashmir was not habitable in winter,
and during which the lake that occupied the plain was
drained by the cutting of a deeper channel. Physiography,
as we have seen in the discussion of the paradoxical origin
of lakes, seems to show that if there were a lake larger than
that of to-day, it must have been drained during one of the
moist epochs of which the terraces furnish independent
evidence. In Transcaspia, Persia, and Turkestan, other
lines of research indicate that two thousand or more years
ago the water supply was decidedly larger than now, the
country was colder, and the desert regions were more habit-
able. Putting together all these conclusions, there seems
to be reason for believing that a fluvial epoch, culminating
somewhere in remote antiquity, had not yet wholly passed
THE VALE OF KASHMIR 45
away at the beginning of the Christian era, and was the
time indicated in the legend when Kashmir was too cold to
be inhabited, except in summer, by nomads. Even to-day
the snowfall of Kashmir is so great that agriculture can-
not be carried on at an elevation of much over 7000 feet;
and on the plain itself, at an elevation of from 5000 to 6000
feet, early snows sometimes cause disaster by destroying
the rice crop. It would need but a slight increase in cold or
in snowfall to render the whole country unfit for agriculture
and habitable only for nomadic shepherds, who would drive
their flocks southward in winter, away from the snow, to
the warm, low plain beyond the mountains. Such we may
reasonably believe to have been the condition of Kashmir
before it appears in history near the opening of the Chris-
tian era.
By the sixth or seventh centuries of that era, as history
shows, Kashmir had acquired nearly its present prosperous
character, and not long after was suffering from the filling
of the channel of the Jhelum with detritus from the moun-
tains, and the consequent expansion of the lakes. Such pros-
perity and such disaster would naturally result from a rela-
tively dry or warm epoch like that which appears to have
occurred during the first six or eight centuries of the Chris-
tian era. On the one hand, agriculture would be stimulated,
and on the other, fans of boulders and gravel would be
deposited in the river bed, causing the lake to rise, and
perhaps to submerge villages.
As to the possible succeeding mediaeval epoch of some-
what lower temperature and greater rainfall, there is little
to be said. The deepening of the channel of the Jhelum and
46 THE PULSE OF ASIA
the slight lowering of the level of the Wular Lake are the
results to be expected under such circumstances, as are
also the famines, which Stein, on the authority of Kalhana,
describes as taking place in the twelfth century because of
. prematurely early snowfalls. Similarly, the complete freez-
ing over of the Jhelum, described by Kalhana in 1087-
88 a. d., and the extreme isolation of Kashmir during the
Middle Ages, would be natural if the winters were more
severe and the passes more snowy than now. Altogether,
the history of Kashmir, as well as its present condition and
future development, seems to depend upon climate more
than upon any other physical feature. Changes of climate
appear to have caused a population of a few scattered no-
mads to give place to a far denser population of tillers of the
soil and artisans, whose mode of life and whose character
are wholly different from those of wandering shepherds.
And the present climate, in cooperation with other physi-
cal features, exerts a strong influence upon the habits and
character of the people, and upon the lines of development
which must be pursued in the future under the changing
conditions of English occupation.
CHAPTER II
LADAKH AND THE INFLUENCE OF THE
HIMALAYAS
A HE habitable portion of the upper Indus valley consti-
tutes Ladakh. Upstream to the southeast in Tibet, the
valley cannot be permanently occupied above an elevation
of 12,000 feet; downstream from an elevation of 9000 feet
to the point where the river emerges on the low plains of
India, it narrows to an impassable canyon, where there is
no room for habitation. Between the cold gravel plains
of Tibet and the magnificent canyon, the sunny province
of Ladakh lies warm and contented in its narrow valley.
Although governed by the native Indian state of Kash-
mir, under British regulation, it is essentially Tibetan in
character, not only physically, but in respect to race, lan-
guage, and religion. The people are mainly Buddhists, with
a few Mohammedans at Leh and in the western villages.
To resume our narrative where it was interrupted by the
account of the ancient climate of Kashmir, we and our
coolies had reached the pass, or col, of Zoji La, 11,300 feet
above the sea. We were on our way eastward from Kashmir
to Ladakh, diagonally across the middle range of the Hi-
malayas, here running northwest and southeast. The pass
was fairly difficult, for the ascent from the southwest was
long, steep, and snowy, and the descent on the other side
toward the Indus, though gentle, was at first through deep
snow. The other approaches to Ladakh are much more
48 THE PULSE OF ASIA
difficult". Aside from Zoji La, the passes southwest of the
Indus rise to heights of 15,000 feet or more, and those to the
north, as we found later, are still higher. The easiest line
of communication within Ladakh itself is along the Indus,
but this does not furnish an easy avenue of approach from
without. Upstream to the southeast, a difficult caravan jour-
ney of three months over the snow and barren gravel of
Tibet separates Leh from Lhassa, the next important centre
of population in that direction. Downstream, where the
Indus turns to the south and breaks through the middle and
front ranges of the Himalayas, its canyon is so narrow and
impassable that it has never been properly explored. Thus
the isolation of Ladakh is even greater than that of Kashmir.
As might be expected, there is a radical change when one
passes from the moist, forested southwest base of the middle
range, with its easy conditions of life, to the northeast side,
where most of the moisture from the Indian Ocean is shut
out by the mountains, and life responds to a drier, sterner,
more bracing climate. The mountains are rock}^ and bare,
naked of vegetation, save for a few scattered weeds and
small bushes. Irrigation, the only possible means of rais-
ing crops, is far more difficult than in Kashmir. Perennial
streams are rare, and the only land smooth enough for cul-
tivation consists of small patches of the extremely stony
surface of fluvial fans and terraces. The uncouth dweller
among the loftier Himalayas must work hard more than
half the year in order to live, while his Kashmiri neighbor
across the mountains, whom he despises as lazy, cowardly,
and dishonest, can sit idly on his heels much of the time,
and yet live comfortably.
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIMALAYAS 49
There are other equally marked differences between the
two sides of the mountains. The Kashmiri's food consists
chiefly of rice, with some bread and many vegetables ; while
the Ladakhi eats bread or parched flour of wheat or barley,
with much butter, sour milk, and dried apricots. The Kash-
miris wear clothes of woven cotton, or rarely of wool; but
the Ladakhis, in a colder climate with greater extremes,
need something warmer, which they find in the skins of their
many flocks. Men, women, and children wear sheepskins,
which take the form of coats with the men, and of circular
capes, carefully arranged, with the women. Again, in Kash-
mir, the abundant precipitation and consequent forests have
led the people to build their houses largely of wood, with
sloping roofs to shed the rain; beyond the mountains, on
the other hand, the rarity of rain and consequently of
timber has induced another type of architecture — one or
two story houses of rough stones plastered with mud, and
covered with flat roofs of mud, supported on beams and
bushes.
At Matayan, the second village east of Zoji La, a friendly
villager invited me to dive down from the crust which cov-
ered eight or ten feet of snow into a one-story house like
that shown opposite page 48. We were still at an elevation
of 10,500 feet, and had not wholly passed beyond the influ-
ence of the abundant precipitation of the Kashmir side of
the mountains. Although it was the 11th of April, the snow,
even on a level, was higher than the tops of the houses.
Where it had been shoveled off the flat roofs, it formed
high banks protecting them from wind, and making them
the favorite sitting-room at that season, and even in winter;
50 THE PULSE OF ASIA
for the sunshine is always warm in that dry, cloudless cli-
mate. When the little black cows had been driven and
pulled out of the way, I descended to an almost closed shed
used for the two or three hardy sheep and goats, and was
ushered, stooping, into a dark stable containing a little
pony, shaggy like all the animals. Bending low once more,
I climbed over a high sill, and was in the warm, close, fam-
ily living-room. Light and air came in through a hole in
the roof a foot square, surmounted by a chimney-pot a foot
high, made of three stones set up to. keep out the snow..
A few bits of ragged cloth on the mud floor for sleeping
purposes, a half-dozen metal utensils, and an iron pot full
of Himalayan tea, kept warm over some embers of dried
dung, comprised all the visible equipment for housekeep-
ing. After my host had persuaded me to take a seat on the
floor, a half-palsied old woman insisted upon twice ladling
out for me a bowl of tea. It was surprisingly good in view
of the fact that a poor grade of leaves had been steeped
half an hour or more with milk, butter, salt, and soda. In
richer houses I was often served with tea which had been
improved by being churned violently in a slender, greasy
black churn, twenty inches long by four in diameter, in
order to mix the rancid butter well into the compound
before it was poured into the drinking-bowls.
As we sipped our tea, my host said that because of the
unusually stormy winter, the snow, which was then nearly
twelve feet deep, would not melt till June, two weeks later
than the regular time. He went on to say that the earth,
which we had seen scattered over many acres of the deep
snow, had been dug up in the fall, stored in the stables and
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIMALAYAS 51
houses all winter, and had now been spread over the fields
to hasten the melting of the snow.
Although our friendly entertainers were Kashmiris, who,
with their neighbors, had been brought across the moun-
tains fifty years before by the government in order to keep
the road to Ladakh open in winter, they had adopted the
habits peculiar to their new environment. It may have been
imagination on my part, but it seemed as if, under the
influence of the more bracing climate, steadier work, and
greater necessity for forethought demanded by the harder
conditions of their new life, the people of Matayan had
become franker, more hospitable, and less suspicious than
their relatives in Kashmir.
Matayan lies in the upper part of the valley of the Dras
River, in the midst of magnificent mountain scenery. The
bottom of the valley is broad and flat and easy to trav-
erse, while the sides rise precipitously 500 or 1000 feet
to a shoulder above which peak after peak rises white
and gleaming to a height of 17,000 or 18,000 feet. When
we passed that way, everything was white except where the
snow had slid in avalanches from some dark precipice of
naked rock. No trees broke the pure expanse; the villages
and the fields where earth had been scattered were but
insignificant spots in a vast world of snow. Even at a dis-
tance of a few hundred yards, the trail that we were to fol-
low was lost in the universal snow, which sparkled and
scorched our faces in the sun, or lay cold and quiet in
the blue shadows. Once some specks appeared far ahead,
which, when we met them, proved to be three stooping boys,
carrying on their backs huge loads of asafcetida cut in the
52 THE PULSE OF ASIA
fall and dried for the sheep and goats. Long ago, a van-
ished glacier ground its way slowly down from the moun-
tains, cutting off projecting spurs, smoothing and broaden-
ing the valley-floor, steepening the walls, and changing the
valley from a gorge with a V-shaped cross-section to a typi-
cal glacial trough, U-shaped, with well-marked shoulders at
the top of the U.
A few miles farther downstream, at the point where the
old glacier came to an end, the trough changed suddenly
to a gorge, and we found that our U became a V. The road,
ceased to follow the broad valley-floor near the river, for
there was no room beside the water. The stream flowed be-
tween the steep cliffs of narrow terraces of gravel, like those
of Kashmir, which filled the bottom of the V. Along these
we made our way, finding the path level and easy except
where it crossed the narrow gullies of frequent tributary
torrents. At Karbu we found the terraces pitted with numer-
ous tunnels, dug for gold which is contained in the gravel.
There we met an English engineer prospecting for a mining
company. He was disgusted with the meagre quantity of
gold; it was not worth looking at, he said. He had found
just one thing that interested him — a fragment of good gold
ore said to have come from a mine near Lhassa owned by
Buddhist lamas. The engineer was going home to tell his
company that Tibet was the place to hunt for gold.
The terraces furnish not only the one source of mineral
wealth in this poor region, but the only level land avail-
able for agriculture. Though they are extremely narrow
and rocky, fields and hamlets are located upon them wher-
ever water is available for irrigation. The difficulty expe-
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIMALAYAS 53
rienced in bringing water to the places where it is wanted
is enormous. At Hard us, for instance, on the Dras River
near the mouth of the Suru, we saw that a mountain stream
had been diverted into a little canal and carried along the
precipitous side of the valley for three or four miles at a
height of over a thousand feet above the river. Far below,
in some characteristically rocky fields, irrigated from an-
other canal, women with baskets slung on their backs were
laboriously gathering the stones which had worked up dur-
ing the winter.
The glacial features of the upper part of the valley and
the terraces of the middle both appear to owe their origin
to the great series of climatic changes of which we have al-
ready found evidence in Kashmir. It is difficult to assign
any date to the later changes on the basis of local evidence.
The general freedom of the fronts of the glaciers among the
lofty mountains from large amounts of detritus and the
withdrawal of some of them from their moraines show that
the glaciers are on the whole diminishing in size; this sug-
gests that the climate is becoming warmer or drier. Work-
man, however, mentions the case of one glacier which has
recently advanced, though the advance may be only tem-
porary. He also mentions finding large trees lying dead at
a height greater than that where even stunted trees now
grow. Probably the trees are relics of the dry epoch dur-
ing the first half of the Christian era, but this has not been
proved. West of the pass of Fotu La, I later saw, at an ele-
vation of 12,400 feet, the ruins of a village which was said to
have been abandoned a few years ago because its springs
dried up — another suggestion of change of climate. The
54 THE PULSE OF ASIA
reported cause of the abandonment of other villages in the
same vicinity is that the streams have undermined and
largely removed the terraces on which the fields were
located.
At Kurgil, where the Suru River joins theDras, we reached
the first large village of Ladakh. Tibet seemed very near.
In fact, we were already in Little Tibet, and our men al-
ways spoke of this, their own country, as Tibet, while they
called Tibet itself, Lhassa. Thus far, the people whom we
had met had been Mohammedans like our servants, but
now we began to meet Buddhists with greasy pig-tails and
big turquoise-studded earrings. When I met the first of
them, I suddenly remembered a book on Ladakh which I
had read years ago, and I saw again the mental pictures
of Buddhist sculptures, monasteries, and prayer wheels that
I had formed as a boy. Nor were they far wrong.
We had left the abundant snow of the Kashmir region,
and were in a region of slight precipitation. Although Kur-
gil lies at an elevation of 9000 feet, the snow had almost
disappeared on April 17th, and the field where I watched a
primitive game of native polo that afternoon was almost dry.
Not one part in a hundred of this rugged country can be
cultivated. As one looks abroad, nothing can be seen but
jagged white peaks and deep, narrow gorges of naked rock,
dull and slate-colored most often, but sometimes of the pale
gray of granite, or tinged with red, brown, and purple.
From the appearance of the map, we had supposed that
our road from Kurgil would follow the Dras River ten miles
farther to the northeast to its junction with the Indus, and
then would go southeast up that stream to Leh. As a mat-
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIMALAYAS 55
ter of fact, the valleys of both rivers here take the form of
narrow gorges, which can be traversed only with the greatest
difficulty. Hence at Kurgil the road turns to the southeast,
leaving the larger valleys, and for forty miles lies almost
parallel to the Indus, keeping ten or twelve miles away,
above the heads of the short tributary gorges, and crossing
two easy passes over 13,000 feet high. Apparently, the deep,
narrow character of the lower reaches of the Dras, Indus,
and other rivers indicates that the Himalayan region, as a
whole, has been recently uplifted in such a way as to accel-
erate the main river and cause it to carve a deep canyon.
Naturally the tributaries have followed suit, much to our
inconvenience, and have converted the lower parts of their
valleys into narrow gorges, although the process of deepen-
ing has not yet had time to reach the upper parts. Thus
the warping of the earth's crust and the last phase of the up-
lifting of the Himalayas, though they took place long before
the earliest recorded human occupation of the country, have
had a very recognizable effect upon man. The process has
not only raised the upper Indus valley to a greater elevation
and intensified its Alpine character, but it has increased the
isolation of the country. It has made the main passes higher,
more snowy, and more difficult to cross; and has obliged
every traveler to Ladakh to traverse two minor passes,
instead of going down the Dras and up the Indus. The Dras
River is typical of Ladakh. The Indus and most of its
tributaries have three distinct parts like the Dras, — at
the head a broad, glacial valley, smooth and easy to trav-
erse, but cold and almost uninhabitable; in the middle a
narrower valley, rendered habitable by its lower altitude and
56 THE PULSE OF ASIA
by the terraces which occupy the bottom ; and at the lower
end a deep, impassable gorge. Sometimes there is no rela-
tively habitable middle part of a valley; and a U-shaped
glacial trough gives place abruptly to a V-shaped canyon.
Nevertheless, the threefold division and its appropriate
response in the habits of organic beings give the essential
features of the geography of Ladakh.
Arid, inhospitable, and rugged as Ladakh may be, its
clear air, bracing climate, and splendid scenery make the
traveler long to return to it. The stony villages and ugly .
people have a peculiar charm. After leaving the Moham-
medan villages in the vicinity of Zoji La and Kurgil, we
had our first glimpse of the genuine Buddhist Ladakh
at the hamlet of Maulbeck. A winding climb of several
hundred feet up a massive tooth of limestone brought us
to a lamasery, two whitewashed buildings with bands of
red around the top, prominent landmarks, perched on a
lofty pinnacle above the broadened upper pari of a bleak
open valley, surrounded by snowy mountains. Two of the
lamas, or monks, clothed in the regulation gowns, caps, and
boots, all of purplish red, received us. One, a young man
of twenty, led us into the dark room which served as a
temple. The other, the head lama, a little, beardless old
man, with a most bland and innocent expression, showed us
his own small room, which appeared to be the real sanc-
tuary. Our guide from the village, a young man wearing a
greasy pig-tail and a long gray gown of wool, prostrated
himself on his knees before the door, and touched his fore-
head to the ground repeatedly. We were not invited to
enter. As we gazed in through the door, the room appeared
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIMALAYAS 57
to be a curiosity shop. Brilliant masks, gaudy banners, and
colored streamers bearing prihted prayers hung from the
walls and ceiling; a row of shelves contained the holy
Buddhist books, oblong packages of long, narrow leaves
wrapped in cloth or leather; small, shining brass bowls
full of water stood on boxes on the floor; and among them
a huge salver of oil, said to be replenished once a year,
bore on its surface an ever-burning wick. The room was
regarded with distinctly more veneration than any of the
holy places which I later saw in other, larger lamaseries,
and the little lama's reverent attitude made us honor it.
When I asked the use of a thin, drum-like object hung
vertically from the ceiling, the lama smiled like a pleased
child. Seating himself before it, he took a sickle-shaped
drumstick in his left hand and a cymbal in his right, and
illustrated the call to prayer. The childlike simplicity of
the two inmates, especially of the old man, impressed me
greatly, as did also the cleanness of the monastery. The
other two or three lamas, one of whom we had met trudg-
ing down the valley, were away on the tours of begging by
which the institution is partly supported.
Later, I visited other lamaseries, including Himis, the
largest, but the impression was by no means so pleasant.
The walls and ceilings of the sacred rooms were crowded
with inartistic and sometimes vulgar paintings; countless
images of Buddha and of saints stood in rows with offer-
ings set before them in the shape of little round bowls of
oil supporting burning wicks, or of conventional flowers
and symbolic forms modeled in dough; and the open
spaces in the middle of the room were filled sometimes with
58 THE PULSE OF ASIA
dusty benches, mere planks six inches above the ground,
on which the lamas sit to read the holy books. In general
there was an appearance of dust and untidiness. Some of
the lamas seemed to be men of ability, and all were friendly,
but the majority appeared coarse, lazy, avaricious, and
sensual. In spite of previous reading as to the resemblance
between Buddhism and the Roman Catholic form of Chris-
tianity as it is seen in the less enlightened countries of
Europe, I was surprised at the closeness of that resem-
blance. It appeared not only in the monastic system, well
known to be almost identical, but in the form of worship,
the lights, the images and pictures, the intricate ritual, the
absolute dependence of the people upon the priests, the reli-
ance of the latter upon spectacular effects, and the faith of
all in charms and set forms of prayers.
It is difficult to say whether the Ladakhi is superstitious
because of his religion, or whether his religion is supersti-
tious because of something in his environment. Certain
it is that few people are more superstitious, or make their
superstition more evident in their religion. In addition to
the frequent lamaseries, we found in almost every village
scores of "chortans," pagoda-shaped structures of mud
and stones, erected partly as receptacles for the ashes of
the dead, and partly as works of religious merit. The
approaches to villages were marked by "manis," which
the Buddhist religiously passes on the left, so that his right
hand may always be toward them. They were long heaps
of rubble, shaped like sheds, with a width of twenty feet, a
height of five or six, and a length of from fifty to a thou-
sand. Each "mani" was covered with hundreds of flat
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIMALAYAS 59
stones, eight or ten inches in diameter, on every one of
which the lamas, "for value received," had inscribed the
universal prayer, "Om mani padme hum," often inter-
preted as "Oh, the jewel of the lotus." The number of
repetitions of this prayer determines the amount of credit
which the worshiper of Buddha lays up for himself in
heaven. In the lamaseries the lamas write it on pieces of
paper, which are put in hollow wooden cylinders about a
foot high and eight inches in diameter. The cylinders are
set up in long rows on the outside of a building at a height
of three or four feet above the ground, and are mounted so
that they revolve easily on vertical axes. Visitors to the
lamaseries as well as the lamas themselves take occasion
to walk past the rows of cylinders and to strike each one
with the right hand in such a way as to cause it to revolve.
Each revolution gives the worshiper as much credit as if
he had himself said, "Om mani padme hum." The lamas
often carry little hand cylinders full of prayers, which they
swing round and round instead of telling their beads.
Every house has its prayer-inscribed streamers of cloth
fluttering from poles on the roof, to keep off demons; and
every man, woman, and child is said to wear a charm for
the same purpose. Streamers are used to cure all varieties
of trouble. At Leh we were shown one set up on a pole
a few months before to prevent the demon of the cattle
plague from killing the yaks and oxen. The people con-
fessed their regret that it had proved a much less effective
preventive than had the drastic measures employed in cer-
tain valleys where all ingress and egress, whether of man
or beast, had been strictly forbidden.
60 THE PULSE OF ASIA
The intensity of the Ladakh's superstition may perhaps
be connected with the impenetrability of his great moun-
tains, fit homes for millions of demons, and with the sudden-
ness of the disasters which overtake him. On a clear dav,
a storm may gather on one of the snowy passes and in an
hour or two overwhelm a whole caravan. Under the influ-
ence of a mild drizzle or of a bit of melting snow, the soil
may be loosened so that avalanches of rock suddenly sweep
down the steep mountain sides to block the roads, kill
travelers, and bury villages. At other times, as happened
at Leh a few years ago, a flood of accumulated snow-water
may burst out of an apparently dry valley, and destroy
houses, fields, and villages. When he sees so many evi-
dences of what he supposes to be the activity of demons,
small wonder that the Ladakhi becomes nervous, and thinks
it wise to save his crops from drought and frost by hiring a
red lama to sit beside his field while it is being sown, and
read all day from a leaf of the holy book. And it is equally
wise to keep demons out of the house by smearing the lintels,
doorposts, and corners with blood or red paint, a custom
curiously suggestive of that of the ancient Israelites.
In spite of his fears, the Ladakhi is famous for his good
humor, partly, perhaps, because of the clearness and invigo-
rating quality of the mountain air, which undeniably tends
to put the traveler in high spirits. I had an illustration of
the good temper of the Ladakhis during a two weeks'
trip from Leh to Lake Pangong, sixty miles to the east, on
the border of Tibet. On the way it was necessary to use
coolies in crossing the pass of Chang La, 18,400 feet high,
over the most remote and lofty of the three ranges of the
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIMALAYAS 61
Himalayas. On arriving toward sunset at Sukti, the last
village on the southwest side of the mountains, I told the
"lumbadar," or headman, that I wanted seven coolies to
be ready to start at two in the morning, so that we might
reach the pass before the snow began to grow soft in the
hot May sun, and so get over in a single day. Although at
nine o'clock, when I went to bed, nothing appeared to
have been done, at about eleven a crowd of men filed into
the room, headed by the lumbadar. The pass was very
bad, they said in Ladakhi, which Ibrahim, my Mohamme-
dan servant from Leh, interpreted for me into Turki. To
go over to-morrow was impossible. All the men in the vil-
lage were willing to go, but they were not ready. Would I
not take two days to go over ? — putting their hands to-
gether, and bending low in supplication. Their shoes were
bad, and must be mended, and they must get new strips of
cloth in which to wrap their legs. Here they all showed
their ragged garments and foot-gear. Would I not delay
the start till daybreak to-morrow ? — bending again in sup-
plication. They did not want pay. Five men would go for
the wages of one. The result was that we took two days
for the pass. If the breathless climb and labored descent
through the snow made the coolies as weary as it did me,
their supplication is not to be wondered at. When they
turned back, Ibrahim, by a mistake, afterward rectified,
paid them only twelve cents apiece instead of twenty-two.
They accepted it without complaint, and said, "Ju! ju!"
the usual Ladakhi greeting, as if most grateful.
On returning across the pass, May 13, my six young
Ladakhi coolies were even more cheerful, and acted as col-
62 THE PULSE OF ASIA
lege boys might in America. Going up the pass they sang a
little, but a temperature of eight degrees Fahrenheit at half
past six in the morning, and a steep ascent through snow,
made it necessary to attend strictly to business. Coming
down, however, they sang vigorously and musically for
hours, sometimes all together, and sometimes one alone* the
others joining in the chorus. From the laughter and gestures
it appeared that they often inserted sentiments about one
another. In the intervals of singing they cracked jokes,
and did " stunts " in the way of running down steep places
with their loads, conduct utterly different from that of the
sober professional coolies whom we had employed a month
before in Kashmir.
Another incident illustrating Ladakhi character occurred
one noon when we reached the village of Ibrahim's parents-
in-law. Nothing would do but that I must go in and have
a cup of tea. So in I went, by a devious way, through the
stable and up some stone stairs to the second story and the
large living-room, low and smoky. Sooty cobwebs hung
in festoons from the shining black rafters of the flat roof,
smoke-blackened heads of barley were tied as ornaments,
or as votive offerings, about the capitals of the wooden pil-
lars, and two long shelves supported a row of black pots and
pewter plates. The glory of the house was the mud oven
about two feet high, with several openings for pots. Its sides
were neatly adorned with clay bas-reliefs of flowers. The
chief defect was the absence of an effective chimnev. An
entire goat-skin, open only at the neck, served as a bellows.
I was given the seat of honor on the floor in a corner, where
a little mattress, hard, thin, and square, was placed for my
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIMALAYAS 63
benefit. I carefully moved it to an uncomfortable place
near the smoking stove. I did not enjoy the heat, nor the
smell of cooking fat, but my head was close to the single
small hole in the wall, through which a mild gust of wind
occasionally thinned the smoke. "Talkan," or parched
flour, stirred into a paste with Himalayan tea, sugar, and
plenty of melted butter, was placed before me, and was
followed by a bowl of salt tea, flat cakes of bread, and
fried eggs, the latter most unsavory in appearance, but not
unappetizing. The visit seemed to give real pleasure to
the household. Whenever I looked at the wrinkled little
mother-in-law, she made a half curtsey, jerked her hand
to her forehead, and smilingly said, "Ju!" In spite of
being a Mohammedan, the only one in the village, she was
unveiled, and went about freely among the men like the
Buddhist women.
The position of women among the Ladakhis, as among
the Tibetans, of whom, it will be remembered, they are a
branch, is peculiar because of the practice of polyandry.
This custom, like the prevalence of monasticism, as sev-
eral writers have pointed out, is probably due chiefly to
the limited amount of land available for cultivation, and
to the consequent necessity of restricting population. If
two brothers from a family of three have a single wife, and
if the other becomes a lama, the entire family heritage of
fields can be kept undivided, and a single house will serve
for the whole family. But the question at once arises,
What becomes of the daughters for whom there can be no
husbands under such a system? There do not seem to be
any. For some unexplained reason, girls appear to be less
64 THE PULSE OF ASIA
numerous than boys, as I was told by Dr. Shawe, an Eng-
lish physician, who has lived for years in Leh as a mis-
sionary. He knew of no cause, such as female infanticide,
which could account for the anomaly.
Geographically, the institution of polyandry is most in-
teresting as a unique response to straitened physical con-
ditions. In Ladakh the means of supporting life are scanty,
and there is no opportunity to increase the amount of cul-
tivated land, or the number of flocks. In most such lands
the population increases until the pinch of want is felt,
whereupon emigration ensues. In Ladakh the growth of
population has been limited by the two peculiar institu-
tions of polyandry and monasticism. Hence in a region
where we should expect frequent movement of part of the
inhabitants, there is the opposite condition of great fix-
ity. Objectionable as both polyandry and monasticism
are to modern western ideas, some method of limiting
population seems to be a necessity in a land where oppor-
tunities are so restricted, and migration to unoccupied
lands is so difficult. In Baltistan, just west of Ladakh,
where physical conditions are similar, these institutions
were overthrown some centuries ago by the introduction
of Mohammedanism. Hence the people are constantly
becoming too numerous, and the poorer ones are com-
pelled to migrate to the most unproductive, and therefore
heretofore unoccupied, corners of the regions round about
them.
The dress and houses of the Ladakhis, their manner of
life, and their more obvious habits have been often de-
scribed. The connection of all these things with physical
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIMALAYAS 65
environment is generally easy to trace. Perhaps the most
noteworthy fact in regard to the people is that their char-
acteristic traits of comparative honesty, courage in spite
of superstition, industry, intense love of home, and cheer-
fulness under difficulty, are those which, all over the world,
seem to make mountaineers, of whatever race, better men
than the inhabitants of plains, where life is easy.
CHAPTER III
LAKE PANGONG AND THE KARAKORUM PLATEAU
31 ORTH of Ladakh a vast desert stretches for two hun-
dred miles to the borders of Chinese Turkestan. It is not
a desert of sand and heat and plains, but of snow and cold
and mountains. On the north and south respectively it is
bordered by yet higher mountains, the magnificent ranges
of Himalaya, the "Abode of Snow," and of Kwen Lun,
still more inaccessible. In both, the loftier peaks tower to
heights of 25,000 feet, and the main passes are 15,000 feet
or more above the sea. Between the ranges the mountainous
plateau of Karakorum or "Black Gravel," at an altitude
of 16,000 to 18,000 feet, forms the main portion of the
bleak desert, the dread of caravans. It is not surprising
that India and western China, with such a desert between
them, have little communication.
My acquaintance with this region began with an ex-
cursion of two weeks from Leh eastward over the main
range of the Himalayas to the salt lake of Pangong, 14,000
feet above the sea, — an excursion which was described in
part in the last chapter. Later, with Mr. Barrett, I spent
thirty-five days, from May 15 to June 18, in crossing the
main plateau and the bordering ranges from Leh, south of
the highest range of the Himalayas, to Sanju in Chinese
Turkestan, north of the Kwen Lun range. After traversing
the main plateau, we attempted to shorten our journey by
crossing the unexplored pass of Hindu Tash in the Kwen
LAKE PANGONG 67
Lims, and thus going direct to Khotan. Storms and snow
compelled us to turn back and make a detour of a hun-
dred miles to the west, to the easier and lower pass of
Sanju, 16,700 feet high.
On the way to Lake Pangong, I went up the Indus valley
a day's journey from Leh, and crossed on foot to the north,
over the pass of Chang La in the main range, with my
cheerful Ladakhi coolies. Near Durgukh, at the north-
ern base of the pass, I left the main road, which we later
followed on our way to Turkestan, and turned to the east
up the valley which carried the drainage of Lake Pangong
before that sheet of water contracted to its present size and
ceased to overflow. At Durgukh, an official order from
Leh enabled me to hire ponies for the ride of thirty miles
to the lake. They were shaggy, unkempt little animals,
and were cared for by two equally unkempt Ladakhi
youths, quiet, cheerful, and willing. I could not make my
horse hurry at first, for when I said, " Clck," he stopped as
though shot, nearly throwing me over his head. It was
only when I learned to say, "Choo! choo!" that I could
persuade him to hasten a little. Downstream from Dur-
gukh the valley turns to the north, and enters a narrow
V-shaped gorge, almost impassable, as we found later.
Upstream, however, we encountered very easy traveling,
for the valley has been glaciated, and its broad U-shaped
trough forms an easy approach to Pangong.
The lake is a sparkling sheet of the clearest, deepest
blue, shading delicately to purple in the shadows, and to
pure pearly green in the shallow rim near shore. Dark
rugged mountains spring steeply one or two thousand feet
68 THE PULSE OF ASIA
from the winding shores of smiling blue bays, and then,
at gentler angles, rise four or five thousand feet more to
snow-capped peaks separated by glacier tongues. All is
silent save for the cry of a waterfowl, or the lapping of
the waves. The barren mountains, with their dull tints of
gray, purple, red, and brown, stand in all the naked gran-
deur of the earth's solid crust of rock. There is no vege-
tation or settlement worthy of mention, nothing to soften
the severity of the clear-cut scenery into the gentler, milder
beauty of more favored lands. Yet even so, the beauty cf
Pangong rivals that of the most famous lakes of Switzer-
land or Italy.
Elsewhere I have discussed at length some of the scien-
tific problems connected with Pangong. 1 Here I shall only
speak briefly of two, namely, the origin of the lake, and the
climatic changes to which it bears record. I shall merely
state the results of my investigations, without attempting
to cite the evidence. Pangong is the lowest of a series of
five lakes, lying at nearly the same altitude, and separated
only by deltas two or three miles wide, like that at Inter-
laken in Switzerland. The five are really one, which has
been divided into parts by the deposits of tributary streams.
They occupy what appears to be part of an ancient wind-
ing river valley. The lakes and deltas together have a
length of a hundred and five miles, a maximum breadth of
four miles, and an average breadth of only two. The rela-
tion of length to breadth is about the same as that of the
length of this page, from top to bottom, to the height of
the larger letters in this line. In scenery and shape, and
1 Journal of Geology, vol. xiv, 1906, pp. 599-617.
LAKE PANGONG 69
apparently in origin also, the valley lakes of the Pangong
series are of the same type as the famous lakes of Switzer-
land, the lochs of Scotland, and the fiords of Norway.
Many geologists believe that such lakes and fiords are due
to the work of glaciers. The streams of ice are supposed to
deepen and broaden certain parts of their channels more
rapidly than other parts. Thus relative depressions are
formed, which are converted into lakes when the ice re-
tires. Other geologists hold that this is impossible; for, if
it were so, there surely would be similar lakes among the
intensely glaciated regions of the Himalayas. The discovery
there that one such lake lies in a valley formerly occupied
by a huge glacier detracts from the force of the objection.
Apparently, the number is not larger because, as I saw in
the Shyok valley and one or two other cases, most of the
streams flow at right angles to the mountains, and have
such steep grades that, in- spite of the deep erosion of the
glaciers, the streams have been able with equal rapidity
to cut gorges through the relative elevations in the valley
bottoms, which would otherwise cause lakes to accumu-
late above them. The Pangong valley, on the other hand,
runs parallel to the mountain ranges, and has a gentle
grade, so that the cutting power of its stream has always
been less than that of the transverse streams.
The most important geographic feature of Pangong, so
far as human relations are concerned, is the evidence
which it affords of recent climatic changes. Old beaches
and lake deposits indicate that after the great changes in
climate which gave rise to the glaciers that scoured out the
basin now occupied by the lakes, there were other changes
70 THE PULSE OF ASIA
of the same type, but of less intensity. The varying amount
of precipitation, or of evaporation, caused the lakes to al-
ternately expand and contract. In Pangong itself, the high-
est beaches indicate that the lake expanded to a level two
hundred feet above that of to-day. It then contracted,
as the deposits show, and again expanded to a sixty foot
level marked by lower beaches. Numerous smaller strands
and desposits show that minor oscillations of the lake
level, caused apparently by minor changes of climate,
were superposed upon the larger oscillations. As all these
changes of lake level took place after the severer epochs of
the glacial period had passed away, they must have come
within the time of man, and the later ones probably within
the years covered by history. Hence their study is of im-
portance not only for itself, but in relation to the problem
of the influence of climate upon history. Apparently, the
change from fluvial conditions of lake expansion to inter-
fluvial conditions of lake contraction was characterized
by great irregularity in the form of acclerations and re-
versals of various degrees. If the climate of Pangong from
prehistoric times down to the present be represented by a
curve descending from a state of severe cold and heavy pre-
cipitation to one of comparative warmth and aridity, the
descent must not be pictured as regular, but as broken by
many minor curves both up and down. Climate, to judge
from Pangong, is, and long has been, a more changeable
element than is commonly supposed.
On returning to Leh from Lake Pangong, I found that
Mr. Barrett had equipped a caravan of fifteen unusually
good ponies and five mules. He had also engaged another
THE KARAKORUM PLATEAU 71
man. in addition to the five excellent Mohammedan Ladakhis
who had accompanied us from Kashmir. The new man was
a strapping, good-humored, pig-tailed young Tibetan, who,
according to the fashion of his people, politely stuck out
his tongue whenever we looked at him. The shortest route
to the north, via the passes of Kardong and Saser, was
out of the question so early in the season, because of snow,
but there was a chance that we might be able to get the
ponies over the more easterly pass of Chang La, which
I had just crossed twice on foot. Then we could travel
to the north up the Shyok valley, instead of eastward to
Pangong, as I had gone. The croakers of Leh said that no
ponies could get through the snow on Chang La, and if
they did, it would be of no use, for the many fords of the
Shyok River would stop us anyhow. Mr. Barrett, however,
decided to take the chances. On the 15th of May, a
month before the time for the opening of ordinary caravan
traffic, we started eastward up the Indus on our way to
Karakorum and Turkestan far to the north.
When we reached Chang La, 18,400 feet high, on the
third day, the croakers were almost justified. The ascent
was not especially difficult, as we started at night when there
was a stiff crust on the snow. On the farther side the coolies
made good progress, although the new snow, which had
fallen to a depth of eight or ten inches on the old crust
since last I crossed, became soft almost as soon as the
sun rose. The animals, however, even though none of
them carried loads, broke through, and floundered and
struggled pitifully, scarcely able to draw their bleeding
legs out of the deep holes in the icy crust. By the time we
72 THE PULSE OF ASIA
had descended four hundred feet, they began to appear ex-
hausted. One mule was already far behind, able to move
only with the help of two men. Although it was only ten
o'clock, we decided to stop where we were, on a little hill-
top with a few rocks projecting through the snow. The
prospect of camping there at an elevation of 18,000 feet did
not seem at all bad in the hot sun between ten and twelve
o'clock. We hoped that at night the snow would freeze
stiff enough to support the animals. As we had been work-
ing hard since near midnight, every one went comfortably
to sleep; but we had forgotten the west wind. About noon
it began to blow, gently at first, merely wakening us by
whirling snow into our faces; but in an hour a gale was
raging, chilling us to the bone, though the sun was shining
brightly. It filled the air so full of blinding dry snow that
we could sometimes scarcely find one another. Wrapped
in sheep-skins, and with woolen cloths tied over our heads,
we and our escort were fairly comfortable, but the poor
coolies and horses were shivering unprotected in the open,
and a few hours of such a wind might kill them. It was
absolutely necessary to go on, even if some of the horses
died from over-exertion in such rarefied air. Poor brutes,
how they plunged and fell, and lay panting and exhausted,
and then with splendid spirit, heaved their cut legs out of
the crusty snow, and struggled on, to fall scores of times,
but never to yield. Only the mules, Lhassa-born though
they were, seemed to lose all spirit. Time and again one
or another stretched out its legs, and laid its head on the
snow as though to die. Each time our plucky men got
it up, rolling it over upon its legs, and almost lifting it
THE KARAKORUM PLATEAU 73
bodily upon them by pulling its head and tail. Often a poor
beast plunged its legs inextricably into the snow, whereupon
the men dug them out one by one, pulled them out by
hand, or even dragged them out with ropes. By sunset the
exhausted men and animals had all descended a thousand
feet more to a miserable camp at an elevation of 17,000
feet, where the snow was only a foot or two deep. No one
seemed to suffer from a temperature of minus two degrees
Fahrenheit the next morning, May 19. As we had plenty
of grain for the animals, and food for the men, every one
was ready for work. We all reached Durgukh in safety.
When the fifty or sixty coolies were paid off, Mr. Barrett
gave generous presents to those who had worked hard.
Thereupon it appeared that even the patient, cheerful
Ladakhi has socialistic tendencies, and appeals to mob
violence on occasions. When those who had received only
the regular wages found that their complaints were in vain,
they combined to take away the extra money from the
more fortunate ones by force, and after a wordy fight with
some blows, divided it equally among all.
The fords of the Shyok River, to which we had been
looking forward with such anxiety, proved much easier
than Chang La. We spent the eight days from May 22 to
May 29 in traveling northward up the steep-sided, broad-
bottomed glacial valley, crossing the river twenty-seven
times, and once making our horses wade half a mile in the
stream, all without the least difficulty. The reason for the
half mile in the river was that just before turning up a trib-
utary canyon to the Depsang plain, we found the whole val-
ley bottom covered with a sheet of ice. As its bed became
74 THE PULSE OF ASIA
gradually choked with ice at the beginning of the previous
winter, the stream had overflowed and frozen in a huge
sheet. In melting, the edge of the ice broke off in a little
cliff from three to five feet high, which the horses dared
not attempt; so the only open path was in the water.
We had no difficulty with the fords because the weather
for a few weeks previous had been unusually cloudy, so
that but little snow had melted. Among the lofty mountains
of the arid regions of Central Asia, as we saw and were told
again and again, floods are rarely or never due to the influ-
ence of rain upon melting snow, as so often happens with
us in America and Europe, but rather to the rapid melting
of the snow under the powerful rays of the unveiled summer
sun. The rain among lofty mountains, as is well known,
is usually a cold drizzle with little melting power; while the
sun, shining undimmed through the clear thin air, is extraor-
dinarily hot. May 28 was a cloudy day, and a little wet
snow fell in the evening. We pitched our camp that night
on the right side of the Shyok River, a clear, rushing stream
thirty feet wide and a foot deep. In the morning, we traveled
diagonally across the cobble-strewn flood-plain, here about
half a mile wide. It was seamed with numerous dry chan-
nels. Some time after we had come to the farther side, it
suddenly occurred to me that we had not crossed the river.
I waited till Mr. Barrett came u*p, and asked: —
" Have you crossed the river this morning ? "
He could not remember having done so, and neither could
the men. We looked again, but there was no river. Yet
even as we were talking about it, a new stream came foam-
ing down a dry channel, a red muddy flood of freshly melted
THE KARAKORUM PLATEAU 75
snow. During the preceding cloudy day, so little snow had
melted that the river had completely dried up. This morn-
ing, an unusually hot sun had melted the fresh snow of the
preceding night so rapidly that before eleven o'clock the
river had revived.
A month later, on the northern slope of the Kwen Lun
mountains, I proposed to take a guide and a servant, and
go down the gorge of the Sanju River, where the fords are
very bad. The guide said that it would be possible if the
cool, cloudy weather continued, but not if it were clear and
sunny. It rained the evening before we started, but that
neither caused the river to rise, nor disturbed the guide.
The next day, however, it was warm and clear. The guide
became nervous, urging us to gallop down the valley when-
ever possible, in order to cross the last ford before the daily
flood from the high snowy mountains overtook us. We out-
stripped the river, but had not been long in camp when a
boy called out: —
"The flood has come."
Sure enough, the river had suddenly become muddy, and
was visibly rising and broadening into an impassable tor-
rent. Similarly in August, on the upper Chira River, a week
of rain, mostly drizzle, did not cause the stream to rise so
much as did a single day of bright sun. Farther east, near
Lop-Nor on the same northern slope of the Kwen Lun
range, I was told that in summer the erratic Vash Sheri
River becomes a mere brook during periods of three or four
days of cloudy, rainy weather among the mountains, but
expands to a violent flood when, for a few days, sunny
weather melts the snow. Various writers have noticed simi-
76 THE PULSE OF ASIA
lar phenomena. For instance, Church, speaking of the
Akjas River in the eastern Tian Shan plateau, says in a
matter-of-fact way : —
" I don't know how they cross it when the snow is melt-
ing in spring, but suppose that then the old plan of wait-
ing for a few cloudy days has to be adopted."
The significance of all this for our present purpose lies
in the fact that increased cloudiness, however caused, pre-
serves ice and snow. It also prevents evaporation. If Asia,
for instance, should, as a whole, become more cloudy, the
result would be a series of phenomena practically identi-
cal with those which characterize fluvial epochs; and also
practically identical with those which would ensue if the
temperature of the country were lowered, or if the amount
of rain and snow became larger. The size of glaciers would
increase; the volume of springs and rivers would be larger
and more uniform; lakes which have no outlet would ex-
pand; the soil would everywhere be moister; and vegetation
would flourish in places which are now desert. We do not
yet know whether fluvial epochs are due to greater cloudi-
ness, heavier precipitation, or lower temperature — probably
to all three. The question is of especial interest because of
the diverse influence which changes of the three kinds
would probably have upon the occupations and hence upon
the history of man. We shall come to it again in another
connection.
The main features of the bottom of the Shyok valley, in
addition to the rough flood-plain, are terraces of gravel and
talus, covered with fans whose fronts have been nipped
off by the river. Behind them tower splendid cliffs, one or
THE KARAKORUM PLATEAU 77
two thousand feet high, shutting out most of the gentler
slopes lying above. The scenery was magnificent, but we
wearied of limitations. We longed to see the upper parts
of the narrow tributary valleys, which hung on the sides of
the main valley and poured forth huge fans and cones of
angular gravel from their mouths, high above the flood-
plain of the main stream. We were also eager to inves-
tigate the glaciers, whose gleaming fronts, unhidden by mo-
raines, peered out from lofty hanging valleys, and the high
peaks which, according to the map, rise 25,000 feet above
the sea. We could not understand the origin and history
of the mountains without a view of their upper parts.
Starting at 4 a. m. on the 27th of May from a height
of 13,800 feet, I rode up the steep talus slope of an old
moraine to an elevation of 16,000 feet, where the ponies
had to be sent back. Then, from six o'clock till noon, I
toiled on alone over sliding talus slopes, struggled through
soft snow up to the hips, or climbed with hands and feet
up slopes of naked rock. I had chosen the mountain illus-
trated opposite page 76, because from the valley it appeared
comparatively easy to ascend, but at noon, though I had
reached a height of 20,500 feet, a white slope of snow of
a thousand or more feet still rose steeply ahead. To go
on, alone as I was, would have been folly, for it had taken
a full hour to climb the last three hundred feet, and the
mixture of smooth cliffs and soft snow ahead looked
even worse than what I had already surmounted. I was
tempted to think that I was exhausted and cold, and had
a headache from the exertion and altitude, but a seat in a
warm, sunny nook, and the sound of a little bird singing
78 THE PULSE OF ASIA
there four miles above the sea, drove away the thought of
discomfort.
From the top of the pass of Chang La, ten days before,
I had looked to the southwest across the Indus valley to
the middle range of the Himalayas, and had been impressed
by the evenness of the sky-line brought out in the accom-
panying photograph. At an earlier date, when looking
northward from the lamasery of Himis, I had noted the
same feature in the main range to the northwest of Chang
La. Now, from my nameless mountain, the view seemed,
at first sight, to be of a different nature. It was character-
ized by sharp, freshly-cut forms. Closer examination, how-
ever, showed that there were three kinds of slopes. The
youngest were the steep valley sides due to glaciation, and
rising two or three thousand feet above the streams. Above
them, and often merging into or undercut by them, there
were less precipitous, but, nevertheless, very steep young
slopes due to the ordinary non-glacial processes of erosion.
Higher yet, the mountain tops, for the most part, were
characterized by gentler slopes and occasional smooth crests.
Some of these appear in one of the illustrations of this
chapter. If the gentler slopes are reconstructed, a subdued
mountainous country is produced, with a topography like
that of New England, old mountains with gentle slopes
rising sometimes into " Monadnocks " four or five thousand
feet above the general level.
Farther north, we found that the deep young inner gorge
of the Shyok River grows shallower, and finally merges into
the upland plain of Depsang near the centre of the Kara-
korum plateau. The topography of Depsang is of the same
THE KARAKORUM PLATEAU 79
gently rolling sort as that which has just been described,
as is apparent from the illustrations. The character of the
scenery remains the same for nearly a hundred miles to
the north, to the border of the Kwen Lun range. There
again the rivers begin to flow once more in steep-sided
young gorges, and cut across the range itself in canyons
of wonderful depth and grandeur. The mountains are
sharply dissected into magnificent peaks and aretes, but
at some places, as is shown in the photographs, traces
of what seems to be an older, gentler topography can be
detected.
Apparently, during recent geological times, the whole
Karakorum region and its borders, from India on the
south to Turkestan on the north, stood at a much lower
level than now. The mountains, instead of being like the
present Himalayas, were low and mature, not unlike the
Appalachians. Later, the whole region seems to have been
uplifted in a single mass, much as a continent rises slowly
above the sea. Some parts, such as the border ranges of
Himalaya and Kwen Lun, may have been raised more than
others, forming broad, gentle arches, or elongated domes,
measured in units of scores of miles. In such places the
grade of the rivers must have been steepened. Hence the
border ranges are much more dissected and furnish much
finer scenery than the central regions. There seems to be
little or nothing to indicate that individual ranges or peaks
owe their form primarily to local movements of the earth's
crust. The whole appearance of the country, and the uni-
formity of the types of mountain and valley on the two sides
of the main plateau, seem to indicate that there has been a
80 THE PULSE OF ASIA
single great uplift, with more or less buckling of the crust
into long swells. The minor, albeit to the traveler the most
impressive features, such as valley, ridge, and peak, appear
to be wholly the product of aqueous, supplemented by
glacial erosion. On every side of Chinese Turkestan, as
appears from my own observations and those of others, the
so-called mountains are in reality plateaus of comparatively
slight relief except on the edges. Potentially, to be sure,
they are mountainous, for they have the necessary elevation,
and the typical contorted rock structure. In time they must
be cut to pieces by rain and rivers, and must assume forms
like those of the Alps, where few or no traces of a plateau
can be detected. On the whole, the Karakorum plateau
and the other plateaus of Central Asia strongly support the
new geological view that the great mountain systems of
the world originate as plateaus, that is, as uplifted blocks
or arches of the earth's crust, which are raised up not as
individual ranges, but as broad regions, to be carved later
into the form to which we usually apply the name of
mountains.
The descent from my mountain and the little bird was
easy, as I slid on the snow for nearly two thousand five
hundred feet. The bird was probably a migrant on the way
to Turkestan. Henderson, the only ornithologist who has
ever worked in the country, says that some of the most
delicate of the birds of India, little warblers with the most
wavering, uncertain flight, cross the cold plateau of Kara-
korum to spend the summer in Chinese Turkestan. It is
marvelous that such seemingly impotent creatures should
be able to cross two hundred miles of bleak desert amid
THE KARAKORUM PLATEAU 81
the cold winds and storms which so often prove fatal
to man. Most of the way, the wee creatures must fly at
an elevation of almost 20,000 feet, where one would sup-
pose that they would be chilled to death at night, or that
such extremely active little beings would perish for lack
of air.
Back in the Shyok valley, we pursued our way north-
ward. As we rose higher, the nights began to grow cold.
On June 28, near the Depsang plain, at an elevation of
nearly 17,000 feet, the temperature fell to eight degrees. Our
men confused the effects of temperature and altitude.
Knowing that in this region something often seems to be
wrong with an animal's head, they supposed it must be due
to the cold. Accordingly, they made for each mule a red or
white triangle of cloth, and tied it below the ears so that it
hung down between the eyes. As a precautionary measure
for themselves, they wisely refrained from eating meat, and
gave up their buttery tea. At Kuzzil Langer, May 31,
where we camped at an elevation of over 16,500 feet, Ra-
mazan, the cook, brought us some pieces of an especially
esteemed kind of bread. It was a slightly sweet, thick,
buttery cracker, not particularly healthful, but much prized
by the home-loving Ladakhis, who always carry a supply
of it with them to eat on special occasions, when they meet
friends, or when, as they say, " they want to think of home, .
where the bread was made."
" Put this in your pocket to eat to-morrow," said Rama-
zan. "There is some kind of poison in the air here. You
will be out of breath and feel sick, and you ought not to eat
anything else. The Lhassa man," he added, referring to
82 THE PULSE OF ASIA
Jum Yung, the Tibetan, who was in the habit of running
and singing a great deal when he took care of the horses,
"is already out of breath."
When I told Ramazan that the trouble with the air was
not due to poison, but to the height of the pass, he could
not understand how that was possible.
"This pass is not high," he said. "You will see when
we come to it that the climb is short and gentle. Zoji La
[the pass between Kashmir and Ladakh] is much higher,
but there is nothing the matter with the air there."
I explained that we had been climbing gradually for
many days, and were now at a great elevation.
"You have traveled far and read many books," he an-
swered, only half convinced, "and I suppose you know;
but when we have to climb hard to get to a pass, we call it
high, and when the climb is easy, we call it low. So we
think that Zoji La [11,400 feet] is high, and Karakorum
[18,300 feet] low."
At this time, having left the canyon of Shyok and that of
its tributary, the Murgo, we were among the broad open
valleys and gently domed mountains of the central part of
the plateau. Traveling would have been easy, if it had not
been for the great altitude and the almost utter absence of
vegetation. The horses suffered from hunger in spite of
their generous rations of grain. The animals of any caravan
not well equipped with grain become pitiably weak and
die by scores. Along most of the route from Leh to the Sanju
pass, carcases were so abundant that the vicinity of the road
had become the haunt of the dismal carrion-eating crow, or
raven. At least, when we left the road the ill-starred birds
THE KARAKORUM PLATEAU 83
became scarce, and when we returned to it they again
became abundant.
On the first day after joining the main caravan road in
this region, I counted the remains of thirty-two horses, half
eaten by wolves and ravens. The following day, in eighteen
miles I counted two hundred and twenty skeletons and
carcases of animals that must have died within the last two
or three years. We also passed, that day, thirty-six bales
of tea, spices, cloth, and Korans, abandoned the previous
fall bv a caravan which started too late from Leh. Rasul,
our headman, had heard all about it: one horse gave out
here, two there, and three in another place; then a snow-
storm came on, and the men fled for their lives, leaving the
remaining loads, ropes and all, in the middle of the flood-
plain of a stream. The owner expected to send a new cara-
van in a month or two to get the goods and carry them on to
Yarkand. He knew that they would be safe, for such inci-
dents are common. Custom, stronger than law, binds all
travelers to respect the property thus temporarily left in
the road. We camped at an elevation of 17,400 feet, near
twelve of the bales, which our men used as a wind-break,
unmindful of the carcases of four or five horses lying close
at hand.
We had now reached the centre of the plateau. The next
day, June 2, we crossed the Karakorum pass, 18,300 feet
above the sea, the culminating point of the highest trade
route in the world. In twenty-one miles I counted four
hundred and seventy-four dead horses, not to mention nu-
merous dismembered skeletons, thirty-two bales of mer-
chandise, and one human corpse. His fellows had no time
84 THE PULSE OF ASIA
or strength to bury him; they simply wound him in cloth,
and laid him on the ground with his face toward Mecca.
At the top of the pass our caravan halted, as its predecessors
have done for ages. Our pious Mohammedan servants
gathered around the roughly squared heap of stones which,
though a hundred miles from the nearest habitation, marks
the boundary between India and China, the two most
populous countries of the globe. Each man took one of
the round, flat Ladakhi home-cakes, broke it in two, laid
half with a handful of dried apricots as an offering on the
stones, and ate the other half with another handful of apri-
cots. There was no fanaticism about it, simply reverent
gratitude to Allah for bringing them safely to the top of the
dreaded pass. Even the despised Buddhist and the half-
tolerated Christian were invited to share in the offering, and
in the short prayer which concluded with reverent stroking
of the beard in memory of the Prophet.
A short distance beyond the pass, there were jolly shouts
from the men as we came upon the last pair of the sixty-*
eight abandoned bales of the unfortunate caravan which
preceded ours. They contained dates, very dry, but large
and sweet. As one bag was open, each man took a handful.
Rasul said to me in Turki: —
"We have crossed the pass in safety. Now Allah has
given us something to make us glad. We had no tea this
morning. Now he has given us dates. The ' kismet ' [for-
tune] of the Sahibs is good."
That night snow began to fall; when the last man, who
was supposed to have charge of the weakest animals, ap-
peared at camp long after dark, two ponies were missing.
THE KARAKORUM PLATEAU 85
They were ahead with the rest of the caravan, so he thought.
The next day, in the dazzling glare of six inches of new
snow, the men found one of the animals, but the other
with its load of food and clothes never appeared. Prob-
ably there were four hundred and seventy-five ponies dead
on the road instead of four hundred and seventy-four.
For the next ten davs the weather was bad, with snow
almost every day. Rasul grew sober.
" I not seeing what for we having this bad weather," he
remarked in his Kashmiri English. " We not opening that
bag date. He making open when we coming. Every horse,
dog, donkey could eating. This road's rule is even,- man
taking all thing from bag when he finding open. That bag
open heself. We not making. But this bad weather coming
after we taking date. Perhaps Allah making very angry.
I plenty wishing we not taking."
Our misfortunes were not serious. The worst was that
we lost six days in a vain attempt to force a passage across
the ice and snow of the unexplored Hindu Tash pass in the
Kwen Lun range, leading directly to Nissa and Khotan.
Between the Karakorum plateau and the Kwen Lun range
lies the valley of the upper Karakash River, habitable for
nomads, but not for people who practice agriculture. Here
we found a few Khirghiz, who put their yaks at our disposal,
and in every possible way helped us in our attempt to cross
the Hindu Tash. Leaving the horses to follow us later if
our attempt proved successful, we essayed the pass. The
yaks, splendid strong creatures, which never stumbled and
never hurried or grew nervous in the steepest, most pre-
carious places, bore us up to a height of 17,000 feet. When
86 THE PULSE OF ASIA
the snow grew deep, three of the best ranged themselves
side by side, put their heads together, and pushed their way
through the drifts like a great living snow-plow. It was of
no use, however. The snow was too deep. We were obliged
to retrace our steps, and go a hundred miles westward down
the Karakash River to Sanju Dawan, 16,700 feet high,
the last of the great passes on the usual route for caravans.
Even this is by no means easy: the ascent on the south is
tremendously steep; and the descent to the north, when
we crossed, was slippery with ice. All our loads, as well as
ourselves, were carried by grunting yaks, which ground
their teeth most horribly. Even though relieved of its load,
one mule could not climb the steep ascent, and had to be
shot. The rest of the caravan crossed the pass without mis-
hap, and we camped that night on the northern slope of the
Kwen Luns in Chinese Turkestan. Some pilgrims from
Mecca, who came over a day or two later and overtook us,
followed the wrong path, and encountered bad ice. Four
out of their eleven horses slipped, and, with their loads,
fell one or two thousand feet to destruction.
Almost without exception, the caravans which cross the
"ridge-pole of the earth," as the Karakorum plateau is
sometimes called, suffer disasters from famine, storm, or
mountain sickness. It is by no means rare for a caravan
to lose a quarter or a half of its animals. Yet in spite of
its difficulties, the same baleful route has been followed cen-
tury after century by panting, famished caravans. Nothing
illustrates more forcibly the strength of the distinctively
human passions for novelty and gain, or whatever it is that
leads to trade and the pursuit of wealth. The continued use
THE KARAKORUM PLATEAU 87
of such a route is probably due to the diverse physical con-
ditions of tropical India, on the one hand, which give rise
to vegetable products of tea, spices, and dress-fabrics, and
of temperate Turkestan, on the other, with hemp which
the Hindu smokes to while away the monotony of life, and
with various animal products of fine wool, felt, and skins.
These diverse products, acting on man's acquisitive nature,
induce him to keep open this worst of all roads. If the Kara-
korum plateau and its flanking ranges had extended north
and south as the Andes do, and had separated countries no
more different than Chinese and Russian Turkestan, there
would have been much less incentive to the establishment
of such a route, the products of the two regions not being
sufficiently diverse.
Chinese Turkestan is connected with the outside world,
other than China, by two routes, those of Karakorum and
Terek Davan. The latter runs westward from Kashgar,
at the western extremity of the country, to Osh and Andi-
zhan, the terminus of the Central Asian railroad in Russian
Turkestan. Since the completion of the railroad, it has
largely supplanted the Karakorum route as an avenue for
the importation of the manufactured products of Europe.
In every way it is an easier route than the other, for it rises
to an elevation of only about 12,000 feet, and the part at
a high altitude can be crossed in a day or two. In the past,
however, as now, communication with the west by this
route, more frequently than by the other, must have been
interrupted by wars, during which travelers and merchants
were forced to use the harder, but cheaper and more peace-
ful Karakorum route. Even lately, so remote a geographic
88 THE PULSE OF ASIA
impulse as the disorder created by the struggle of the com-
peting nations of Russia and Japan for the coast of the
Pacific has outbalanced the influence of the Central Asian
railroad, and has turned considerable traffic to Karakorum.
When we were at Ladakh, the price of horses and grain
showed symptoms of rising, because it became known that
about fifteen hundred Mohammedan pilgrims returning
from Mecca to their homes in Chinese Turkestan were com-
ing up through India to Leh. Many would have gone by
way of Russia ; but the examination of passports and the ex-
actions of petty officials, always much dreaded by the pil-
grims, were so much worse during the war, that they dared
not go that way. One of the pilgrims who overtook us had
been to Mecca twice. On his first journey he had traversed
Russia, so he told me. There he had been obliged to pay
twenty-two and a half dollars duty on nineteen dollars' worth
of cherished dates and other presents for his family from
the holy city of Mecca ; and had been asked for his passport
whenever he left the train. Fearing that matters might be
worse in time of war, he had this time traveled through
India, and, like many others, was loud in his praise of that
country and its freedom from espionage. He could not
praise Bombay enough — its wide streets and fine buildings,
its freedom from prying police, its railroad station where
you knew that you were paying only the right price for your
ticket, and above all its economical bazaar, where, under
the strict rule of the Sahibs, an official list of the prices of
all articles is posted at frequent intervals, and there is
little or no bargaining.
The simple pilgrim's tale of his two journeys to Mecca,
THE KARAKORUM PLATEAU 89
related as we sat under a mulberry tree in a narrow valley
at the northern base of the Kwen Lun mountains, contained
an epitome of the geography of Asia. The component ele-
ments of his conception were first himself and his Chanto
people, the mild, courteous, not over-valiant, and none too
honest product of generations of life in the sheltered, unin-
spiring environment of irrigated oases among the deserts
of Central Asia. Closely connected with his daily life was
the government, of whose rapacious officials he mildly
complained : the Chinese, whose slow, imperturbable, ever-
persistent tenacity and economy are perhaps the result of
thousands of years of the dull, hard struggle of a teeming
population against overcrowding in a land of splendid pos-
sibilities, uninfluenced by great changes either from within
or from without. A more important factor in his life was
his religion, the fanatical creed which seems to have im-
bibed its nature from the stern inexorableness of the desert,
on the one hand, and the utter relaxation of the oasis, on
the other. Drawn by religious zeal, and repelled by Chi-
nese stolidity, our mild Chanto pilgrim started westward
on his first pious journey, following the easy route along
the line of oases at the northern base of the great central
mountain system of Asia to the Caspian Sea, and so across
Trans-Caucasia to the Black Sea and Arabia, and finally
back again. There was much that he liked, and the rail-
road was a keen delight; but he could not understand the
inquisitive, aggressive new race of fair-haired men from the
north, and could not protect himself from the half-Russian-
ized races who fleeced him right and left. When again he
was about to go to Mecca, he heard of new factors, a race
90 THE PULSE OF ASIA
of little people called Japanese, whose fathers, so report
said, were English, and whose mothers were Chinese,
but at any rate a people who had fought and whipped the
Russians. It would not be pleasant in Russia, he and his
friends thought; it would be better to go by way of India,
where it was reported that food was cheap and officials not
inquisitive, even if the way was execrable. So it happened
that on his return I met this highly traveled, ignorant pil-
grim under the mulberry tree, and found that unconsciously
he had grasped the essentials of the. geography of Asia.
From his standpoint in Central Asia, the world was chiefly
desert with some oases. Had he not seen countries of that
sort from far away in Mongolia to the ends of the earth in
Arabia? China, known to him as "Bajin" (Pekin), stood
for civilization, something vast, populous, and unknown;
the land of his rulers, to be sure, but a place whither he
had no thought or desire of going. Russia, by which he
meant Siberia, was a broad land, easy to traverse and
interesting, but not a place in which to stay, for it was
expensive, and its people were prone to investigate the
affairs of others. And finally, India, under its Sahib rulers,
represented plenty, freedom, and honesty, coupled with
impenetrability, for it lay beyond the frigid ranges of the
"Abode of Snow," and the breathless desert of "Black
Gravel."
CHAPTER IV
THE HEART OF ASIA
X 1 ROM the sharp ridge of the Sanju pass, at a height of
16,700 feet, the view to the north gave us our first sight
of the great Lop, or Tarim basin, in the very heart of Asia.
Near at hand, huge glaciers wound their ribbed way down
from the unnumbered nameless peaks, which they them-
selves, by cutting headward, had carved into sharp triangles
resembling the famous pyramid of the Matterhorn in the
Alps. Two or three thousand feet below us, at our very feet,
as it seemed, the steep amphitheatre of a huge cirque, or
corrie, formerly occupied by a glacier, ended in a broad
expanse of old moraines. Instead of the boulders and rough
hollows which one usually sees in moraines, these pre-
sented surprisingly soft outlines, for they had been deeply
buried in loess deposited from the atmosphere. The loess
was covered with thick grass, full, as we soon saw, of count-
less alpine flowers, and dotted with sleek flocks_oi- sheep
and herds of cattle. Farther away the moraines contracted,
and finally came to an end where the stream which drained
them plunged into a deep gorge and was lost to view among
a maze of rough, naked mountains. The brown and gray
flanks of these lower heights sloped steeply, and some of
the ridges were sharp; but their nakedness, and the absence
of snow and of dominating peaks, made them comparatively
uninteresting. Our gaze went out far beyond them to where
the last low hills gave place to a strange yellow band. It
92 THE PULSE OF ASIA
seemed at first to be the sandy desert of the heart of Asia;
but during the two hours of our stay on the pass, it ex-
panded and rose, and we then knew it for the inevitable
dust-haze which shrouds the country more than half the
year.
We were looking down into the great enclosed basin
which, as the map of Asia shows, occupies the very centre
of the continent. It stretches east-northeast for fourteen
hundred miles from Kashgar to Su-Chow, and has a maxi-
mum breadth from north to south of over four hundred
miles. Except to the northeast, toward the Desert of Gobi,
where there is a region of low, maturely dissected moun-
tains, the basin is sharply bounded by lofty, newly uplifted
plateaus, diversified with mountains which rise to a height
of from 15,000 to 25,000 feet. The edges of the plateaus
are marked by steep ranges, such as that of Kwen Lun on
the south, forming the northern escarpment of Tibet and
the Karakorum plateau, those of the heights of the Pamirs
on the west, and the southern range of Tian Shan on the
north. Within the ring of encircling mountains, the basin
floor is composed of a broad desert zone of gravel surround-
ing a zone of vegetation in which most of the villages and
towns are situated, and which in turn surrounds a great
central desert tract of sand and salt. The entire basin,
which is as large as the portion of the United States east
of Lake Michigan and north of Tennessee (three times as
large as Great Britain and Ireland), drains to the salt lake
of Lop-Nor. At least it would drain thither, if most of the
streams did not wither to nothing in vast slopes of gravel
and plains of sand. The principal river, the Tarim, or
THE HEART OF ASIA 93
Yarkand, flows along the western and northern sides of
the basin and drains over half its area. Because of the im-
portance of this river, the region is often called the "Tarim
basin." As this name applies to only the western portion
of the country under discussion, it seems better to designate
the basin as a whole by the name of its terminal reservoir,
as is done in the case of the Aralo-Caspian basin, the
Titicaca basin, the Great Salt Lake basin, and many others.
Accordingly, I shall make little or no use of the term
* Tarim basin," and shall use " Lop basin " as the name of
the central basin of Asia. The Lop basin, thus defined,
comprises the most western portion of the Chinese Empire.
Together with the Turfan basin north of Lop-Nor, it
forms what is known as Chinese Turkestan; and with the
smaller regions of Hi and Dzungaria to the north, is com-
prised in the huge Chinese province of Hsin-Kiang, the
"new province."
The most important factor in determining the character
of the vegetation, and hence of the animal and human life
of a region, is, of course, its climate. The climate of the
Lop basin depends upon the threefold fact that the basin
lies first in the middle of the temperate zone, second in the
centre of the largest of the continents, and third in the
midst of a ring of lofty mountains which completely enclose
it. The three factors combine to minimize the amount of
precipitation, and to induce great extremes of temperature.
From September, 1905, to March, 1906, during most of
which time I was in the central part of the basin, I saw no
precipitation whatever, though in mid-January, near Lop-
Nor, I came upon two or three inches of snow which was
94 THE PULSE OF ASIA
reported to have fallen in mid-December. There are said
to be usually two or three slight falls of snow each winter.
In summer, from June to August, more or less rain falls.
At Khotan, in July, 1905, we had some severe showers, but
commonly the amount of rain is very slight. It increases
rapidly, however, as one approaches the high mountains;
and among or close to the main ranges, at an elevation of
10,000 feet or more, there is an abundant fall of rain and
snow. The results of the unequal distribution of rainfall
are brought forcibly to the traveler's .notice as he descends
from the plateaus to the basin floor. At an elevation of from
10,000 to 14,000 feet, he is among pasture lands where the
grass is thick and even turfy, but lower down, at a height
of from 5000 to 10,000 feet, he encounters only sparse
vegetation of the xerophilous or drought-loving kind, like
the sage-brush found in the deserts of Utah and Arizona.
The change from this poor growth to the almost complete
absence of vegetable life in the main floor of the basin, at
an elevation of from 3000 to 5000 feet, is equally significant,
though less marked. Certain parts of the basin floor are
well covered with plants, which, however, are supported by
rivers, or by underground waters from the mountains, and
rarely or never by rain. It is probable that in the centre
of the basin the annual precipitation does not amount to
more than an inch or two ; although on the high mountains
a hundred miles away it may amount to twenty-five or thirty
inches. This fact must be kept in mind, for upon it depend
the marked contrasts in the vegetation of the contiguous
concentric zones of the Lop basin; and these, in turn,
determine the distribution and many of the habits of man.
THE HEART OF ASIA 95
The temperature of the Lop basin varies greatly, but the
extremes are comparatively easy to endure, and their effect
is much less noticeable than that of the variations in pre-
cipitation. During the nine months that I was in the basin,
from June, 1905, to March, 1906, the observed temperature
ranged from minus seventeen degrees Fahrenheit to ninety.
The extremes must have been greater, for I kept among
the mountains for the most part in the hot months of July
and August, and was at the lowest, warmest part of the
basin during the winter, which was not regarded as par-
ticularly severe. In general, the months of December, Jan-
uary, and February are intensely cold, the temperature re-
maining below zero much of the time. The people suffer
but little, however, since the areas of vegetation furnish
abundant firewood in most places, sheep-skins can be pro-
cured cheap from the shepherds among the mountains, and
warm houses can usually be made of mud. Moreover, the
air is dry, and there is comparatively little wind in winter.
The chief difficulty caused by the cold, except where the
nrewood has all been cut off, is the freezing of the shallow
streams which furnish the usual water supply. In some
cases, as I saw at Oi-Toghrak, east of Keriya, the difficulty
is met by digging wells. They are not very satisfactory,
however, because of their great depth, sometimes two hun-
dred feet, and because the water is often impure or saline.
Still, it is much more convenient to use such wells than to
be obliged to melt ice chopped from the frozen canals and
brought home in donkey loads, as we saw in some of the
smaller villages. Where the main stream is so large that
it never freezes entirely, pools, of such depth that they can-
96 THE PULSE OF ASIA
not freeze to the bottom, are located at the street corners,
and, according to Bellew, are filled at intervals by turning
the stream into them. To the fastidious Occidental, the
practice has certain disadvantages : the dust and dirt blown
into the water are never cleaned out ; and in summer people
wash not only their clothes but their bodies in the pools.
At one place, Imamla, — and so far as I could learn, it is
the only place in the Lop basin where the practice is fol-
lowed, — the winter water supply comes from a " kariz,"
one of the tunnels common in West Turkestan. They are
dug under a gravel flood-plain, and slope slightly less than
the surface, so that they lie deeper and deeper under ground
as they are followed up toward the head at the base of the
mountains.
At first it seemed to me that the people of the Lop basin
— Chantos, as the Chinese call them, and as I shall hereafter
— were remarkably indifferent to cold. Time and again I
saw men curled up under small sheep-skins sleeping soundly
out of doors in zero weather. Experiments showed that
I could readily do the same, and could sleep comfortably
under a sheep-skin in the open air with a temperature of at
least minus six degrees. The absence of wind, especially
at night, makes the low temperature easily endurable. The
natives like to keep warm, nevertheless. When we were
camped where there were no houses, the guides or pony-
men frequently waited about my tent at night to forestall
one another in pouncing upon my fire as soon as I left it.
They usually dug a shallow trench, put the live coals into
it, covered them with three or four inches of soil, and slept
on top.
THE HEART OF ASIA 97
The change from winter to spring is said to come sud-
denly. April is often so warm that flies and gnats, an almost
unendurable pest all summer, begin to be very troublesome.
The summers are somewhat trying because of the long hot
days and glaring sun. The temperature, even in the shade
of the cultivated trees in the irrigated regions, sometimes
rices to a hundred degrees. I did not find it particularly
disagreeable, however, either in August, 1903, near Kash-
gar, nor in June, July, and August, 1905, near Khotan. It
was much like Utah. The heat was tiring, but if one stayed
in the shade at noon, and did not exert himself, it was pos-
sible to be quite comfortable. Out in the open deserts of
sand and gravel, however, the heat and glare were terrible.
Even in September the sun raised the temperature of the
sand in the Keriya desert to such a degree that one could
not walk on it barefooted. In addition to the heat, the
summer, like the spring, has an extremely disagreeable
feature in the strong winds, generally from a northerly
quarter. They rage violently at frequent intervals, darken-
ing the air with dust from the never remote desert, filling
one's eyes, nose, and mouth with dust and gritty sand, and
making every one irritable.
By the middle of September in 1905, — and such, I be-
lieve is usually the case, — the winds had largely ceased,
the hot season was past, and the weather was almost ideal.
The air was crisp and invigorating; one could work hard in
the sun, or sit still in the shade, without discomfort. Day
by day the weather grew cooler and more bracing, but there
was rarely any sudden change. In October I began to have
a fire of dry tree trunks in the evening, but the days were
98 THE PULSE OF ASIA
mild. It was not till the end of November that the inspir-
ing coolness of autumn changed to the dulling cold of
winter- On the whole, the climate of the floor of the Lop
basin is excellent. The extremes are neither debilitating
nor deadening; the dry air and the freedom from sudden
changes make it healthful; and during certain seasons it
is stimulating. Its chief drawbacks are the monotony, and
the dry, parching heat of summer. One always knows
what the weather of to-morrow or next week or next month
will be; one is rarely invigorated by a clear day after a
storm in summer; and one never has the stimulus of sud-
den changes, such as that which rouses all the energies of
the farmer to get in his hay before it rains, or the gardener
to pick his fruit and vegetables before a sudden frost.
Turning now from the climate of the Lop basin to its
character and appearance as a whole, the latter can, per-
haps, best be appreciated by comparing the basin to a sea.
Indeed, except for the accident of the absence of water
for the last few million years, since the Cretaceous or early
Tertiary era, it has all the qualities of a basin such as
that which holds the Mediterranean Sea. For age after age,
a great block of the earth's crust — the basin floor, corre-
sponding to the floor of the sea — has been slowly settling
downward, away from the surrounding plateaus, — cor-
responding to the continents, — which once were approxi-
mately on a level with it; or else, what amounts to the same
thing, the plateaus have been lifted up, and the floor has
moved but little. At the west end of the basin from Keriya
around through Kashgar to Uch Turf an, and perhaps to
Bai, or Kucha, the dislocation between the plateau blocks
THE HEART OF ASIA 99
and the basin floor takes the form of a monocline or bend.
Farther to the east, from Keriya to beyond Lop-Nor or
farther, and from Korla to Ying-pen, where the uplifted
portion of the northern mountains comes to an end, it takes
the form of a fault or break. The result is a pronounced
topographic difference between the more gently descending
western borders of the basin, on the one hand, and the
sharply cut eastern border, on the other. To the west, the
mountains merge somewhat into the plain, and, however
grudgingly, invite man, as it were, to enter and occupy
them: to the east, the mountains, though battered and
dissected, rise steep and repellent, offering no opportunity
for roads or settlement. Here, as on the borders of other
sharply depressed seas like the Mediterranean or Carib-
bean, there are evidences of volcanic activity at times no
farther distant than the early part of the glacial epoch, as
I saw on the Keriya River near Polu.
In order to understand the distribution of life in the Lop
basin, we must remind ourselves of a familiar geological
process. Ever since the beginning of the differentiation
between the plateaus and the basin, streams from the high-
lands have brought to the basin floor rock waste of all sizes,
and have deposited it to a depth of probably thousands
of feet. Among the mountains, the streams descend steeply
and rapidly, and are heavily loaded with rock-waste, much
of which consists of cobbles and pebbles. On reaching the
edge of the basin, their velocity is suddenly checked because
of the change in grade; and they are compelled to deposit
the coarser materials, and to go on loaded only with sand
and clay. Little by little these too are deposited, as the
1
100 THE PULSE OF ASIA
streams grow more sluggish farther away from the moun-
tains; and at last, the very finest particles are deposited in
the terminal salt lake, if the streams are able to persist so
far. By the long continuance of these processes, the basin
floor has been provided with two chief parts. The first is
a somewhat sloping zone of gravel, a characteristic pied-
mont deposit, forming a peripheral ring from five to forty
miles wide at the base of the mountains. The second is a
vast inner plain of sand and clay, nine hundred miles long
by three hundred miles wide, and so flat that it is every-
where sensibly horizontal. The plain is not featureless,
however, for it is clearly divided into three parts, charac-
terized, as the map shows, by vegetation, by sand, and by
'acustrine deposits.
Vegetation is confined chiefly to a narrow but contin-
uous zone encircling the desert areas of sand and lake
deposits, and lying just within the piedmont zone of gravel,
to which it is closely related. Occasional narrow tongues
or bands of vegetation accompany the larger rivers far out
into and even across the sand, but they are relatively un-
important. The relation of the piedmont gravels to the zone
of vegetation must be clearly understood, as it is perhaps
the most important fact in determining the habitability of
the Lop basin. On entering the zone of gravel, the streams
deposit their loads of pebbles, and thereby fill their beds,
making it necessary for the water to seek new channels,
which naturally branch often and are broad and shallow.
Thus a large surface is exposed to evaporation, and the
streams lose in volume. A much greater loss takes place,
however, because of the vast quantities of water which sink
THE HEART OF ASIA 101
into the porous, thirsty gravel. Most of the smaller streams
thus disappear entirely, and many of the larger ones do
likewise except during the flood season. The effect is most
marked where the break between the plateaus and the
basin floor takes the form of a fault, for there the steepness
of the slope of the valleys cut in the escarpment causes the
streams to be very swift and to bring down a great amount
of coarse detritus. The sudden change of grade at the base
of the mountains necessitates the deposition of much ma-
terial, with the result that huge slopes of piedmont gravel
are formed. Between Keriya and Cherchen they sometimes
reach a width of forty or fifty miles. Only a large stream
can succeed in crossing such an expanse of parched, naked
gravel. It is evident that the major part of the rather abun-
dant supply of water from the mountains must disappear
in the piedmont gravel zone long before it can reach a
point where it might support much vegetation, or be util-
ized by man. The water is not wholly lost, however, for
it cannot sink straight downward. The gravel contains
frequent lenses of somewhat clayey, less pervious material,
along the slightly sloping surface of which the water is
obliged to flow away from the mountains. Moreover, the
few wells which have been dug show that the lower layers
of the gravel are saturated with water, and hence whatever
more seeps down from above must tend to flow along the
surface of the previous ground water, the level of which
necessarily slopes away from the mountains. The net
result is that the vanished streams spread out into an un-
derground sheet* which slowly, but steadily, flows toward
the centre of the basin. As it gets away from the rather
102 THE PULSE OF ASIA
steeply sloping piedmont region of coarse gravel, and
reaches the flatter region of fine sand and impervious
clay, it approaches the surface, or rather the surface ap-
proaches it, until finally, near the end of the last fine gravels,
the ground becomes permanently damp close to the sur-
face. The phenomenon is the same as the so-called spring-
line in northern Italy, where the water from the Alps, after
flowing underground through piedmont gravels, forms a
line of springs. In the Lop basin, where the surface of the
ground becomes damp, an abundant growth of vegetation,
chiefly reeds, tamarisks, and poplars, is able to flourish
without the help of rain. The zone of vegetation thus formed
varies in width from nearly twenty miles between Khotan
and Keriya, to a few hundred yards at the eastern end of
Lop-Nor, but its character is everywhere much the same.
It is unmistakable along the entire south side of the basin
for nearly a thousand miles, and is almost equally continu-
ous, I believe, on the north side, though there it is much
less noticeable because its location is almost coincident with
that of the similar zone of vegetation of the eccentrically
placed Tarim River. The only part of the basin where the
zone cannot be detected is the northeast corner, which is
exceptional in many other ways also. Most of the towns
of the Lop basin are located in the zone of vegetation;
the chief roads follow it, and from the point of view of
geography or the relation of the organic to the inorganic,
it is the most important feature of the country.
The areas of sand and lacustrine deposits comprised in
the central plain are notable as examples of the kinds of
regions not adapted to life of any form. They are more
THE HEART OF ASIA 103
important as showing that in times past, under different
conditions, the same regions were more favorable to life. In
the eastern part of the plain, widespread deposits of broken
and blistered salt, and beds of variegated clay, proclaim that
long ago the lake of Lop-Nor was much larger than now.
Farther west, the waste of sand known as the Takla-makan
desert illustrates the work of the wind. Acting upon the
materials deposited by the streams in broad flood-plains
and playas, the wind heaps the coarser grains of sand into
an endless succession of waves. It carries off the finer par-
ticles as a hateful haze, which is finally deposited on the
mountain slopes to the south, covering them with soft beds
of loess, excellent for pasture-land wherever there is rain
enough. In many places the sands of Takla-makan have •
buried the ruins of ancient villages, or the remnants of
ancient vegetation, which could have existed only when
the climate was moister than now.
Few parts of the world are so simple in structure as the
Lop basin with its marked concentric zones. In few do
contiguous regions differ so greatly and change so abruptly
in physical character, and hence in their relation to life.
The lofty, well-watered plateau zone stands like a conti-
nental ring around a sea forever dry. In their colder, more
elevated portions the plateaus are absolutely desert; but in
slightly lower regions they are covered with rich grass, and
in summer support the numerous flocks of pastoral nomads.
Sometimes the nomads pass over the edges of the plateaus,
and go part way down the long slope leading to the basin
floor. In general, however, and especially where the break
between the plateaus and the floor takes the form of a fault,
104 THE PULSE OF ASIA
the mountain slope is too rugged in its upper portions, and
too arid lower down, to be occupied by man except in the
larger valleys. At the heads of these valleys, hardy nomads
graze their flocks amid the magnificent scenery of loess-
covered moraines and steep valley walls, while far down-
stream, beyond almost impassable gorges, charming villages
lie like green ribbons on narrow terraces of loess. At the
ends of the valleys, a rude transition brings one into the
wearisome desert of the zone of piedmont gravel, like a huge
beach of dark, monotonous shingle. Sometimes the gravel
bears on its lower edge isolated areas of sand-dunes like
lagoons of the great dry sea beyond ; but oftener it abruptly
gives place to the refreshing verdure of the zone of vegeta-
tion, a jungle of tamarisks and poplars, broken by broad
expanses of feathery reeds, or by areas of cultivation. The
zone of vegetation is not all a zone of life; frequent areas
contain little except dead plants, slowly worsted in the hope-
less fight against a changing climate. In scores of places
in this, the sole zone where life is abundant, great mounds
from ten to fifty feet in height, capped with the feathery
shoots of dying tamarisk bushes, — easily legible records
of desiccation, — stand like huge boulders capped with sea-
weed between the green tide-flats, so to speak, of the zone
of vegetation and the encroaching waves of the great inte-
rior desert of sand. The desert, white, yellow, or gray on
the edges, reddish in the centre, is beautiful in spite of our
presuppositions. Life, to be sure, is absent, but the graceful
curves of dune and ripple and the harmonious blending
of tints are a continual delight, provided the mind is free
from anxiety.
THE HEART OF ASIA 105
Even the ruins of ancient civilization are beautiful in the
clean, graceful shrouds of their interment in the sand. It is
only far to the east, in the monotonous wastes of the salt
and clay of old Lop-Nor, that one comes to the real " abomi-
nation of desolation."
CHAPTER V
KHIRGHIZ NOMADS AND THE INFLUENCE OF THE
HIGH PLATEAUS
JlHE great physical difference between the plateaus and
the floor of the Lop basin has notable consequences in the
diverse human habits and character of the two regions.
Apparently, the physical differences are the cause of the.
human differences. In order to take the first step in bring-
ing out this geographic contrast between the human inhab-
itants of the two diverse regions, I shall postpone the ac-
count of our journey from the Sanju pass down to the zone
of vegetation, and shall devote this chapter to a description
of the Khirghiz, a race of Mohammedan nomads inhabit-
ing the high plateaus. As the Karakorum plateau is for the
most part too high and cold to be inhabited, we saw but a
few score Khirghiz on the way from India to Turkestan. In
the summer of 1903, however, as a member of the Pum-
pelly Expedition of the Carnegie Institution, I spent three
months among the Khirghiz of the plateaus to the west and
southwest of the Lop basin, chiefly in the western and
central part of the Tian Shan plateau. During a residence
in Turkey I had learned a little Turkish; and now I found
that I was soon able to pick up enough of the Khirghiz
dialect of Turki, a language very closely allied to Turkish,
to dispense with an interpreter in all ordinary matters. A
little knowledge of their language went far to put me on
terms of comparative intimacy with my Khirghiz servants,
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 107
and facilitated a very pleasant acquaintance with many of
the people whom we met.
Wherever I have found the Khirghiz living unrestrictedly
under their normal nomadic conditions among the moun-
tains, whether north, west, or south of the Lop basin, they
appear to have essentially the same habits and character.
So far as I can learn, the Indo-European nomads to the
west of the Lop basin in Wakkan and Sarikol, and the
Mongol nomads of Buddhist faith to the east in northern
Tibet and eastern Tian Shan, all of whom live under physi-
cal conditions similar to those of the Turanian Khirghiz,
have very similar habits and character in spite of differences
in race and religion. This suggests that environment is in
this case more potent than either race or religion in deter-
mining habits and even character, provided, of course, that
the environment is operative long enough. In the follow-
ing chapters it will be interesting to inquire how far the
specific habits and characteristics mentioned are best ex-
plained as the product of physical environment, according to
the hypothesis of this book, and how far they are the result
of other and less easily defined causes not here considered.
The typical part of the Tian Shan plateau which I visited
in 1903 lies between Andizhan on the west, Issik Kul
(Warm Lake) on the north, and Kashgar on the south. The
main physiographic feature of this western Tian Shan
region, as of the Karakorum, is that the so-called moun-
tain system is in reality an area of low relief which has been
uplifted to a great height, forming a broad plateau. The
uplift was accompanied by warping, which has divided
the plateau into a series of basins and rolling ridges or
108 THE PULSE OF ASIA
uplands, none of which are as yet extensively dissected by
the rejuvenated rivers, whose grade and consequent power
of dissection were greatly increased by the change of level.
Thus a large part of the western Tian Shan region con-
sists of smoothly floored basins and gently rolling uplands
lying at a height of from 10,000 to 12,000 feet above the
sea, and therefore subjected to relatively heavy precipita-
tion in summer. The conditions of climate among these
"pamirs," as they are generically called according to
Younghusband, allow an abundant growth of thick, turfy
grass full of flowers. Trees, however, are wholly absent on
the main plateau, and are rare even on the lower slopes.
Schimper explains this as due to the fact that the wet season
in midsummer is not long enough to favor the growth of
trees, which require a growing season much longer than
that of grass. Nevertheless, in the valleys, at an elevation
of from six to nine thousand feet, there are some trees and
a profusion of delicate flowers, rich grass, and shrubs.
It is not my purpose to discuss the vegetation. It may be
worth while, however, to print here a list of the plants, so
far as I happened to record them, which grow wild among
the lower slopes of the mountains northeast of the Lop
basin, but are cultivated in Europe and America. They
comprise the apple, apricot, plum, and olive (not the com-
mercial species); the asparagus, onion, and rhubarb; the
candytuft, chrysanthemum, crocus, heliotrope, peony,
phlox, and tulip; the large blue and purple varieties of
columbine; the pansy and lady's delight, both purple and
yellow; and the red, yellow, and white varieties of the poppy
and rose. That there are many more than these nineteen
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 109
species I am well aware, but those mentioned are enough to
show the general character. The names of the plants were
originally recorded with no thought of their possible signifi-
cance. The list is of interest in view of the much controverted
theory that Central Asia was the original home of the chief
races of Europe. So far as it goes, it supports the theory;
for it suggests that the original migrants from Central Asia
carried with them plants which there grow wild, and which
have since been cultivated in the new lands where the wan-
derers finally settled.
Returning to our main subject, the first and most impor-
tant geographic feature of the Tian Shan plateau is, as we
have seen, the pamirs, or plains of rich grass. They deter-
mine the character of animal life, including man. The cli-
mate is so cold, and snow lasts so long, that animals cannot
permanently inhabit the plateau in great numbers, unless
they hibernate like the innumerable marmots, or migrate
like birds; and even the latter cannot find food easily be-
cause of the scarcity of insects and of weeds with large
seeds. Yet during the summer months the conditions are
almost ideal for herbivorous species of animals. Man can
easily turn this fact to his advantage, provided he adopts the
habit of permanent nomadism. The rich, grassy uplands
are capable of fattening millions of sheep and cattle during
the summer; but before the winter snow sets in, the flocks
must be driven many days' journey down to the dry open
plains, or to protected valleys, in either of which places the
animals find poor picking compared to their rich summer
pasture. The Khirghiz shepherd must change his residence
at least twice a year. His family must go with him. All the
110 THE PULSE OF ASIA
men are needed to care for the flocks, and it would not be
safe to leave the women and children far away in the valleys.
Moreover, if they were left, they would have nothing to do,
for there is practically no opportunity for agriculture, and
the only work to be done in summer at the winter quarters
is to cut a little grass for winter use. Some of the poorer
families are sent down for a few weeks in July or August
•to do this. As a matter of fact, the shepherds move their
dwellings much oftener than twice a year, for the best pas-
ture is found close below the ever-shifting snow-line. It
takes but a few weeks to eat up the finest grass near to the
tents, and then, either the camp must be moved, or the
flocks driven farther. Again, as the animals are brought
close to the encampment at night, the ground soon becomes
foul, especially during the rainy weather of summer, when
there is no chance for it to dry. Thus, by force of physical
environment, nomadism is the only condition under which
human occupation of most of the Tian Shan plateau is
possible.
This being so, it is easy to see that the necessity for fre-
quent migrations becomes the main fact in the lives of the
Khirghiz, and determines all manner of habits and customs.
For instance, dwellings must be such that they can be
easily carried from place to place. All men, whether rich or
poor, must move equally often, and even the richest cannot
have a very large or ostentatious habitation. The materials
for houses are willow sticks and woolen cloth, because these
are the most easily available. The round tent is thick and
tight, in order to withstand heavy rain and snow. It has
in the roof a large round hole, capable of being covered with
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 111
a felt, but oftener left open to allow the escape of the pun-
gent smoke of dried dung which forms the only available
fuel. The most salient feature of the dwelling, however,
is the ease with which it can be taken to pieces and moved
from place to place. Hence its peculiar appearance and
mode of construction, which are more evident from the
accompanying photographs than from any description.
No iron is used; the lattice-work, made of pieces of willow
an inch in diameter, is bound together by strips of raw-hide
drawn through holes, while the poles which support the roof
are tied in place with home-made ropes of wool. Large
felts cover the outside, the lower part of which is sometimes
adorned and protected by matting made of reeds a quarter
of an inch thick and four feet long, tied so as to stand ver-
tically. The whole dwelling can be folded compactly into
pieces of convenient size for carriage by camels or oxen
whenever a migration is to take place.
In similar fashion the furniture of a "kibitka," as the tents
are called, is of peculiar sorts, corresponding to the materials
at the disposal of the Khirghiz, and to the necessity of easy
transportation. Utensils are made chiefly of leather and
wood, the most available materials which will not break.
Again, the dress of the Khirghiz is adapted to the coolness
and dampness of the climatic conditions under which the
people live. Having described these things, we at once per-
ceive that they in turn limit the aesthetic sense of the Khirghiz. '
These people cannot know much about architecture or the
ceramic art; but they can and do enjoy bright-colored rugs
and felts, gaudy leather boxes, gay screens or hanging door-
ways, and gorgeous robes or delicately embroidered head-
112 THE PULSE OF ASIA
dresses for the women. The designs which the people em-
ploy are for the most part simple and highly characteristic,
as appears in the drawings on page 113, which were made
by Professor Davis in some of the kibitkas where we were
entertained. The environment of the Khirghiz limits and
controls, but by no means stifles, the aesthetic sense.
A description of some of the events of two days in early
July, 1903, when Professor Davis and I traveled from the
Narin River up to Son Kul (Left-hand Lake) will illustrate
some of the points already mentioned, and will give an idea .
of the daily life of the people. From the ford of the Narin
River, an easy ride up a pretty mountain valley brought us
to a group of kibitkas, set in a green amphitheatre sur-
rounded by steep walls of gray limestone. An unusually neat
kibitka, so new as to be still white, was evidently being pre-
pared for us at the suggestion of the Khirghiz guide, who, of
his own accord, had ridden ahead to see that all was ready
for our reception. The kibitka had been picked up bodily,
and, as we approached, was being carried to a cleaner spot
away from the unpleasant neighborhood of the other kibitkas
and of the flocks and herds. A dozen men and women had
gone inside, and picked up the kibitka by the lattice-work
fence. Under the direction of a man on the outside, who
acted as eyes for the rest, they were carrying it blindly to
the designated spot. It looked like an enormous beetle,
walking across the turf with a dozen pairs of human legs.
The household goods which the kibitka had sheltered — the
piles of rugs, felts, quilts, skins, boxes, bags, wooden bowls,
and leather buckets — were left exposed in a sorry heap,
which the women good-naturedly removed to another tent.
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 113
^""llllllMUlllllllUIlP 11 "
Frlngtd Big (lor will of klbltka)
» 5^
"^D *zr\r> ^r^j "xr-0 ^ ¥\
--n ^» v .--
£-^-
Bands of woolan oloth (used (or tying tha walls of a klbltka)
Patttrn In mlddla of large fait (for floor of a klbltka)
K11IKGHIZ DESIGNS
COPEBD iiV
W. Iff. DAVIS
Blue
lU-d
Brow a
Light Drmra
rr — ]
114 THE PULSE OF ASIA
In the evening, our Khirghiz village was in perfect order.
Ten or fifteen kibitkas were scattered on a fair green slope
between the steep gray cliffs. On one side, hundreds of
stupid sheep were trying to push their way into the cen-
tre of the flock; on the other, herds of neighing, kicking
horses, fat mares, and frisky colts were interspersed with
stolid cattle and with camels — awkward two-humped
beasts, strangely out of place among the lofty mountains,
and ridiculous in feitcoais. put on to keep them warm
and, especially, dry. In the morning, the village was in
dire confusion. Kibitkas were lying in pieces on the ground
with household goods strewn around them. A migration
was to take place, and men, women, and children were
busily making preparations. The slow-moving, pattering
flocks of sheep had already been sent away at dawn, but
the rest of the animals disported themselves among the ruins
of the tents, waiting to be packed or ridden.
The men of the community were clad in big top-boots,
black conical hats of heavy felt with brims of Astrakhan,
and long quilted cotton gowns, which had been wet so often
as to appear dark and oily. Their chief business seemed to
be to load the animals, or to catch those which were still
loose. When a horse was to be caught, a man seized a pole
like a fishing-rod with a loop of rope at the end, and jumped
bare-back on another horse which was already bridled.
Violent kicking and lusty shouting started both horses into
a fine gallop, and it was sometimes half an hour before the
loop was thrown over the animal's head.
The women wore heavy boots and quilted gowns much
like those of the men. Many, however, had taken off the
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 115
outer garment, and were dressed in loose gowns of white
cotton, or, in the case of the rich, of gorgeous silk, red,
purple, and yellow. The sleeves of the garments of both
sexes extended five or six inches below the hands, and took
the place of gloves as a protection against cold, especially
in riding horseback. The headdresses of the women, often
a foot high, were wonderfully constructed of fold after fold
of white cloth wound into a cylinder. One fold hung over
the ears and under the chin in such a way that it could be
drawn up over the lower part of the face, although this
was rarely done. From below the huge headdress the black
hair hung in silver-studded braids, pieced out with cords or
strings of leather. At the ends of the braids, one or two
silver roubles and the keys of all the family chests dangled
close to the women's heels.
When one of the kibitkas had been tied up ready for pack-
ing, a tiny girl of six led up a camel ten feet high, and in
spite of the creature's horrible grunts and roars, made it
kneel meekly by twitching the rope fastened to a stick in
its nose. The largest, finest camel was adorned with a long
red fringe, which hung over the saddle and over the animal's
long, curved neck to its head. When two men had tied a
load of pots, pans, boxes, felts, and parts of a kibitka se-
curely to the camel, I saw a silk-gowned mother lay her
baby in a wooden cradle without rockers. After covering it
well, she tied one rope over its legs and around the cradle,
and a second over its chest. Then, in spite of its lusty cry-
ing, she lifted the cradle unconcernedly to the top of the load
of the kneeling camel, lashed it on, and covered both baby
and load with a large rug. She did not mean to neglect her
116 THE PULSE OF ASIA
baby, but though she was one of the richest women of the
community, she, like every one else, had to work that day.
Cradles of the sort in which this mother laid her child fig-
ured sadly in a scene which I saw later. Out on a lonely
hill-top among the great mountains we came upon a group
of graves. Beside each of the six smallest heaps of earth
there stood an empty, weather-beaten cradle.
Camels were not the only baggage animals that morning.
Horses are esteemed too highly to be often burdened with
loads, but frequently we saw a man on one side of a stout ox.
and a woman on the other, each with the right foot braced
against the animal's side while they drew taut the ropes
which bound the load of kibitka poles. A monkey -faced
dog slunk behind one such pair, while close by, a girl of ten
in figured red and purple silk waited to be helped on to her
horse. Beside her a tiny imp of three stood motionless; his
round, astonished face, long gray dress, and boots so high
that he could not bend his knees, all sunk into insignifi-
cance under the immense dome of his black sheep-skin hat.
Even he could ride a horse, as we soon saw.
At last, when all was ready, we started on a delightful
ride up a steep gorge. The road zigzagged among fine
spruces, almost the only ones that we saw in Central Asia.
We passed first a man on a cow, then a heavily loaded
camel with two small boys perched high on top of the load,
and two ridiculous baby camels, too small to carry even
a roll of felts, running awkwardly in the rear. Next two fat
cows with wooden rings in their noses walked placidly
along with loads of straw-matting and poles. In front of
them an old gray-beard with a black hat and a wadded gown
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 117
rode proudly on a spirited horse. His gloved right hand
rested in a wooden crotch at the upper end of a short stick
which stood in a little stirrup, and on his wrist perched a
hunting-eagle with a leather hood over its eyes. Behind the
man a four-year-old urchin, a miniature of his grandfather,
planted his feet sturdily on the horse, while his hands firmly
L r r-'>ped the old man's shoulders. Ahead of this pair a
ragged lad, mounted bare-back on a yearling steer, jogged
along contentedly behind a herd of horses and colts. In
spite of his rags, he looked happy, w r ell-fed, and warm. So,
too, did all the people on that day's march; and, indeed,
all the pastoral nomads whom I have ever met seemed to
be comfortable. When their flocks diminish and they grow
poor, they are obliged to seek new homes, and to betake
themselves to agriculture, leaving only the rich to continue
the nomadic life. /
A- might be expected from their surroundings, the food
of the Khirghiz is very limited in variety, and is eaten in the
simplest way. A typical meal, such as one in which I shared
and many at which I was a spectator, is likely to prove un-
pleasant to civilized nerves. One day, as I sat cross-legged
with a circle of Khirghiz on the gay felts which carpeted
most of the floor of a rich kibitka, our host came in, hold-
ing up the skirt of his gown full of dried dung. With this he
kindled a pungently smoky fire on the stones in the middle
of the kibitka floor, and on the flamcless conflagration put
some tea to boil. When this began to simmer, he took from
the lattice-work of the kibitka a cloth heavy with grease and
dirt, and spread it before me, questioning the entire circle
meanwhile as to the advisability of serving cream with the tea.
118 THE PULSE OF ASIA
After much discussion, a boy was sent to fetch both milk
and cream, while the host placed on the dirty cloth a metal
tray containing small pieces of bread and sugar. The bread
was in the form of cubes half an inch in diameter, such
as I had seen the plump, red-cheeked women cooking like
doughnuts in hot fat at the bottom of enormous iron bowls,
the sole cooking utensils. Among the strictest nomads bread
is a great rarity, and I have had the pleasure of giving a
piece to children who had never tasted it before. After the
tray was in place, our host took some china bowls from their,
nest in a round wooden box, and having wiped them with
another greasy cloth, filled them with tea. By the time this
had cooled, the boy returned with news that his quest had
been successful. At his heels followed a fat Khirghiz house-
wife, who dived into the small woman's sanctum behind the
ornamented screen of reeds which invariably stands on
the right as one enters the door, and with a wooden ladle
scooped almost solid cream from a large wooden bowl into
a small china one, and then poured milk from a leather flask
into another smaller wooden bowl. As she handed the milk
and cream to one of the men, she saw that bread was needed
on the tray. Kneeling before a red and green leather-covered
box, she reached behind her heels for the silver-loaded
bunch of keys suspended from her long braid of straight
black hair, and, finding the proper key, took from its safe
repository a handful of carefully treasured bread. Now the
tea-drinking began, and it continued till the supply was ex-
hausted. Each guest had three or four bowls, but even that
was not enough, so each one finished with a wooden bowl of
" kumiss," the fermented milk that still remains one of the
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 119
most important articles of Khirghiz diet. Then when the
servants had smacked their lips over the remains of the meal,
each man, with a look to see that his neighbors were ready,
raised his hands to his face, and all in unison stroked their
beards, with a muttered prayer to Allah.
During the next hour or two, big stories of brave deeds
and travel were told, or less praiseworthy talk of quarrels
and women kept the party animated at first, but soon the
kumiss took effect, and drowsiness began to prevail. At
length, to the relief of all, the host appeared, and we knew
that the real meal was at hand, for the tea-drinking is, after
all, but a new-fangled Russian notion. In his hand, at the
end of a spit, he bore a small piece of roasted fat from the
immense kidney-shaped tail of the sheep that we were to
eat. Pulling his big knife from his girdle, he cut off mor-
sels and placed one in the mouth of each guest as an appe-
tizer. Behind the host came his boy, bearing a basin and
a copper urn of water, from which in the oriental way he
poured water over the hands of one after another of the
squatting circle, beginning, of course, with the foreigner as
the most honorable. As the Khirghiz put out their hands
to wash, they made a peculiar gesture in throwing back their
long sleeves.
The washing over, dinner followed promptly — an enor-
mous quantity of boiled mutton in a huge wooden bowl,
flanked by two smaller bowls full of the broth in which the
meat had been cooked. The host waved his hand over the
bowl and cried, " Eat; " some one else cried, " Eat; " and then
each cross-legged Khirghiz cried, "Eat," and, whipping his
knife from his girdle, plunged his hand into the dish. The
120 THE PULSE OF ASIA
scene that followed was like the feeding of wild animals in
a menagerie. Each man grasped a bone, and with his knife
and teeth ripped off huge chunks of meat or fat, and with
a mighty sucking and smacking drew them into his mouth.
The daintiest portions, the head and liver, were offered to
the elders of the feast, who skillfully gouged out an eye and
yanked out the tongue. When the edge of appetite had been
appeased with two or three pounds of meat and a pound or
two of fat, most of the guests took a drink of soup, and then,
with idly hanging greasy hands and greedy eyes, watched,
while the epicure cracked and sucked a bone, and one ot
two of the more skillful carvers prepared a delicate hash.
The fat tail, which is really delicious, a selected portion of
the liver, and a good supply of other fat and meat were most
cleverly sliced into fine fragments and mixed with soup in the
bottom of one of the bowls. When the mixture was ready,
each man rolled up a handful and sucked it noisily into his
widely distended mouth, or, as a mark of respect and affec-
tion, put it into the mouth of his neighbor. The meal was
over in an incredibly short time — the last bones were cracked
and thrown to the edge of the kibitka; bowls of soup, fol-
lowed by kumiss, were again passed around; the big top-
boots were oiled by cleaning the greasy hands upon them;
the beards were stroked ; and the main business of life was
over. Day after day the diet is the same as at this feast,
except that the amount of meat is less and of kumiss more.
The mutton is occasionally fried or boiled in its own fat,
or roasted on a spit. Sometimes a young colt is killed,
and is eaten as the greatest of delicacies. The meat, the one
time that I ate it, tasted like a cross between the best grades
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 121
of veal and lamb, and was fit for the table of the most exact-
ing epicure.
Just as the Khirghiz habits of eating are the result of an
environment which compels the people to live on animal
food, so their hospitality is the result of that same environ-
ment, which isolates them, and at the same time compels
them to travel. Habitations are so often moved that special
accommodations for wayfarers do not exist^Yelthe nomad,
in his search for stray cattle, in his business of exchanging
animals, or in his rides between the shifting summer camp
and the lower valley where he cuts the winter supply of
grass, must often spend the night far from home. Every-
where the people are in the habit of receiving guests, and
the custom is to pay nothing for entertainment. In spite of
his lonely life, the Khirghiz meets the traveler with less sus-
picion than does the less cosmopolitan villager who lives
near a large city. Usually, when I arrived at an encampment,
the chief man, who had ridden out a mile or two to meet me,
jumped off his horse and gave it to an attendant. Then he
led my horse as close as possible to the kibitka which I was
to occupy. As I dismounted, he put his hand under my
shoulder to assist me. When I touched the ground he raised
his cap, a habit learned, probably, from the Russians.
Then he took my right hand softly between both of his, and
finally stroked his beard, suggesting a prayer to Allah.
Often when we met strangers on the road, they turned and
rode with us, to do us honor, and to get the news. The
isolation of the Khirghiz accounts for their eagerness in
this latter respect, and the abundant leisure of the nomadic
life accounts for the unconcern with which a man puts off
122 THE PULSE OF ASIA
his work for half a day. These chance encounters on the
road were often most interesting. One day, as I was crossing
the Jukuchak glacier south of Issik Kul, five men appeared
on the ice above me, one mounted on an ox, one on a
cow, and three on horses, with a loaded camel bringing up
the rear. All these five strangers dismounted from their slip-
ping animals and, walking across the treacherous ice, gravely
shook hands with me.
Another hospitable Khirghiz habit appears to be a direct
result of the nomadic life and the abundance of animals.
On entering the main Tian Shan plateau, I found that each
day fresh horses were brought for me and my men, and even
for our baggage. At first I understood the servants to say
that our horses were tired and needed rest, which was true,
but when I offered to pay the hire of the supplementary
horses, I discovered my mistake. In these regions, it appears,
the traveler is theoretically supposed to start from home,
and to return thither by the way that he went. The first day
he rides his own horse, and at night turns it out to feed with
those of his host. In the morning he does not take his own
animal, but a fresh one from among those of his host. This
he again leaves at night, and so on day after day. On the
return journey, he picks up at each place the horse that he
left there and returns it to its owner. In practice, the scheme
is not so simple. In our case, we were furnished daily with
from six to ten horses belonging to various people at the
camp where we had spent the night. At the end of the day's
march, or occasionally in the middle of the day, we gave up
the animals to one or two men who had come with us for
the purpose of driving them back. For all this the people
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 123
would take no pay whatever, though it was often offered. So
freely does one man make use of another's horses that not
infrequently, when we passed a new herd, some one would
say, " My horse is bad," and would dash off to catch an-
other with a fish-pole. I do not know how universal the
custom is, but during our journey the changing of horses
played so important a part that the stock remark was not
about the weather, but " How is your ' animal ' to-day ?
Has he a good gait ? "
The sports as well as the labors of the Khirghiz result
from the physiographic conditions which induce nomad-
ism. Horses and horseback riding are the one idea of these
people, and their greatest sport is the " bagai." I saw this
interesting game in the Alai valley, close to the border of
Bokhara. As we came down the hillside to the smooth plain, a
crowd of distant horsemen seemed to be standing motionless,
until one darted out, and the whole fifty or sixty dashed after
him. Evidently they were chasing a leader in some game,
and the leader kept changing. Drawing nearer, we saw that
two galloping horsemen had detached themselves from the
crowd and, as they rode toward us, were struggling for a
large black object bigger than a sheep. Suddenly one of
them threw his leg over this, gave it a jerk which nearly dis-
mounted his rival, wheeled his horse to the left, and, dash-
ing up to me, threw the thing at my horse's feet. It was
a black calf, headless and footless, and partly skinned. At
once three or four men who galloped up behind the leader
leaned from their moving horses and attempted to pick it
up. Two grasped it, twenty or thirty others surrounded
them, and all struggled to seize the calf and carry it off. In
124 THE PULSE OF ASIA
the melee, the horses jumped and turned this way and that,
while all the riders tried to force a way to the middle of the
fight, whipping their own and other people's horses, tak-
ing horses by the head and turning them suddenly round,
and themselves leaning far out of their saddles as they
grabbed madly at the black calf. At last one man captured
it, threw it over the front of his saddle, put both legs over it,
and was off at a dead run with fifty others after him. They
could not catch him, and, making a great sweep as large
as the terrace allowed, he returned in triumph to throw
the beast before me and get the customary reward.
Then began another scrimmage, in which one over-zeal-
ous rider was knocked from his horse and apparently tram-
pled on, but when the kicking, surging crowd of horses had
passed, his horse was still with him, and he mounted and
galloped off with a grin. After half-a-dozen scrimmages,
one daring rider seized the prize and went over the terrace,
down a hundred-foot slope so steep that a footman could
scarcely climb it without zigzagging. At the foot, the bold
rider, hard pressed by his pursuers, cantered across a broad
arm of the river, and away across the plain beyond, trying
as he went to skin the calf, for he who carries off the skin
wins the "bagai."
We rode away with the "Deyem Bai," the giver of the
entertainment, who was homeward bound to inspect the
cooking of the sheep for the feast that was to follow. It is
the custom, I was told, for men of wealth to furnish a goat
or calf for the " bagai," and to invite all the men of one or
two villages to join in the sport, and at the end to indulge
in a feast, or better, a carnivorous orgie. Among the occa-
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 125
sions for a " bagai " are a marriage, the birth of a son, the
erection of a new kibitka, and a death. Possibly this strug-
gle for a dead animal is a relic of the time when the ances-
tors of the Khirghiz really fought to get the prey from one
another. Whatever its origin, it is a wonderful training in
horsemanship. For some reason, no woman is allowed to
see the " bagai," or, naturally, to join in the subsequent
feast.
The completeness with which Khirghiz life and character
are determined by natural surroundings makes the relation
between physiography and life far more evident than in the
case of more highly civilized people. If the nomad is to be
successful, the keenest of eyesight is necessary to detect
cattle or encampments at a distance. I was amazed one day
to hear my guide say, " Do you see those cattle off there at
the foot of the mountain ? They are Chinese animals —
yaks." After a long search I found them, mere tiny specks
of black, so far away that even with a strong field-glass
I could barely distinguish them from ordinary cattle. That
my guide should recognize them as yaks shows a keenness
of sight equal to that of the most skillful hunting tribes of
savages. Other Khirghiz showed equal quickness in detect-
ing smoke, kibitkas, men, and animals at a distance, so that
the trait seems general.
His mode of life makes the Khirghiz able to endure hun-
ger, thirst, and fatigue, for these are the necessary accom-
paniments of long rides in search of strayed cattle. He has
no fear of raging fords or slippery passes, and despises the
Chanto or Sart of the city, who shrinks from crossing a ford
where his horse may lose his footing and be washed down-
126 THE PULSE OF ASIA
stream. In such rough experiences the Khirghiz learns to
be self-reliant, and his frequent meeting of strangers under
all sorts of circumstances gives him an air of readiness and
self-possession. The talk of the Khirghiz is full of roads
and travels. If you ask a man how far it is to a certain
place, he at once begins to tell you all the intermediate
stages and their difficulties. These people have the know-
ledge of their plateau that comes from experience, but
book knowledge is very rare. As my escort, a proud, influ-
ential Khirghiz, said one day, "Why should the Khirghiz
learn to read ? It is enough for us to know about sheep and
horses and cattle. What more do we want?"
If there were no outside world with which to come in con-
tact, such a view of life might perhaps be wise. As it is, the
Khirghiz cannot stand against the hard realities of civiliza-
tion. The coming of the Russians, who now rule most of
the native tribes, has done them an immense amount of good
in making the country peaceful and safe, and in providing
good markets for the products of the flocks. It has also
added to their happiness by making such luxuries as tea,
sugar, bread, and cheap cotton cloth accessible to all, but it
will harm them if it leads them to abandon the pastoral life
for that of the day laborer. The delightfully gentle and
gracious courtesy of the Khirghiz cannot offset their lazi-
ness, if that term can be properly applied to a quality which
is a necessary outcome of the nomadic life. A nomad is jus-
tified in being often idle, for his great exertions at certain
times compel him to rest at others, but the qualities so en-
gendered are of no use when steady work is required day
after day. Thus it comes to pass that those Khirghiz who
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 127
have come into close contact with the Russians seem to be
deteriorating. Laziness leads to dishonesty, and both tend
to insolence and vulgarity. A change of habits, too, causes
greater uncleanliness, for customs that may be harmless
where a camp is shifted every month or oftener, lead to
fiHhiness where a kibitka stays for six months or a year in
one place. Change of any kind is always difficult, especially
for people like the Khirghiz, who have adapted them-
selves completely to a type of physiographic conditions so
unusual as those of the Tian Shan plateau.
Not only the outward habits of life, but also certain men- ,
tal and moral qualities of the Khirghiz are due largely, if
not entirely, to physical environment. We will now take up
one or two among the many subjects where such a relation
does not at first sight appear, although I believe that it
exists. In determining the mental and moral character of
a people, no factor is more important than the position of
women, and the resulting character of the homes in which
the children grow up. If the position, and hence the char-
acter, of women is materially affected by physiographic
environment, it follows that a host of other characteristics
must be indirectly affected through the tremendous agency
of the home and of early training. I freely admit that
religion, heredity, tradition, and perhaps other unknown
factors play an immense part in determining the character
of a race, but these, too, in their origin and growth have
probably been greatly influenced by physical environment.
^Vith that, however, we are not now concerned. It will be
enough to point out certain ways in which the physiography
of the Tian Shan plateau, working through the institutions
128 THE PULSE OF ASIA
of nomadic pastoralism, affects the position of women. If
our conclusions are correct, all character is influenced, more
or less, by physical environment, and hence is one of the
subjects with which geography is concerned.
Mohammedanism, as every one knows, inculcates the
seclusion of woman, and makes of her nothing but a stupid
drudge to do man's work, or a light plaything for his plea-
sure. Wherever people of Muslim faith gather in towns and
cities, as I have seen them in Turkey, Persia, India, Asiatic
Russia, and Chinese Turkestan, this ideal prevails. In the
crowded villages and cities women can do their work behind
high mud walls, and can be confined to certain unseen rooms
when male guests visit the house. The support of the family
does not depend upon them, and their activities are almost
wholly dependent on the will of their husbands. It is but
rarely necessary that they should leave the house, and when
they do, there is usually no work to be done and it is easy
to keep their faces covered. Even the peasant women, who
must work in the fields, keep aloof, and come in contact
with men but little. Only the very poor, or those who are
confessedly immoral, go about in public with unveiled
faces. The evil effect of all this has been often described,
and needs no comment.
Among nomads the case is different. The women of all
races, so far as I know, both Mohammedan and non-Mo-
hammedan, go about unveiled, and have a strong influence
in the affairs of the community. Their relative strength
of character is evident from the notable fact that when a
Turkoman woman is married to a Persian, or a Kurdish
woman to a Turk, the wife from the nomad stock, so it is
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 129
said, usually rules the harem, and often rules the whole
house. The universality of the contrast between the posi-
tion of woman in nomadic and non-nomadic Mohammedan
populations goes to show that the contrast is not the pro-
duct of racial differences, but of nomadism.
The house of a nomad must of necessity be small, and
cannot contain two rooms, save under the most excep-
tional circumstances. A visitor must enter the room where
the women are at work, or else the women must work out-
side; and there, of course, they cannot be prevented from
being seen by men other than those of their families.
Then, again, at the time of migrations there are no shelters
left standing, and the women cannot possibly be kept con-
cealed. Moreover, they cannot be made to veil their faces.
No one can work with a cloth hanging down over her face.
The village woman bakes and brews and washes, and milks
her few sheep and goats, in the seclusion of her own court-
yard, where she can throw off her veil in the assurance that
no strange man will see her. The nomad woman must work
in semi-publicity, and cannot be bothered with a trouble-
some veil, especially when both hands are more than oc-
cupied in milking some of her many sheep. Accordingly,
while the Khirghiz woman is very particular about her head-
dress, she makes no attempt to conceal her face. She is in
the habit of meeting strangers, whether men or women, and
she does it modestly, though without timidity. Indeed, she
makes a most admirable hostess. Her freedom from seclu-
sion does much, both morally and mentally, to elevate her
[above her less fortunate sisters of the villages.
Another side of nomadic life tends to strengthen the char-
130 THE PULSE OF ASIA
acter of the women. They are obliged to rely more or less
upon themselves, and to take the initiative at times. In
their care of the flocks and herds, it often happens that the
men are all far away throughout the whole day, and at cer-
tain seasons, when the grass must be cut in the valleys, many
of them are away for several days. At such times, the women
are responsible for everything. I have come to an encamp-
ment of seven or eight tents where no one was left except
a few girls and one or two old women. The smaller girls,
not unnaturally, were afraid of us; but the newly wedded
wife of the chief man, a pretty girl of sixteen, entertained
us most graciously, and by the time that her husband and
the other men arrived, had supper ready for them and
us. A veiled village woman would have screamed and run
away at our approach. Besides all this, the occupation of
the men with the horses and larger animals leaves to the
women the care of the sheep when the flocks are driven
home at evening. And, finally, it is always the wife who has
the responsibility of taking down and packing the kibitka,
and setting it up in a new place, while the husband takes
care of the herds. All these differences between the women
of Tian Shan and those of the villages are the direct results
of nomadism, and all of them tend to make the Khirghiz
wife stronger, more capable, and more self-reliant, and
hence a better mother.
In view of all this, is it going too far to say that the rela-
tively free, warm-hearted, and affectionate spirit shown by
the Khirghiz in their relation to one another is, in part at
least, a geographic fact, the result of physical surround-
ings? In Karategin, at the eastern corner of Bokhara, I
THE INFLUENCE OF THE HIGH PLATEAUS 131
had a most pleasant glimpse of the inner life of a Khirghiz
family. ^ As we entered the village of Kichik Karamuk, I
spied a villager making a rude sledge of the sort which the
semi-agricultural Khirghiz use for hauling grain and hay,
and style "arbas," or cart s. Of course I wanted to photo-
graph it, and told my servant Sherif to ask the carpenter
to »it out farther into the light. Sherif, for some reason that
I did not catch, said that it was impossible, but as another
servant put the man in the right place, I took the picture
before asking any questions. The sledge-maker proved to
be Sherif 's brother, whom he had not seen for seven years.
Out of sheer politeness, the brothers remained silent till
the picture was finished, then they embraced each other
gently, as wrestlers might clinch before a struggle, first on
this side and then on that, repeating very often and very
fast the greeting, " Salaamet, salaamet, salaamet " (" Peace
to you, peace to you, peace to you"). Later, I saw Sherif
meet another brother, the oldest of nine, and an older sister,
who had been like a mother to him. The gray-bearded man,
who was some twenty years older than Sherif, literally fell
on his brother's neck and wept. The story of the Prodigal
Son seemed very real just then. Meanwhile the wet-eyed
sister stood silent till her turn came. As she fell on her
brother's neck, she wept aloud for a moment, and then, still
clinging to him, began to chant a song of thanksgiving; and
so she continued for some minutes, first weeping and then
singing. Feeling out of place, I went into the kibitka and
sat down on the floor. After me came a chubby little urchin
of three, with a rosy, dirty face and a single scanty garment.
A vague idea possessed him that some one had come whom
132 THE PULSE OF ASIA
he must welcome, so with a charmingly friendly smile he
came and put his fat arms around me.
In this sketch of the Khirghiz I have tried to take some of
the chief facts in their life and character, and to show how
they are related to the physiographic facts of the Tian Shan
plateau. Beginning with the grosser, more material aspects
of life, it appears that the nomadic pastoralism of the Khir-
ghiz is due to the climate and vegetation of the region that
they inhabit. On this is dependent the form of their houses,
furniture, utensils, and dress, which in turn leads up to and
determines the nature of their art. Again, the food of the
Khirghiz is narrowly limited by the nature of their occupa-
tions, and this in its turn controls the large number of habits
which centre about the necessity of taking nourishment.
Another line of thought leads from the frequent movements
of the Khirghiz to the character of their hospitality and to
their politeness. Once more, the hardships of the nomadic
life result in certain mental and moral traits, such as brav-
ery, hardihood, and, unfortunately, laziness. Finally, the
conditions of nomadic life determine the position and char-
acter of the Khirghiz women, and lead to certain of the
higher moral traits, such as morality in the stricter sense,
self-reliance, and even family affection.
CHAPTER VI
THE SLOPE FROM THE PLATEAU TO THE
BASIN FLOOR
\JN June 18th, our caravan descended from the crest of
the Kwen Lun mountains to the soft grassy moraines at
the head of the Sanju valley. The few Khirghiz of this
delightful region received us hospitably, according to their
wont, but we saw little of them. Living as they do on a fre-
quented caravan route, they have ceased to take special in-
terest in travelers, except as a means of profit. It is a strange
anomaly that people who live on much frequented roads,
in Central Asia at least, tend to become mean and selfish,
with no purpose in life except to exact the last penny from
the traveler; while those who travel on the same roads, like
the many pilgrims whom we met, become relatively open-
minded and generous. The Khirghiz of the Sanju valley
were not so bad as the Chinese innkeepers at the lonely
desert stations farther north, who not only charged ordinary
travelers five-fold for grain, hay, and fuel, but locked up
the beggars and poor people who had bought nothing, and
kept them till they had paid a few "cash" for the water
which they had drunk. It is fitting that men who exact so
much remain so poor as the innkeepers seemed to be. Even
the good-natured, hospitable Khirghiz have been so injured
by proximity to a trade route that though, out of respect to
the orders for our reception sent by the Chinese govern-
ment, they charged us only a fair price for grain, they coolly
134 THE PULSE OF ASIA
charged the next caravan four times as much, though it con-
sisted of the holy pilgrims from Mecca whose acquaintance
we found so pleasant.
While stopping with the Khirghiz, we examined several
old moraines. It is not necessary to discuss them, for their
significance as indicators of pronounced, world-wide changes
of climate in the most recent geological times is well known.
The most peculiar quality of the Kwen Lun moraines is
that they are shrouded in typical loess, a close-grained, yel-
lowish deposit of the finest dust, unconsolidated, and yet so
tenacious that for years a perpendicular face will hold the
marks of the spade with which it was cut. Wherever the
slopes outside the moraines were not too steep, they were
likewise shrouded with loess, and wherever there was loess,
there was also vegetation. Our first day in the Lop basin
happened to be unusually clear, but, as we saw from the
Sanju pass, a yellow haze lay low over the desert fifty miles
to the north. As the air grew hot, the haze gradually rose
and expanded. That night a strong north wind came up.
In the morning, as we looked out from our camp among the
moraines, the whole country was enveloped in a haze of dust
which we at first took for thick, dirty fog or cloud. When
the wind died down for a time, the haze began to settle,
the mountain tops appeared, and the sky overhead showed
a faint bluish tint, though the lower hills, scarcely a mile
away, were invisible. When the wind blew again, the dust
was whirled upward, concealing the mountains and the sky.
We could not see or feel the dust except as a haze, and were
only positive as to its nature when the air, forced upward
over the mountains by the north wind, became so cool that
FROM THE PLATEAU TO THE BASIN FLOOR 135
rain and hail began to fall. When the hailstones melted on
a piece of dark eloth, each one. left a spot of dust which it
had gathered in the air, typical yellowish loess, of precisely
the same nature as that which covered the moraines and
mountain slopes. The dust could not have been of local
origin, for the region nearby was well covered with grass,
and was receiving accessions of loess rather than giving
them up. Apparently, the dust came from the desert far to
the north.
During the next few days, we descended twenty or thirty
miles into the narrow Sanju valley. Even at so short a dis-
tance from the main mountain range there was a distinct
decrease in the amount of rain, as we could see from the
vegetation, and also from the clouds which gathered thickly
over the main range, but only thinly over us. The loess,
too, began to grow thinner, and in many places was being
dissected by wind and rain. It soon became evident that
though dust from the desert was deposited everywhere,
it accumulated into thick deposits of loess only in places
where there was rain enough to support an abundant,
growth of vegetation, able to hold all the dust that fell.
On June 21, 190.5, 1 left the main caravan and went down;
the Sanju valley. Thereafter, in order to cover more ground, .
Mr. Barrett and I worked independently most of the time,
until our final separation in September. Taking a single'
sen-ant, Ibrahim, and a Khirghiz guide, I rode down the
narrow gorge where, as already related, we raced so success-
fully with the daily flood due to the snow melted by the hot
sun on the mountains. We forded the river twenty-three
times that day among huge boulders, where the horses con-
136 THE PULSE OF ASIA
tinually lost their footing and almost fell. Once, as we were
leading the animals among the boulders at the foot of an
almost perpendicular cliff, my horse slipped and fell into
the river, knocking me in with him. I seized a big stone
and pulled myself out of the swift current, with no mishap
beyond a wet note-book and a ruined aneroid. The horse
could not land on our side of the river, and had to swim
across. It took half an hour to catch him, which greatly
disturbed the guide. The road down the Sanju gorge is so
difficult that, except when the stream is frozen, caravans
follow a circuitous route down the next valley to the east,
crossing one of the many " topa, " or " earth " passes char-
acteristic of the loess-covered mountain slope. The major-
ity of the valleys leading from the plateaus to the basin
floor are even more impassable. Hence the roads from the
upper to the lower zones are all difficult, and the conse-
quent rarity of communication accentuates the tendency to
diverse development in the plateaus and in the lower zones.
At an elevation of about 8000 feet the Sanju valley
broadens, and we there emerged upon a low terrace of loess
lying upon gravel, and covered with waving fields of green
wheat and barley. The verdure was delightful after the
shades of gray, brown, red, and yellow which had wearied
us among the barren mountains. At the hamlet of Ulachi,
a ragged peasant in a short quilted gown and fur cap made
us welcome. The best he could offer us was a place in the
large dusky living-room of his flat-roofed mud house. Stand-
ing on the ground outside, one could easily look over the
roof, but inside, one stepped downward and found that
the room had a height of fully six feet. When my eyes had
FROM TIIE PLATEAU TO THE BASIN FLOOR 137
become accustomed to the darkness, I saw that the room
was divided into halves by a depressed path four feet wide,
running from the outside door to a store-room, and bor-
dered on either side by posts supporting the roof of reeds
and mud. On my side, where there was no furniture save
a box, sat the peasant and his three sons. On the other, a
young woman, looking like a withered hag, nursed her baby,
and a girl, who at twenty was the mother of three children,
worked not ungracefully as she sat cross-legged before a
wooden spinning-wheel. A third, a girl of fifteen, put weeds
on the fire below a big iron bowl of milk; and then cleaned
a red earthenware jar, a rare possession, by dropping hot
sizzling stones into the water which half filled it. The
family ate their supper of hot bread and milk in relays,
using a single unwashed wooden bowl and spoon, aided by
the fingers. First the two older boys ate; next the father,
taking his rosy four-year-old son affectionately in his arms,
fed himself and the child alternately; then two demure little
girls had their turn; and finally the women modestly retired
to the store-room to eat what was left. The peasants' diet,
so they told me, is almost invariable, morning, noon, and
night, and month after month. Meat, at the local rate of a
dollar for a whole sheep, is too expensive to be eaten oftener
than three or four days a month. The peasant and his sons
care for several hundred sheep and goats, but they all, like
the house, the fields, the cows, the trees, and well-nigh the
people themselves, belong to a "Bai," or rich man, who
lives in Sanju. The peasants have all the milk, and what-
ever fruit and vegetables they can raise. Half the grain,
after next year's seed has been taken out, goes to them
138 THE PULSE OF ASIA
also; but they cannot kill any animals or cut any trees.
They seemed desperately poor according to our western
standards, but were far from being in want. Like most of
the people of the Lop basin, they had plenty to eat, enough
to wear, and a place to sleep, and their further wants were
few. Later, we met other people who work in the same
almost slavish way for the rich land-owners. Though a few
expressed mild complaints, the majority of the Chantos
seemed entirely satisfied with their lot.
The name " Chanto," or " Chan-teu," as Younghusband
gives it, is a Chinese word, meaning " Turban-wearer. " It
is applied by the Celestials to non-Chinese Mohammedans
of the Lop basin, Turfan, and a few oases to the north and
east. The Mohammedans, though they belong to a single
race and number from one and a half to two million, have
no name for themselves other than local designations, such
as Kashgari, Khotani, Turfanlik, and so forth, derived
from the names of their cities. Nor, so far as I can learn,
do the people of Russia, or India, or any neighboring coun-
try, except China, have a specific name for them, and one
finds no proper designation in books of travel. Their lack
of a name, except among their Chinese rulers, shows how
little individuality they have as a race, and how their iso-
lation in separate, self-sufficient oases surrounded by vast
deserts has prevented the growth of national feeling.
The Chantos, as it seems most fitting to call this nameless
people, are generally supposed to be an Indo-European
race, closely allied to the original stock from which sprang
the races of western Asia and Europe. They have, to be
sure, become more or less mixed with various invading
FROM THE PLATEAU TO THE BASIN FLOOR 139
races, Huns, Chinese, Tibetans, and Turks; but the main
stock still persists, as appears from Stein's anthropometric
observations, and from the general appearance of the Chan-
tos. Their features are large and coarse, but on the whole
resemble those of Europeans rather than those of the high-
cheeked Mongols or slant-eyed Chinese. Their skins, where
not tanned by the sun, are fair, and the children are rosy
and often have light brown hair, which later darkens almost
to black. The beards of the men are heavy compared with
those of the neighboring races, though by no means equal
to those of Germans or Englishmen. Ancient tradition
relates that the original inhabitants of the Lop basin, the
probable ancestors of the Chantos of to-day, migrated from
northern India. The tradition is confirmed by the fact that
the earliest specimens of writing found in the ruins of the
Takla-Makan desert are in the Kharosthi tongue, a Ian-
guage akin to Sanskrit, and spoken in northern India not
far from the beginning of the Christian era. Since the Mo-
hammedan invasion of the tenth century, the ancient tongue
has been displaced by the Turki language of the conquerors,
which is spoken in several primitive dialects.
From the simple, but kindly hospitality of the poor peas-
ants at Ulachi, a day's ride brought us to Sanju, a town of
perhaps six thousand people, where Chanto courtesy dis-
played itself more elaborately. The ride along the fertile
loess terraces was delightful. We entirely forgot that the
desert lay but a few thousand feet away, at the top of the
enclosing red walls of the upper terrace. The narrow rib-
bon of the green oasis filled our thoughts, and satisfied us
with its freshness. Trees and bushes, gardens of vegetables
140 THE PULSE OF ASIA
and gourds, fields of Indian corn and grain, were around us
on every side; and the air was full of the delicate fragrance
of the yellow mustard fields, or the sweeter, heavier odor
of the yellow flowers of the thorny gray eleagnus tree, or
Trebizond date. Here, as in all the oases of the Lop basin,
the low mud houses stood apart, as they naturally do in a
secluded land where war and violence are rare, each by itself
in the midst of fields, orchards, and shade trees, and yet
none so remote as to be lonely. Only in the very centre of
the town, where the weekly bazaar is held, were the houses
close together. There the open country lanes, bordered by
hedges or low mud walls, gave place for a distance to the
typical streets of a bazaar town, dusty alleys between high
walls of grayish-yellow mud, pierced every hundred feet by
low wooden doors. It is hard to imagine any mode of life
more conducive to conservatism and contentment than
that of such small oases. Most of the five or six thousand
people of Sanju live on their own small farms, and raise
enough to support themselves in comfort. No one is poor,
and no one is immoderately rich. No one is isolated either
socially or physically. The farms are so small that neigh-
bors are always close at hand ; throughout the whole extent
of the oasis, though it stretches along the river for a dozen
miles, one always feels that he is not far from the centre
of the village. The contentment of the people is shown
by their care-free manner. Though I talked with scores of
them freely in their own language, almost no one mentioned
his grievances. The Chanto has no opportunity to expand
his activities into new fields, and as he is content with his
lot, there is nothing within or without to spur him on.
FROM THE PLATEAU TO THE BASIN FLOOR 141
During my stay in the Lop basin, I received the most per-
fect courtesy at the hands not only of the natives, but of the
Chinese officials. On leaving Ulachi, we had not ridden
half an hour when we met a horseman, who obsequiously
dismounted as we appeared. He bowed almost to the ground
and presented a bunch of sheets of red paper, in the midst
of which were two other pieces of similar thin red paper,
six inches by three, the calling cards of the Chinese "am-
ban," or local governor of Kiliyan, a town and district forty
miles to the west, which I did not visit. This official sent
his compliments, and a message to the effect that he had
sent a present of two sheep, a hundred pounds of grain for
our horses, forty pounds of flour, twenty of rice, and four
donkey-loads of hay. All this had been despatched into the
mountains, but had failed to meet us because we had come
by an unexpected route. The messenger, together with the
interpreter of another "amban," had been waiting for us
nearly two weeks. All the ambans of the region had been
advised that two American officials were coming to Chi-
nese Turkestan, and accordingly they were on the watch
for us. At our request, the United States Department of
Agriculture had commissioned us to collect seeds of grain
and other forage plants. Accordingly, we were described in
our Chinese passports as American officials. Orders had
come from Pekin, so it appeared, that we were to be treated
with all honor, and provided with every facility for the pro-
secution of our work. The Chinese officials carried out the
orders most faithfully and heartily, the only partial excep-
tion being a peevish official of minor rank at Charklik. His
ill-temper was amply excusable, indeed, I ought rather to
142 THE PULSE OF ASIA
say that he was surprisingly good-tempered in view of the
indignities to which he had been subjected by the previous
travelers, two unrepresentative Englishmen, whose fond-
ness for whipping and browbeating Asiatics may be most
charitably attributed to indigestion. Repeated official pre-
sents, chiefly of sheep and grain, and formal receptions
upon entering and leaving the towns were sometimes em-
barrassing, especially when we had nothing suitable to
offer in return. Nevertheless, the good-will of the officials
and their ready help in seeing that we were furnished
with means of transportation, supplies, lodgings, and guides,
even in the most remote regions, were highly welcome. They
never delayed us a day, or interfered with our work for an
hour; their cooperation saved much time, and enabled us
to accomplish much more than would otherwise have been
possible. Chinese officials are often and perhaps justly the
cause of complaint, but in many cases the traveler has only
himself to blame for his difficulties. I wish to record here
my lasting gratitude to the officials of Chinese Turkestan,
from Governor-General Oo to merry Emin, the interpreter
of Sanju.
A few hours after receiving the message from the " amban "
of Kiliyan, we met the Chanto "Beg," or "Lord " of Sanju,
and the Dungan, or Mohammedan Chinese interpreter of
the "amban" of Guma, the chief town of the Sanju district.
With them came eight or ten attendants, mostly chief men
of the village, who had ridden out seven miles that morn-
ing to meet us. The slender, irascible, bearded Beg in his
dark blue skull-cap, bright blue robe, black girdle, and
loose red trousers, contrasted strongly with the stout, good-
FROM THE PLATEAU TO THE BASIN FLOOR 143
humored, smooth-faced interpreter, also in a dark blue
skull-eap, but wearing a very light blue robe, which half
covered his purple trousers, and was itself partly concealed
by a black silk waistcoat. The interpreter led my horse to
a pleasant group of trees, and carefully turned him so that
I might dismount upon some felts spread on the ground.
Beside the felts a low platform was covered with rugs, on
which stood a little table a foot high and a red cushion on
which I was expected to lean. I sat alone on the platform,
as etiquette required; while the Beg and the interpreter sat
on the felts with Ibrahim, who, being often needed to help
me out when my Turki vocabulary failed, was fast acquiring
the habit of posing as a man of consequence. The rest of
the party, in robes of rusty brown, deep blue, and cinnamon
purple, formed a soberer group on the bare earth. Of course
we all sat cross-legged, or, more modestly and respectfully,
on our knees with our feet concealed as far as possible.
A " dastarkhan," or tablecloth, was produced at once from
behind a tree. It is hardly right to call it a "tablecloth," for
except in cases of great formality, where foreigners or Chi-
nese are concerned, it is always spread upon the floor. More-
over, the term includes the food as well as the cloth. The
"dastarkhan " is the alpha and omega of hospitality in Cen-
tral Asia, for it always appears as a guest arrives and as he
leaves. This first " dastarkhan " consisted of a red table-
cloth, showing more signs of use than of washing, on which
a servant placed a teapot, and dishes of cold boiled mut-
ton, curdled milk, walnuts, raisins, sugar (which is esteemed
a great delicacy); and the dry eleagnus fruit, dusty and taste-
less. In addition there were round sheets of bread like
144 THE PULSE OF ASIA
stiff water-crackers, an eighth of an inch thick and over a
foot in diameter; other sheets suggested stringy pie-crust;
and still others of the same size, though thicker, were bor-
dered by a rim the size of one's finger. This last kind of
bread was considered unusually delicious because of the
plentiful admixture of sheep's-tail fat and fresh onion stems.
Wherever one goes, the "dastarkhan" is sure to appear,
which, perhaps, accounts for the sleek, fat appearance of
the well-to-do Chanto.
The day after my arrival in Sanju, I wanted to take a
quiet ride alone, and accordingly had Ibrahim prepare
breakfast at six o'clock. Just as I thought to get away
unnoticed, Ibrahim appeared to say that in spite of his pro-
tests, the servants were preparing another meal, and the
Beg, in whose house I was lodged, would feel much hurt if
I did not partake of it. Resigning myself to the inevitable,
I sat down at eight o'clock with the Beg to a characteristic
Chanto dish of " mantos," balls of chopped mutton, rice, and
onions, wrapped in a thin film of dough, and boiled in fat.
As the Beg swore at the cook for not preparing the dish well,
I felt obliged to eat a good deal to show that it was not so
bad. After breakfast, my host announced that he was going
to accompany me. "When I have a great guest, can I let
him go alone ? " he asked when I tried to dissuade him.
Five other "honorable" men and some servants came with
us, for it would not have been deemed polite to make the
party smaller. In spite of the crowd, we had a delightful
ride down the river among green fields and scattered trees
to the end of the oasis, and then up the steep face of the
highest terrace to the omnipresent desert. Here where
FROM THE PLATEAU TO THE BASIN FLOOR 145
the mountains sink into the piedmont gravels, the desert was
almost absolute, only a straggling weed or tiny gray bush
every two or three hundred feet : the sun was hot and glar-
ing; and the yellow haze, which we had forgotten in the
oasis, shut down like a depressing veil, and made us eager
to get back to the green strip far below us. I realized why
the Chanto has such a predilection for staying at home.
As we looked down from the desert to the oasis, the Beg
pointed out the house of a rich "molla," or priest, from
Bokhara, who had made a pilgrimage to Mecca. Should
we stop there for a cup of tea on our way home ? So down
we went between ten and eleven o'clock. The pilgrim and
I exchanged stories over our tea, for our routes of travel
had been identical in many places. As we talked, I watched
a dog eating ripe mulberries as fast as the wind blew them
from the trees. It reminded me of the beggars in Turkey,
who in June and July take up their abode night and day
under the mulberry trees, and wait for a living to drop into
their mouths. Nearly the same thing occurs in Chinese
Turkestan, I found. In the region of Sanju, however, and
in other parts of the Lop basin outside of Kashgar, I saw
very few beggars; though numerous naked children, both
boys and girls, suggest at first sight that the people must
be much poorer than is actually the case.
After our bowl of strong, unsweetened tea, I expected to
go, but a servant brought plates of sugar, and refilled the
i china teapots, this time with a most delicately spiced vari"
!ety of tea. When this was poured into our bowls, our host
insisted, just as the Persians do, upon honoring us by add-
ing lump after lump of sugar which we did not want. As
146 THE PULSE OF ASIA
soon as the tea-bowls were empty, a boy with the regulation
long-necked, slender-nosed ewer and large basin with a
crinkly edge poured water over our hands, the unequivocal
announcement that a solid meal was at hand. The Beg
and I, on a piazza of mud on one side of a shady little court-
yard, shared a huge round platter of "pilaf," or rice, appe-
tizingly cooked with mutton and greens. This the Beg ate
skillfully with his fingers, rolling up a ball about an inch in
diameter and snapping it into his mouth. The remainder of
our repast consisted of a wooden bowl of delicious curdled
milk, which the Beg scooped up with a thin sheet of bread.
The rest of the party, being of lower rank, sat on another
platform on the other side of the courtyard; and the ten
or twelve of them shared two platters of "pilaf," the size of
ours. They ate rapidly, but not noisily like the Khirghiz.
There was no conversation, but once in two or three min-
utes every one drew back and waited. Then one, followed
by another, would wave his hand politely over the dish
and invite the others to begin again, and all would fall to.
It is not considered polite to talk during meals. The time
for conversation is when more important matters have been
attended to.
Having had three meals that morning, I was not at all
hungry at one o'clock. At that hour, as we were on our
homeward way, a galloping horseman shot out of a lane
and almost knocked the Beg over. There was a laugh, and
an explanation. It appeared that the rider bore another
invitation; so we all turned up the lane, "for a bowl of
tea." This time there had been less prearrangement. We
sat around an empty adobe tank under the shade of the
FROM THE PLATEAU TO THE BASIN FLOOR 147
walnut and mulberry trees shown in the photograph oppo-
site page 146. Tea, both sweetened and unsweetened, was
served with walnuts. The chief dish was cold mutton, of
which each guest took a bone in his fingers. The amount
of bread and meat which courtesy demanded should be
placed before the Beg and me was, by careful estimate, be-
tween fifty and sixty times as much as we ate.
Judging from my experience that day, the life of the
Chantos consists chiefly of eating and drinking. And in-
deed it does. Except for a poor sort of music and dancing,
they appear to have no sources of pleasure except those of
the body. Eating plays so important a part in life that the
omission of the "dastarkhan" becomes an insult. As I was
leaving Sanju in slow procession with all the dignitaries of
the town, including a Chinese official on a big gray horse
all jangling with bells, the Beg suddenly hastened ahead
at a gallop, and a servant cantered away in the other direc-
tion. Soon a perspiring footman ran by with a forgotten
red tablecloth under his arm; and near the last field a
horseman with a steaming teapot dashed past. The cause
of the commotion appeared on the edge of the desert, where
we found the felts, table, bread, raisins, nuts, sugar, and tea
of a complete "dastarkhan."
Having finished the hot tea and said farewell to the dig-
nitaries of Sanju, I rode eastward among the barren foot-
hills of the Kwen Lun range to Puski in the next valley,
where I rejoined the main caravan. The scenery was like
that of Arizona, low, desert mountains covered scantily
with weeds or low bushes of the sage type. The perpetual
haze hemmed us in, making everything dull and uniformly
148 THE PULSE OF ASIA
brown or gray in color, and causing the sun, though bright
and hot at noon, to fade into a molten ball and finally disap-
pear an hour or more before sunset. Everywhere we found
drifts of sand and deposits of loess half dissected by the
wind. Evidently, at no remote date this region near the base
of the mountains, at an elevation of seven or eight thousand
feet, was more thickly covered with vegetation, so that loess
could accumulate as it still does three or four thousand feet
higher up among the moraines and grassy slopes of what
may be called the loess-pasture zone. Within a few hundred
or at most a few thousand years, there appears to have been
such a change of climate that the vegetation has largely
died, and the former region of aeolian deposition has been
changed to one of erosion.
Puski proved to be like Sanju, a fair green ribbon lying
on two low terraces of loess beside a swift stream flowing in
a broad flood-plain of cobblestones. On either side rise the
low desert foothills; to the south, the mountains rise higher,
and the stream is confined to a narrow gorge; while to the
north, the vast naked beach of the zone of piedmont gravel
slopes gently to the zone of vegetation. It took us a day
to cross the gravel between Puski and Zanguya, the first
town in the zone of vegetation. We grew sleepy in riding
over the hot, monotonous plain. There was nothing to look
at except pebbles, wonderfully smoothed and faceted by
wind-blown sand, or dense columns of whirling dust, thirty
or forty feet in diameter at the base and rising to a height
of hundreds or thousands of feet, where they spread out
after the manner of thunder-clouds. Twice I counted be-
tween twenty and thirty dust-whirls visible at one time, and
FROM THE PLATEAU TO THE BASIN FLOOR 149
there were always at least eight or ten. It was evident that,
even if there were no wind, the air in summer would be
full of dust continually.
Zanguya is like Sanju, but as it lies about fifteen hundred
feet lower, at an elevation of five thousand feet, it proved
hotter and less agreeable. It is a typical town of the zone
of vegetation, with dusty, shady streets, mud walls, a small
bazaar with open shops, many orchards and gardens, and
a mild, gentle population. I camped in a garden, and was
entertained in the cool of the evening by a group of village
musicians, who sang vociferously as they thrummed on pre-
posterously long-necked guitars, which somehow sounded
musical though not in tune. A day's journey to the east,
we came to Pialma, another village of the zone of vegetation,
where I was lodged in the house of the Beg of Sanju, whose
guest I still was. From there I crossed the gravel southward
to Dua, another beautiful terrace village, and found the Beg
himself waiting to give me a last series of "dastarkhans."
I explored the Dua valley, which no foreigner had ever
before visited, and found that at its head there were thick
deposits of loess in the grassy pasture zone, where Chanto
shepherds care for sheep, horses, cattle, and yaks.
As we rode eastward out of Dua, all of my escort suddenly
dismounted. When I asked if they would like to have me
do so too, they seemed much pleased. After walking a short
distance, they put their hands together, kicked off their low
shoes, and began to pray before a few poles on the top of a
bluff, the tomb of a saint. I understood then the reason of
our walk of two hundred yards through the deep dust. If
by inadvertence I happened to ride past a shrine where the
150 THE PULSE OF ASIA
natives "walked, my companions did not object any more
than they did if I chose to wear my profane boots close to
the holy place; but they always seemed appreciative when
I humored their prejudices in the matter of walking.
A long day's journey east of Dua we came to Pujiya,
another terrace village at the foot of the mountains. Some
distance from the oasis the local headman met us with at
least a dozen men and horses to help us across the broad,
deep ford of the Karakash River, whose various branches
spread over a rocky flood-plain nearly two thousand feet
wide. He would not be satisfied until I mounted what he
considered the safest horse; and then he wanted two men
to lead it. I allowed this at first, but it was too ridiculous,
so I sent the men back, much to the regret of the young
Chinese interpreter who had been deputed to accompany
me. If my horse was not led, etiquette would not allow his
to be. In a shallow place in the middle of the river he let
his horse get too near another, the two began to fight, and
the interpreter — blue gown, fan, and all — rolled off into
the muddy torrent. Later, when we reached the village, it
appeared that we were to encamp in a garden surrounded
by a high mud wall, and entered only by a low door. The
headman was so anxious that I should ride all the way to
my resting-place that he had ordered part of the wall to
be torn down, and through the breach he led my horse
triumphantly to the felts on which I was to dismount.
When, from the same village of Pujiya, I rode a little way
up into the unexplored gorge of the Karakash, my guide
and I overtook two men a mile or two out from the village.
One carried a dripping bag of curds, the other a wooden
FROM THE PLATEAU TO THE BASIN FLOOR 151
bowl and a black copper teapot. After we passed them,
they kept running to overtake us, and seemed determined
to keep with us. Five or six miles out, they sat down to wait,
while I walked up a precarious path in the gorge. On my
return, they offered me a refreshing drink of curdled milk
and water, and some apricots. By order of the headman
those two men walked ten or twelve miles in the hot sun to
render this small service. The next day, when I left Pujiya,
the two men shown opposite page 150 suddenly appeared
in the desert six or eight miles from the village, and began to
run before us. One balanced on the tips of the fingers of
his left hand a wooden bowl of the inevitable sour milk,
which, by the way, most travelers find both wholesome
and palatable, when once they learn to use it. In his right he
held a teapot filled with water, a china bowl, and a wooden
spoon. The other bore in either hand a platter of apricots
and of mulberries. They had been ordered to run a mile
or two farther in the hot summer sun to the top of a pass.
We stopped, however, as soon as we found some shade at
the foot of a cliff. In both these cases, two men had been
detailed to do what could have been done by only one or
by my guide. The prevalence of such needlessly courteous
customs would be impossible if a low standard of living and
cheap food did not give the people abundant leisure, and
if the Chantos were not so abjectly submissive to every
form of authority.
The submissiveness of the Chantos is largely the result
of cowardice, and this in turn is probably due in great
measure to their isolation by mountains and deserts. The
untraveled headman at Pujiya trembled visibly when he
152 THE PULSE OF ASIA
thought I was not pleased with the trees under which he
spread the first " dastarkhan," yet the same man spoke most
peremptorily to his fellow villagers, many of whom hon-
ored him by jumping off their horses on his approach,
and bending forward with their hands crossed over their
stomachs.
CHAPTER VII
AMONG THE CHANTOS AT THE BASE OF THE
MOUNTAINS
_T ORTY miles northeast of Pujiya lies the large and fer-
tile oasis of Khotan, with a population of perhaps a hundred
and fifty thousand people. On the night before my arrival,
an official interpreter in a dark blue jacket and skirt came
out to the cool native house where I was quartered, and
asked me to set out late the next morning. There was much
excitement as we got ready to start; my men put on their
best clothes; and three or four local officials clad in silk and
mounted on horses which put ours to shame accompanied
us. Five miles from the bazaar at the centre of Khotan a
crowd of fifteen horsemen appeared, and when we came
up dismounted, as did the six or eight men with me. I was
about to do likewise, when Rasul called out in English : —
"No, no! You staying on horse. You big man to-day.
These all little men. Every time to-day you must staying
on horse."
The men were merchants from India, who regard a white
man from that country as a friend and protector. We shook
hands all around, and cantered on, a company of twenty-
five. Two miles from the bazaar, an official in a mushroom
hat with a big red plume met us, and asked us to stop a
minute under the trees. There was the sound of great confu-
sion around a bend in the road just ahead. When a signal
was given, we moved forward, and found beyond the bend
154 THE PULSE OF ASIA
a hundred soldiers in gaudy red and blue suits marshaled in
two lines on either side of the road. Every one else dis-
mounted, but I knew that I " must staying on horse." As I
advanced between the lines, the soldiers stood at attention ;
triangular red dragon-banners were waved; six-foot trum-
pets brayed ; and my horse jumped at the sound of a salute
of great cannon crackers. Across a little bridge over a
muddy irrigation ditch three blue-topped, two-wheeled carts
came to meet me, followed by forty or fifty Chinese officials
and military officers, all in blue, and many with huge smoke-
colored goggles. I met the first cart at the head of the line
of soldiers. As it stopped, I dismounted from my horse,
while the governor, with the button of a high mandarin in
his hat and a beautiful silk dragon on his breast, got out
of the cart. We feelingly shook hands with ourselves, bowed
low again and again, and said many sweet things each in
his own language. Then he took me gently by the hand and
led me to a little red pavilion erected for the occasion by the
roadside. There, with two mandarins from the other carts,
we drank tea and tried to talk. I spoke in one dialect of
Turki or in English to Rasul, he in another dialect of Turki
to the official interpreter, and he in Chinese to the governor.
The conversation was undeniably diluted, but as Rasul put
it: 'You plenty sweet matter telling to governor. I think
he liking very much. You making talk to soldier-man very
good. Yes, that was very best. All men very pleased." He
himself had suggested that I thank the soldiers as well as
the officials for coming out to meet us. As we rode to our
quarters in a shady pavilion surrounded by a moat in the
centre of a large garden, the attendants pointed out parts
AT THE BASE OF THE MOUNTAINS 155
of the road where " the crooked had been made straight,
and the rough places plain," in honor of the governor's pil-
grimage to meet the foreigner.
I shall not attempt to describe my two weeks' stay in
Khotan. Other travelers have told of the crowded weekly
bazaar, the good-natured people, the Wednesday festival in
h"i;or of the life-giving river, and the houses, dress, and
manners of the Chantos. Nor is it necessary to tell of Chi-
nese official dinners with over thirty courses, of all of
which I partook, including fat fish-skin, rotten eggs, and
green algae from the rice-fields. I was impressed by the
strength and civilization of the Chinese, and by the simi-
larity of their attitude toward the Chantos to that of the
English toward the people of India.
After Mr. Barrett's arrival in Khotan, we returned almost
to Pujiya, and betook ourselves once more to the mountains,
among the semi-nomadic people of the pasture zone, who
live in tents or in caves of loess. On August 5, twelve days
after leaving Khotan, we crossed the Yurungkash River near
Nissa, on the rough, loose timbers of the only bridge within
hundreds of miles, and climbed in a heavy rain to a won-
derful upland. The next day was remarkably clear, and as
I stood there on the soft, green, loess-covered slope of the
Pisha basin, 14,000 feet above the sea, I saw at a glance the
lofty mountains bordering the plateau, the pasture zone,
the desert mountains among which lie the terrace villages,
and the deserts of gravel and sand whence comes the haze.
There was no life or movement, save where a flock of black
goats and brown or white sheep were herded near a felt
tent far down the gentle incline of the verdant mountain
156 THE PULSE OF ASIA
side. Not a tree was in sight. There was a delightful sense
of freedom and exhilaration which was accentuated by the
rare purity of the air and the glorious view of the magnifi-
cent mountains surrounding Pisha on every side.
Every sharp peak, gleaming crest, and blue-shadowed
glacier of the snowy Kwen Lun range to the south stood out
with cameo distinctness, though the mountains, from 20,000
to 24,000 feet high, were twenty-five or thirty miles away.
Westward I looked down 7000 feet over grandly buttressed
walls of naked rock into the unknown canyon of the Yu-.
rungkash River, narrower and deeper than the famous can-
yon of the Colorado. It separated the west side of the Pisha
basin abruptly from a veritable maze of deeply gashed,
naked mountains, the remnants of a dissected plateau. To
the north, an opening in the mountains disclosed the yellow
line of haze above the sandy desert sixty miles away, near
Khotan ; while to the northeast, the huge flat- topped bulk of
the isolated Tikelik plateau, 19,000 feet high, obscured the
view of the basin floor. Still farther around to the right, fair,
green pasture slopes, the gift of the loess, fell off, at what
seemed by comparison a gentle grade, to the half-naked
red and brown outcropping rocks of the centre of the Pisha
basin at a height of 9000 feet, and then, twenty-five miles
away, rose again to 16,000 feet in the rounded peak of Khan
Ileseh, connecting the outlying plateau of Tikelik with the
main range of Kwen Lun. During the morning, every de-
tail of the magnificent view was clearly visible. At noon,
however, when a strong south wind gave place to the usual
afternoon breeze from the north, a change took place, and
the process of the deposition of loess was vividly illustrated.
AT THE BASE OF THE MOUNTAINS 157
The yellow band of haze, far away to the north behind all
the mountains, had already expanded to a veil with a defi-
nite top, at the height, presumably, where the convectional
currents of hot air rising from the desert had become so
cooled by expansion that they spread out into a sheet at a
position corresponding to that of the top of a thunder-cloud.
Now the veil came slowly toward us, filling the lower gaps
at first, and pouring into the Pisha basin, though the sur-
rounding mountains and the sky still remained clear. By
two o'clock, the dust had been wafted upward so that the
dark Tikelik plateau was hazy; and by four, even the high-
est of the white mountains to the south were dimmed.
During the two succeeding weeks, which we spent in the
Karatash vallev east of Pisha, the air was thick with haze
most of the time. Dust fell so fast, that even on a still day
one was obliged to brush his letter-paper every ten or fifteen
minutes to prevent the pen from becoming clogged. Almost
every traveler speaks with exasperation or weariness of the
persistence with which the haze shrouds the land for weeks
at a time. I often felt as if my eyes were covered by a veil,
which must somehow be torn off, or else I should drop into
the apathetic mood of the natives. It would be rash, per-
haps, to say that the apathy of the people, and their lack
of curiosity and initiative, are due in any degree to an at-
mospheric haze. Nevertheless, when the traveler finds that
this same haze tends to induce these qualities in himself,
it is reasonable to question whether its continual influence
upon generation after generation of Chanto natives may not,
unconsciously to them, have been a factor in molding their
character. Now they have reached a point where they are
158 THE PULSE OF ASIA
even more apathetic than most Orientals: a dull day is
scarcely noticed ; a clear day inspires them but little ; every
vicissitude of life is received quietly; and nothing moves
them greatly from the even tenor of their way.
The people of the Karatash valley are shepherds at the
upper end, gold-miners in the middle, and farmers lower
down, below an elevation of 8000 feet. The gold occurs in
the gravel of terraces, just as in California. The cut (page
76) shows how the women and children bring the gravel in
bags on their backs to the stream, where it is "panned" by.
the men in subconical wooden bowls eighteen inches in
diameter. The man in the photograph told me that the sluice
where he was working was the common property of twelve
men, belonging to five or six families, every member of
which, from six years old upward, is engaged in the work.
The men own a few fields, but by no means enough to sup-
port their families. Their only live-stock is a few donkeys.
The profits of the united labor of the twelve and their wives
and children during the preceding month had amounted to
two hundred " tengehs," or ten dollars, and during the month
before that to eight dollars. According to the Chinese regu-
lations, all the gold must be turned over to certain native
officials, who pay for it what they choose, often only half
the real value. The slight return from gold-mining is credi-
ble only when one sees the clumsy method of work, the fre-
quency with which a pan of gravel yields nothing, and the
deliberation of the movements of the miners. Yet, with the
help of their fields, the people manage to live on a dollar
a month for each man and his family.
Below the gold-mining district, we found along the Kara-
AT THE BASE OF THE MOUNTAINS U9
tash River a narrow strip of green fields between precipitous
red walls, and there we encountered the first of the famous
Mohammedan shrines of Central Asia, a group of votive
poles bearing flowing yak-tails, sheep-skins, horse-tails,
and streamers of cloth, after the Buddhist fashion. As we
approached the shrine, Akhmet, the servant who was with
me, became visibly excited. With flushed cheeks he said
to the guide: —
'Tell me a long way before we reach the shrine, so that
I may be sure to dismount in time."
A quarter of a mile away, after offering a prayer, he
began to walk; and at two hundred feet from the mud wall
enclosing the shrine — an unusual feature — took off his
shoes and prayed again. A sheikh, or priest, appeared.
"Can one buy a sheep here?" demanded Akhmet
eagerly.
"No, there are no sheep: they have all been driven up to
the head of the valley; but there are some goats."
"Very well, bring me a goat, and bring it quickly."
In his fervor, Akhmet did not even ask the price of the
animal, although usually he was a keen bargainer; and
later, when I offered to pay for it, he said: —
"No, this is a sacrifice. I must pay for it myself."
With surprising speed, two sheikhs, the one old, wizened,
and miserly, the other middle-aged, fat, and gluttonous,
brought a goat, together with wood, water, fire, and a huge
iron kettle. All the able-bodied men in the vicinity found
out what was going on as if by magic. Within an hour and
a half, they had killed, cooked, and eaten the animal; its
horns and skin had been added to the trophies hanging
160 THE PULSE OF ASIA
from the bean-poles of the shrine, and the last prayers had
been said. Akhmet told me that he had prayed for himself,
his family, his "Sahibs" and their work, and all his friends.
The effect on him resembled that of the traditional old-
fashioned revival. He was very good for a few days, very
ready to do more than was required of him; but he was
also more inclined to parade his religion; and there was
a shining of the eyes and an air of forced humility, which
plainly showed that he felt himself to have been elevated
above the plane of ordinary mortals. On the whole, I be-,
lieve that the experience did him good.
In Central Asia, a shrine is almost invariably located near
a ruin ; and so it was in this case. Choka, which I discovered
a few miles below the shrine, is the ruin of a walled town,
which must have had a population of from three to five
thousand souls. It dates from about the time when Moham-
medanism superseded Buddhism, in 1000 a. d. The ruins
have a length of half a mile and a width of a quarter. They
lie at an elevation of about 7500 feet, on a flat gravel terrace
in the sharp angle between the Karatash River and the Choka
brook; and are elevated from two hundred and ten to two
hundred and fifty feet above the river. Evidently, the site
was selected from a military point of view. It is surrounded
on three sides by almost perpendicular cliffs, utterly inac-
cessible except at the northern end, where a massive wall
protects the main approach to the town. At the southern,
exposed end, the town was protected by a double wall and
moat.
According to the natives, the water supply of the ruins
came from the Choka brook, flowing under the ground in
AT THE BASE OF THE MOUNTAINS 161
the stone troughs of which pieces have been found. To-day,
the brook is too small to supply so large a town. The water
supply cannot have come from the Karatash River. To
bring it to the ruins, two hundred and fifty feet above the
stream, would require a winding aqueduct ten miles long,
cut much of the way in the face of almost perpendicular
cliffs of red sandstone or of gravel, and carried across the
mouth of at least one large tributary gorge. Such a piece
of work would be out of all proportion to the size of the
town, and would be an engineering feat utterly beyond any-
thing, old or new, known to exist in Central Asia. Moreover,
if such an aqueduct had ever existed, some traces of it would
surely remain, and would be known to the natives. To
bring water from the Choka brook, on the other hand, would
be an easy matter. The bed of the brook rises rapidly up
the valley; the cliffs soon die out; and within three miles of
the ruins, water could be led out of the brook and brought
to the ruins by means of a simple ditch. The difficulty is
that at present the Choka brook suffices for only twelve fam-
ilies of peasants. A little water runs to waste in summer
when the snow is melting on the Tikelik plateau, but in
spring every drop is needed; and in winter the brook is said
to dry' up completely except for a few small springs.
Since the water supply of ancient Choka cannot have
come from the Karatash River, only two alternatives remain :
either the Choka brook was once larger than it now is; or
by careful management a little stream, which to-day sup-
ports a dozen families of peasants, was made to support
fifty times as many families of townspeople, who, of course,
would require much less water per individual. The second
162 THE PULSE OF ASIA
alternative seems incredible, especially when the scarcity of
water in winter is considered, but it is impossible to speak
positively. It is scarcely probable that with the Chira, Genju,
and Pisha rivers close at hand, any government would have
chosen to build the chief walled town of the district on a
little brook, which, under the best of circumstances, could
provide barely enough water for drinking purposes. There
is no ground for supposing that part of the brook has been
diverted, or that it has grown smaller for any reason other
than change of climate. If the climate was somewhat moister,
and the brook larger, all difficulty disappears.
The hypothesis of climatic change explains another point.
If conditions were as they are to-day, it is remarkable that
so large a town should have grown up in this remote spot
among the mountains. The population from Pisha on the
west to Imamla on the east — the district which is naturally
tributary to a market town located at Choka — amounts
to-day to less than five thousand people. It could not be
greatly increased without the adoption of irrigation meth-
ods far in advance of any known ever to have been prac-
ticed in Central Asia. The present bazaar town of Chaka,
northeast of Choka, has a population of about three or four
hundred directly around the centre, although as the weekly
bazaar was revived only ten years ago, the number may
increase somewhat. A town like Choka, with from three to
five thousand people, seems disproportionately large as the
centre of an outlying district with a population scarcely
twice as great. If, however, the climate were more pro-
pitious, the possibilities of irrigation would increase; and
the pasture zone upon the loess deposits would be increased
AT THE BASE OF THE MOUNTAINS 163
much more. Nomads might become numerous, and the
total population might be several-fold larger. It is probable
that such was the case. From Khotan eastward we heard
frequent mention of the " Kalmucks" or Mongol nomads of
Buddhist faith, who appear to have once lived in consider-
able numbers along the base of the Kwen Lun mountains.
A road almost unused, and running for hundreds of miles
along the base of the mountains, is always called the "Kal-
muck road," and appears to have been formerly more fre-
quented than now. At present, though every available spring
and stream is utilized, the population is extremely scanty.
There seems to be a general impression, however, that some
hundreds of years ago, in the days of the Mongols, the
population was greater, and this means that the water
supply was then greater also.
A few miles north of Choka, I discovered the ruins of
Karaki, or old Hasha, a close reproduction of those of
Choka. They are only a sixth as large, and partake far
more of the nature of a fortress than of a town. The na-
tives have no idea as to whether the water supply came
from the Karatash River, a hundred and fifty feet below
on the east, or from the brook on the west. The latter is
said to be dry except during rain. Here, as at Choka, we
are confronted by the question whether the water supply
came by an impossibly elaborate and completely vanished
aqueduct from the red-walled gorge of the river, or by an
easy ditch from the dry brook. There is the same scarcity
of pottery as at Choka; and the people say that nothing of
value has ever been found, though they and their ancestors
have dug among the ruins in every direction. The fortress
164 THE PULSE OF ASIA
must have been inhabited a long time, for the people keep
a donkey-road in repair for the sake of carrying away the
soil enriched during the abode of man. The marked sim~
ilarity of location and plan between Choka and Karaki
suggests that they were contemporary. If this is so, the
probability that the population was formerly more dense
in this region is increased.
Before finally leaving the mountains, I made a detour
eastward to Imamla, a terrace village, and Polu in the pas-
ture zone, returning again to Choka. Imamla is the seat of .
a famous shrine, and I was anxious to visit it because I had
heard that the sheikhs had a "tezgireh," or chronicle, relat-
ing the history of Choka. I went to the house of the chief
sheikh, a most unpriestly young man, with a merry boyish
air and two or three wives. As befitted so religious a house,
the call to prayer or some one of the five daily prayers
seemed to be in progress most of the time. Even the beg-
gars attached to the shrine would pray for five minutes if
one gave them a penny. Whenever one of the other five
sheikhs came to call, he said, "Salaam," and at once opened
his hands in prayer; and of course there were long prayers
at meals. One might have thought himself in a monastery,
if women had not passed through the courtyard now and
again.
The chronicle, which was owned by the sheikh, is said
to have been written by one of the scribes of Yusup Khadir
Khan Khazi, king of Kashgar in 1000 a. d., at the time of
the death of the Four "Imams," or "Saints," from whom the
shrine takes its name. The Imams, so the chronicle says,
came with the other Mohammedan invaders to convert
AT THE BASE OF THE MOUNTAINS 165
Khotan. As the Khotani "infidels" clung to the Buddhist
faith, the four saints by power of prayer destroyed their
city, then called Khal-khalimachin. Thereupon twelve
thousand people became Mohammedans, and built the
new city of Khotan. Of the remaining pagan inhabitants,
seventeen thousand, with Nuktereshid-Chuktereshid, their
king, came to Choka, and built the city whose ruins I dis-
covered. Forty years later, the Imams followed them, and
naturally were refused admission. A man of Choka, how-
ever, who had secretly become a Mohammedan, came out
by stealth, and led them to the water supply of the city.
As the water flowed in an underground conduit, its exact
course was not evident. The Imams prayed for guidance.
At once a tree sprouted, grew to maturity, flowered, and
produced fruit, a delicate red crab-apple peculiar to the
terrace villages. Knowing that the tree must grow from the
water, they dug a hole, and found the conduit, and dropped
into it a red crab-apple. The apple swirled round and round
in the swift stream, and finally was sucked downward.
Thereupon the water dried up. The city was forthwith
abandoned, the people moving on eastward through Sai-
Bagh and Nura to Imamla on the Ak-Sai River. Thither,
in course of time, the zealous Imams followed them for the
final combat. The pagan king was encamped higher up the
Ak-Sai than were the few Mohammedans, and the water
which came to the latter was polluted. The Imams dis-
patched a pious subordinate, whose fervent prayer caused
the Ak-Sai to be diverted eastward into the Kara Su, where
part of it still flows. This did not quench the ardor of the
pagans, however, for soon after, when the Mohammedans
166 THE PULSE OF ASIA
were at their prayers, the host of Nuktereshid fell upon
them and killed them all, including the Imams. Forty, how-
ever, came to life again, and returned to Kashgar. They
persuaded the king of that country to send some families,
who settled Imamla, Sai Bagh, and Nura, which till then
had been inhabited only by nomads. Nuktereshid and his
people moved on southeastward to Polu, which is said to
have been an important post, "because it lies on the Kal-
muck road from Yarkand to Cherchen." There they were
finally conquered by the Mohammedans.
The whole story is full of fantastic miracles and impos-
sibilities, but the main facts are historically accurate. The
miracles, such for instance as the diversion of the Ak-Sai,
are chiefly distorted explanations of real facts. The dates
are open to question, for while the chronicle gives 1000 a. d.
as the time when Nuktereshid ruled, Bellew gives 1095 a. d.
Apparently, Choka was a provincial town in a district in-
habited by nomads, and rose to importance only during
the brief space when it became the capital of the Buddhist
kings, whom the Mohammedans expelled from Khotan about
1000 a. d. The abandonment of the town was tradition-
ally a withdrawal of the people without fighting because
their water supply failed. Of course the water supply may
have been diverted by an enemy, as is said to have been
done in the case of the Ak-Sai; but that does not explain
where the water went, or why a town was ever founded
with so diminutive a water supply as that now available,
unless the climate were different.
The story of the miracles suggested to me to ask whether
there were any " jins," the genii of the Arabian Nights, in
AT THE BASE OF THE MOUNTAINS 167
the region. The sheikh whom I addressed looked sheep-
ish; the bystanders laughed, and some one said: —
"Oh, yes, he knows how to drive them away. There are
many here, not only in the mountains and the desert, but
in the village. Look at that man. A * jin ' struck him. Can
you heal him ?"
The man referred to suffered from a large excrescence
on the side of the head above the ear. In Kliotan and Yar-
kand, where the people suffer terribly from goitre and stiff
necks, it is commonly believed, so I was told, that the ill-
natured "jins" have a habit of gripping a sleeping man
around the throat, after which the neck swells with goitre.
Sometimes the "jins " vary their mischief by cuffing the side
of a man's head, causing a stiff neck.
The four Imams who died so sadly at Imamla must have
been well-to-do, to say the least. According to the sheikhs,
they cooked their rice in a golden pot, which is still pre-
served in a rickety mosque, and is used for cooking the sac-
rifices of pilgrims. The pot is so holy that whoever looks at
it is struck blind. I naturally inquired how, then, the meat
could be cooked.
"Oh," answered Kassim Sheikh, my host, "when a
sheikh becomes sixty years old, he can see the pot without
injury. Even I have never seen it."
Later, I had a conversation with the old sheikh who acts
as " chef of the golden pot," but refrained from asking ques-
tions. He looked like a man able to keep a secret.
An equally remarkable fact was brought to light when I
sought for geological information. On asking the source of
numerous cobbles and small round boulders of vesicular
168 THE PULSE OF ASIA
black lava in the flood-plains north of Imamla, I was
told that they were the brains and skulls of the infidels
who were destroyed in the great hurricane which arose
after Nuktereshid-Chuktereshid killed the four Imams.
I eventually found their origin in some lava flows of the
glacial period interstratified with piedmont gravel.
While we were at Imamla, the men again offered sacri-
fices. Five or six pilgrims were there at the time; and a
thousand are said to come in the course of favorable years,
in spite of the remote location. One was a highly intelligent,
well-dressed man, originally a merchant of Yarkand. In
his youth he went to Mecca, where he settled for twenty
years: now he was on a money-making tour of the shrines
of Central Asia. His sanctity as a resident of Mecca, and
as a visitor at many shrines, entitled him not only to the
richest entertainment, but to lavish gifts. He attached him-
self to me for a day, and that night I heard a village head-
man give orders for a gift of supplies of all sorts to be made
ready for his journey.
CHAPTER VIII
THE SAND-BURIED RUINS OF CHIRA
\ V HEN I returned from Imamla to the Karatash valley
it was almost the middle of September. The hot summer
\\ ••■:.■ over, and it was time to go down to the zone of vegeta-
tion and the sandy desert of Takla-Makan. So I rejoined
Mr. Barrett, and together we traveled down the Karatash
River to Chira, a prosperous town of about ten thousand
inhabitants. Here, as everywhere in the zone of vegetation,
most of the people are farmers. One rarely sees finer fields
or better fruit than those of Chira. Luscious little white
peaches, dark crimson nectarines, grapes of various sorts,
melons that melted in one's mouth, and delicious water-
melons, both red and yellow, could be bought for a song.
The air was so dry that one could indulge in them freely
without harmful consequences.
At Chira, Mr. Barrett and I, having finished our work to-
gether, undertook separate expeditions. He devoted his at-
tention chiefly to the physiography of the mountain border
of the Lop basin; I mine to a study of the climate of anti- •
quity. The best point for beginning my investigations
seemed to be a group of ruins, Uzun-Tetti and others, which
lie in the zone of vegetation a few miles north and east of
Chira, and another group, Dandan-Uilik and Rawak, which ■
lie far out in the sandy Takla-Makan desert, fifty or sixty
miles north of Chira. Stein, the only archaeologist who has
visited the region, describes Dandan-Uilik, the chief of the
170 THE PULSE OF ASIA
ruins, as having been a large town with several religious
establishments, either Buddhist lamaseries or temples. It
was situated in the midst of an oasis, called Li-sieh, or Litsa.
A considerable agricultural population was settled round
about, as is shown by numerous remains of ancient irriga-
tion works. Rawak, the more northerly town of the Litsa
oasis, was probably abandoned about 300 a. d., while
Dandan-Uilik itself, to judge from the evidence of manu-
scripts found in the houses, does not appear to have been
finally deserted until a little before 800 a. d. "But," as
Stein says, "the striking preponderance of religious build-
ings . . . suggests the possibility that these local shrines and
their small monastic establishments continued to be kept up
and visited, perhaps as pilgrimage places, for some time
after the rest of the settlement had been abandoned. The
condition in which Mohammedan Ziarets [shrines] are now
often found beyond the present cultivated area of oases
would furnish an exact parallel." Stein concludes that "the
lands of Dandan-Uilik were irrigated from an extension of
the canals which, down to a much later date, brought the
water of the streams of the Chira, Domoko [properly Du-
muka], and Gulakhma to the desert area due south of the
ruins . . . [where] the debris-covered site of Uzun-tati . . .
can be proved by unquestionable evidence to have been occu-
pied for at least five centuries longer. ... A number of his-
torical as well as topographical observations . . . point to the
conclusion that the successive abandonment of both Dandan-
Uilik and Uzun-tati was due to the same cause, the difficulty
of maintaining effective irrigation for these outlying settle-
ments." Hedin, on the other hand, believes that this can-
THE SAND-BURIED RUINS OF CHIRA 171
not be true for Dandan-Uilik and Ilawak, of which he was
the discoverer; they must have received water from the
Kenya River, which now flows twenty-six miles east of the
ruins, but in ancient times, so he supposes, was diverted to
the west. I hoped to be able to find conclusive evidence as to
the truth of one or the other of these two conclusions. Also,
it ^tein proved right, as there was reason to expect would
be the case, I hoped to determine whether the manifest dry-
ing up of the streams or canals which supplied the ruins was
due to human causes, such as war or the decay of irrigation
works, or to physical causes, such as a change of climate.
My investigations confirmed Stein's conclusion, and showed
that the water supply throughout the whole region was for-
merlv more abundant than now, and hence that in ancient
times the climate must have been different. An account of
my journey into the desert will show the reasons for this
conclusion, and later I shall discuss the matter more fully.
At Chira, when I inquired for a guide, every one said,
"Oh, Ibrahim Beg, the Master of Canals, is the man you
want. He went with the other Sahib [Stein], and he knows
all the ruins everywhere." So I sent for Ibrahim Beg, a
conceited little man, with the face of a humorous Irishman.
He came in his official uniform, and professed to know
far more than I could possibly want. We tried in vain to
hire camels at Chira, and so went eastward a few miles
to Dumuka, a neighboring village, to try again. There, as
at Chira, the camel owners said that all the animals were
up among the mountains in the summer pastures. No one
hesitated to promise to send for camels to be brought down
at once, but it was clear that no one meant to do so, for fear
>
172 THE PULSE OF ASIA
that in the sandy desert the creatures might suffer from
hunger and thirst. It looked as if we should fail of our pur-
pose, and I determined to buy my own camels at the next
opportunity in Keriya, no matter what happened. After a
long conference with the Beg and various men of influence
that day at Dumuka, I went to bed with my mind made up
to a delay of at least three or four days. In the morning,
however, I heard camel-bells, and went out to find seven
good animals grazing on the poplar trees. Da'ud, one of
my Chantos, had heard that a small caravan from the
mountains was expected to pass that night, for men with
camels do not travel by day in warm weather. He went out
to the main road and waited till midnight, when the cara-
van arrived and he corralled it. We sent post-haste for the
owners, who arrived that afternoon. In view of the fact that
we had "nine points of the law," they let us have the camels
for a good stiff hire. When we returned with the animals
safe and sound, some two weeks later, they expressed them-
selves as well satisfied with the bargain.
From Dumuka I sent the horses and my two Ladakhis,
Ibrahim and Abdur Raman, eastward to Keriya. There
they were to buy five camels, and have everything in readi-
ness for a fresh start when I arrived two or three weeks later.
I myself, with Da'ud, Ibrahim Beg, a camel-man, a camel-
boy, and the five hired camels, proceeded toward the desert.
We spent the first seven days in circling about in the zone
of vegetation. Within a few miles of Dumuka, along the
north and south line of a former course of the Dumuka or
Ak-Sai River, I discovered the waterless, sand-buried sites
of four small villages, evidently the ancient Buddhist equi-
THE SAND-BURIED RUINS OF CIIIRA 173
valent of modern Dumuka. The southern site, called by
my guides Derevzeh Dung, is unimportant. It occupies
nearly the same location as Stein's small Aktaz, with which
it is probably identical. At the next site, Kuk Jigdeh (Green
Eleagnus Tree), as well as at Kushkusteh Dung, the one
farthest to the north, we found some little clay heads of
Buddha and some plaques with typical Buddhist figures,
which show that the sites antedated the Mohammedan con-
quest in the tenth century. The other site, Khadaluk, ap-
pears to have been the centre of the old town. In two places
we found abundant votive tablets with heads of Buddha,
and many fragments of painted plaster and gilded stucco,
evidently the remnants of an old lamasery or temple. Ap-
parently here, as at Dandan-Uilik, the most permanent
structures, and probably the ones last to be abandoned, were
of a religious character. We also found several Chinese
coins, dating from early in our era, some fragments of paper
bearing records in Brahmi script, and two pieces of wood
covered with the characteristic Kharosthi script of the first
three centuries of the Christian era. One of these (B, in cut,
page 204 ) bears on the reverse side paintings of a camel
and other objects. Evidently, the four sites just described
are parts of an agricultural district at least four or five miles
long, and quite as large as modern Dumuka. The final
abandonment of the ruins certainly took place before the
Mohammedan conquest in 1000 a. d., and perhaps earlier.
About eight miles north-northwest of Khadaluk, at
Payet-Begning-Ilesi or Tetti-Gerim, I discovered another
little site, with remains of tamarisk-walled houses, abun-
dant crude pottery, a few beads, and a bit of blue glass, but
174 THE PULSE OF ASIA
with nothing by which to date it. The general appearance,
the aggregation of the houses, and the condition of the
surrounding vegetation suggest that the site is at least as
old as Khadaluk.
Farther west, the ruins of Uzun Tetti and Ulugh Mazar
proved to be more extensive than appears from previous
explorations. From the shrine of Lachinata for five miles
to the northwest, to Ulugh Mazar, and thence six miles far-
ther to the northeast, I found abundant pottery. There
were also other relics of human occupation, including the
traces of a mud house, the straw of an old threshing-floor,
and even the characteristic pattern of the ditches of ancient
melon fields. The entire appearance was such as to suggest
that the site was not abandoned till a later date than Khada-
luk. The pottery also pointed to the same conclusion, for un-
like that of more ancient sites, it was wheel-made, the orna-
mental designs were drawn in curves with a stick of several
points, and one bit had a green glaze. This conclusion is
confirmed by the historic records of the Mohammedan con-
quest, and by some coins of the twelfth and thirteenth cen-
turies which Stein found at Ulugh Mazar. It appears that
at the time of the Mohammedan conquest, and later, not only
was Chira inhabited much as it is to-day, as is proved by
early Mohammedan records, but that here, twelve miles to
the north, along the line where the Chira River would flow
if it were large enough, an equally large area, about six miles
by eight in size, was also densely populated.
From Ulugh Mazar I came back almost to my starting-
point, and spent a day with the Beg of Malakalagan, the
northern part of Dumuka. A short distance north of the
.
THE SAND-BURIED RUINS OF CHIRA 175
Beg's house I had seen the ruins of a large village, which
evidently had been abandoned recently. The Beg told me
their history substantially as Stein has recorded it. For-
merly, the villages of Dumuka and Ponak were located eight
miles north of the present sites. About 1834, the water sup-
ply began to run short, being lost in the sandy jungle above
the village. It diminished so greatly that for seven years no
water reached the canals during winter. The people were
obliged to dig wells. Finally, the scarcity of water became
such that distress ensued from the failure of crops. The vil-
lagers decided to abandon houses, fields, fruit trees, vine-
yards, and everything, and move eight miles upstream to
a new site. The disadvantages of poorer, sandier soil and
of the loss of the labor of years were more than compen-
sated for, they felt, by the greater proximity to the springs
where the water from the mountains reappears after its
underground course through the piedmont gravel. Each
proprietor was given the same amount of land as formerly
in a corresponding location, and with it a proportional
quantity of water. Chira and Gulakhma also suffered at
this time, though much less. Nearly eighty families moved
up to Ekken, a very sandy site close to the springs of another
stream. There can be no doubt of the authenticity of this
account, for Ismail Beg, the relatcr, heard it from his father,
who was among those who moved; and some of the old
people of Dumuka still remember the event. Since the
occupation of the new site, no special difficulty as to the
water supply has been experienced. Indeed, between 1893
and 1900, it actually increased. There was so much sur-
plus water that the hamlet of Malakalagan was founded by
176 THE PULSE OF ASIA
people from Dumuka, who cultivated fields in both places.
In 1900, the population amounted to twenty-five families;
but since then the supply of water has again decreased, part
of the people have gone back to their old homes, and the
cultivated area has diminished from three thousand to
fourteen hundred "mulaks."
In answer to my further inquiries as to the history of the
region, Ismail Beg sent for a "tezgireh " like that of Imamla,
a dull, but apparently accurate contemporary chronicle of
the Mohammedan invasion. It is written in the Turki lan-
guage in monotonous couplets, of which the following is a
sample, with a translation in the same metre: —
"Lachinata yiirdiler,
Keya [Keriya] deyasi geldiler."
"Lachinata conquered, they
Keya-ward pursue their way."
The chronicle describes how, in the tenth century, the
Moslem invaders advanced along the line of oases from
Kashgar through Yarkand and Khotan to Keriya. They
killed some of the Buddhist "Kafirs," or "infidels," con-
verted others, and caused the rest to flee north across the
desert. Chira is described at length with reference to local
sites well known to-day, so that we may assume it to have
been much the same as at present. Having conquered Chira,
the invaders sacked Lachinata and Ulugh Mazar, or Terkhi
Turkhan and Kenan, as they are also called. Of the inhab-
itants of Kenan, which is said to have been a city with
a gate of gold, two hundred and forty-one adult men were
killed, and five or six hundred became Mohammedans. If
Lachinata were equally large, as appears from the ruins, the
THE SAND-BURIED RUINS OF CHIRA 177
combined population of the two must have been about equal
to that of modern Chira. The chronicle docs not mention
Dumuka and Ponak, but there is a local tradition that
their Buddhist inhabitants fled from the Mohammedans
and went northward down the Keriya River to Ak Su, cross-
ing the Takla-Makan desert where now there is no water
and no road. As to the other chief village of the region,
Gulakhma, between Chira and Dumuka, tradition says that
it has occupied the same location from time immemorial.
As it occupies the site where the waters of its river can
most easily and with least waste be utilized, and as there
are traces of ruins in the suburbs, there is no cause to doubt
the tradition. Choka, on the upper part of the Karatash
River, which waters Chira, was inhabited at this time, it
will be remembered; and we have seen reason to believe
that the slope of the mountains whence flow the rivers of
Chira, Gulakhma, Ponak, and Dumuka was then occupied
by a population of Kalmucks, more numerous than that
of to-day. Thus it appears that about 1000 a. d., not only
was the total population supported by the rivers larger than
it now is, but the streams flowed through the modern vil-
lages, where their water is at present entirely consumed,
and reached places like Ulugh Mazar, ten or fifteen miles
farther north. This could happen only if the rivers were
decidedly and permanently larger than now. There has
been no diversion of the upper waters of the rivers except
in the insignificant and easily preventable case of a small
part of the Ak Sai or Dumuka River; and there is not the
slightest evidence that the irrigation system of the past
was better than that of to-day. The true cause of the
178 THE PULSE OF ASIA
diminution of the water supply appears to be that the
climate has changed.
It is proverbially unsafe to place much reliance upon
legends. Students, however, are more and more recogniz-
ing that legendary stories contain a kernel of truth, which
can be detected by comparing scientific facts with those
details of the stories which would be least likely to be the
product of imagination. Therefore the local legend of the
destruction of Kenan or Ulugh Mazar is worth recording.
According to Ismail Beg and the people of Malakalagan, a
holy Mohammedan priest came to Kenan one day, long after
the driving out of the former Buddhist inhabitants, and
found no one at home. Men, women, and children had all
gone out to work on the canals. The holy man was hungry
and tired. Being accustomed to live on the fat of the land,
he was irritated at finding the houses shut and empty; He
offered a prayer, which can hardly be supposed to have
been pious, and began to turn a hand-mill standing in a
courtyard, whereupon sand rained down from heaven. It
ceased to fall when the troubled villagers, having seen it
from afar, came hastening home and supplied the good
man's wants. Nevertheless, the visitation proved fatal.
From that time onward the water supply decreased, until
at last the people of both Lachinata and Kenan abandoned
their houses and fields, and moved to old Dumuka and
Ponak, which had remained uninhabited since the Buddhist
inhabitants fled northward across the desert. A similar le-
gend is found in many other places in Turkestan, appar-
ently because similar events occurred. The rain of sand is
often spoken of as if it were the cause of the abandonment
THE SAND-BURIED RUINS OF CHIRA 179
of ancient towns. I do not think so, however, because
extended observation has convinced me that sand rarely en-
croaches upon a region until after a decrease in the water
supply has caused the death of vegetation. In the Kenan
legend it is distinctly stated that the amount of water dimin-
ished. The villagers said to me, "You see, what happened
to Kenan long ago was like what happened to Dumuka in
the days of our fathers. The river dried up."
From Malakalagan I struck a little north of east across
the desert to the Keriya River. The first day, our way led
through the peculiar scenery characteristic of the parts of
the zone of vegetation where the water supply has decreased,
whether it be on the edge of the zone near the mountains,
or, as is much more common, the remoter border near the
sands of Takla-Makan. Steep-sided mounds, twenty or ,
thirty feet high, were scattered over the plain so thickly
that we had to wind hither and thither through the narrow-
est of passages. Rarely could we see more than three hun-
dred feet in any direction, and often only fifty. Through the .
veil of sand shrouding the sides of the mounds, we perceived
that their lower half was composed of stratified river silts
full of the gnarled roots and underground stems of ancient
tamarisks, while the upper half consisted of fine sand de-
posited by the wind and kept in place by the upper parts
of the tamarisk bushes which projected from the tops.
Sometimes the feathery bushes were gray-green and flour-
ishing, with sweet-scented spikes of minute purple flowers,
but oftener they were wholly dead, or had already shed the
small stiff spines which serve as leaves. At the bottom of
the mounds, one was in a maze of sandy slopes, dead tam-
180 THE PULSE OF ASIA
arisk branches, and narrow passages ; at the top, one looked
out upon what seemed to be a thick growth of bushy vege-
tation perched upon hills and fading away in the near dis-
tance in a dense haze of dust. The scenery was most mono-
tonous and gloomy. No sun broke through the haze; no
landmarks appeared; there was nothing to guide us save
the compass. Even with that I found it most difficult to
make our countless minute zigzags balance one another,
and thus to preserve a straight course.
The tamarisk mound is highly significant as an indicator,
of changes of climate. One finds it in every stage of devel-
opment, from one foot high with a vigorous growth of slen-
der flourishing bushes, to sixty feet high with nothing but
huge, gnarled trunks, dead for hundreds of years. During
seven years in Asia, so far as I remember, I have never seen
young tamarisk bushes growing anywhere except upon the
flood-plains of streams, or in other places where the ground
was thoroughly saturated with water. On flood-plains from
which the water has been diverted by man for four or five
years, half or more of the tamarisks are usually dead or
dying. In later stages still more die, and only those with
very deep roots persist. Then the wind begins to dissect the
dry plain, carrying away the finer materials from the parts
where the plants have died, and heaping up the coarser
grains of sand in the protected spots where living bushes
check its force. Thus mounds are formed, and their height
is increased by seolian erosion at the base and by seolian de-
position at the top. The depth to which erosion can pro-
ceed is limited by the level of underground water, and the
amount of deposition is limited by the amount of sand avail-
THE SAND-BURIED RUINS OF CIIIRA 181
able from the erosion of surrounding areas. Thus the max-
imum size of the mounds is determined by the extent to
which the water supply has diminished. The actual size, of
course, depends partly on the length of time since the water
was withdrawn. Judging from the relation of mounds to
ruins, I should say that mounds fifty or sixty feet high must
be nearly two thousand years old, and those twenty-five feet
hitrh from five hundred to a thousand or more. Sometimes
tamarisk mounds are formed without a change in the
water supply, but such can be easily distinguished from those
of which we are speaking. They are characterized by a
rounded form, by a vigorous growth of bushes on all sides as
well as on the top, and by the fact that they are composed
entirely of seolian sand, and not partly of sand and partly
of river deposits eroded by the wind. In general, tamarisk
mounds are an unequivocal evidence of a diminution of the
water supply. When, as in the region we are now traversing,
they occur over broad areas where man's activity has had
nothing to do with the water supply, they furnish one of the
strongest possible proofs of climatic changes.
At the end of our first day from Malakalagan, when we
had almost reached the border between the tamarisk mounds
and the sandy desert, we came upon the pottery-strewn site
of a very ancient town, lying fifteen miles north of Karakir,
on the line which the Kara Su River would follow if pro-
longed. Karakir, to which I made a flying visit on the way
to Imamla, is now a little hamlet of about thirty houses,
although in the chronicle of the Mohammedan conquest, it
is spoken of, under the name of Bowa Zengir, as a village
of some importance. A peculiar event took place there
182 THE PULSE OF ASIA
a few years ago. In 1891, some villagers were digging above
their spring, as one of them told me, in order to get a little
more water. When they returned to their work one morning,
they found that the spring had visibly increased, and that
the stream from it was perceptibly beginning to deepen its
channel. In great delight, they sat down to wait for nature
to make them rich, for unlimited land was at their disposal
if only they had water for it. A flood from the Kara Su
came down not many weeks after, and entering their chan-
nel, converted it into a broad, deep trench. In the course of
a few months, the new stream grew to a size which proved
unfortunate for the villagers. The government heard of it
and took possession. The officials, with great profit to them-
selves, founded a new village, called Karakir Achma, or
Karakir Opening. There was a rush like that at the open-
ing: of an Indian reservation in the United States. In a few
years, the place had a permanent population of two hundred
families or more, and was deemed important enough to have
a bazaar.
The new channel grew steadily wider and deeper, until
in 1905, when I saw it, it had a width of two hundred
feet or more, and a maximum depth of about sixty feet,
which decreases both upstream and down. For some years
the amount of water remained fairly constant, but in 1905
it had been decreasing for two or three years, and the peo-
ple of Achma had begun to move away. Apparently, the
water supply of neighboring villages did not suffer, but
rather increased. At Shivul, east of Karakir, new springs
broke out, so that between 1885 and 1900, a settlement of
twenty families was formed. The Dumuka River also in-
THE SAND-BURIED RUINS OF CHIRA 183
creased in size, and new springs appeared lower down in
its bed, as has already been stated. Apparently, in this re-
gion, as in all Central Asia, there was an increase in rainfall
from about 1893 to 1900, between times of lessened precip-
itation. The extraordinary abundance of water at Karakir
was due probably in part to the increased rainfall, but much
more to what may be called an accident. The newly opened
watercourse, so it seems, happened to be located in such
a position that for ten or twelve years, and perhaps to the
time of my visit, the stream continued to deepen its chan-
nel. It maintained its volume by continually penetrating
to and drawing upon new layers of soil lying well below the
level of ground-water, and therefore completely saturated.
The temporary increase in rainfall, culminating in 1900,
seems to be part of one of the periodic variations of climate
which Bruckner has shown to take place once in about
thirty-six years in all parts of the world. Such changes
appear competent to explain the minor changes in the vil-
lages and vegetation of the Chira region, for instance the
abandonment of Dumuka at the end of a temporary dry
period in 1841. They cannot explain the broader facts of
the progressive abandonment of cultivated areas and the
death of vegetation from north to south. If the climate of
to-day is like that of the time when the old town north of
Karakir flourished, there is no reason why the vegetation
around the ruins should have been dead for centuries.
To-dav, if all the water of Karakir were free to flow as far
as it could, it would not reach the ruins.
On leaving the ruins, we spent a day and a half in traversing
an almost absolutely barren area of reddish or yellowish
184 THE PULSE OF ASIA
sand dunes, from ten to a hundred or more feet high. There
had been a high wind two days before, and the air was still
so full of dust that we could scarcely see half a mile. In the
dense haze the larger dunes loomed like distant mountains,
and again and again we were amazed to find ourselves sud-
denly at the foot of a small hill, which we had felt must be
a mountain miles away. As we zigzagged hither and thither
in climbing the steep western fronts of the larger dunes,
or as we walked along the narrow crests and looked down
the apparently precipitous slopes into the remote, hazy hol-
lows, we experienced the sensations of genuine mountain-
climbing. There was a sense of height and space; we invol-
untarily drew back at the sound of an avalanche, though
it was only sand slipping from under our feet; we gained
each crest with the joy of achievement; and we walked
warily, to avoid a fall that would plunge us down a thou-
sand feet, as it seemed.
In the midst of this weird illusion, we unexpectedly ar-
rived at the top of a bluff. Below us lay the fair savannah
of the band of vegetation along the Keriya River, a nar-
row plain dotted with clumps of tamarisk bushes, or groves
of poplars rising from a gold-flecked, silver-plumed under-
growth of green reeds. We traveled down the left bank of
the meandering river, sometimes in the open plain of reeds,
sometimes among the poplars, and occasionally out into
the tedious sand of the desert, when the stream swung far
to our side. Now and then we passed a shepherd's hut of
tamarisk branches, or, more rarely, a flat-roofed cabin of
poplar poles, reeds, and mud.
Sixty miles below Keriya, we left the river, which contin-
THE SAND-BURIED RUINS OF CIIIRA 185
ues onward to the north, and directed our course westward
toward Dandan-Uilik across ridge after ridge of sand, fifty
to one hundred feet high. All the ridges, in response to the
prevailing northeast w r inds, faced in general southwest.
Their gently sloping backs to windward were gray with a
cover of rather coarse sand, while their steep fronts to lee-
ward were pale brick-red with the fine sand of the main
desert. The backs of the larger dunes were diversified with
smaller dunes, like shoals of mounting fish, and the small
ones in turn were covered w r ith ripples. All the forms,
whether of dunes or ripples, were on one pattern, endlessly
varied. The variety and grace of the curves in the sand,
like those of drifted snow, give the sandy desert an unceas-
ing interest and beauty. It is utterly unlike the monotonous
flat deserts of gravel, clay, and salt, though even those have
beauty of a certain sort. The charm increases as the dunes
increase in size. The sand is truly aw'ful in times of heat
and wind, but when, as during those days at the end of
September, the hours of sunshine are pleasantly warm,
the nights are fresh, the air is still, the way is known, and
a water supply is assured, its unique beauty is indescribable.
The sandy desert is at its best in the morning, when, as
often happens, the haze falls to the earth during the quiet
night, and the shadows of a clear sunrise bring out all the
details of form.
My plan had been to go direct from the Keriya River to
Rawak, the northern part of the ancient oasis of Litsa, and
then south to Dandan-Uilik. In order to follow as straight
a course as possible, I directed our way with the compass,
heading for a point between Dandan-Uilik and Rawak.
186 THE PULSE OF ASIA
It was easy to keep the direction, but extremely difficult to
estimate the distance traversed because of the continual
zigzagging necessitated by the sand dunes. This was im-
material, I thought, because Ibrahim Beg would recognize
our destination as soon as we came near it. On the after-
noon of the second day from the river, we came upon frag-
ments of pottery and traces of old canals. We were only
twenty-two miles from the river, according to my estimate,
though the distance to the ruins was twenty-six, according
to Stein's excellent map. However, we were certainly near
the ruins; so I told Ibrahim Beg that it was his turn to
play guide. To my amazement, he said that he had never
been to the Rawak portion of the ruins at all, and to the
Dandan-Uilik portion only a single night. Then he arrived
after dark and left before daylight. When the people at
Chira all agreed that he was an authority on ruins, he had
been ashamed, apparently, to confess his ignorance. More-
over, he wanted the good present which Sahibs are known
to give. Accordingly he came along, trusting vainly that
he might find a shepherd to guide us. His action was
characteristic of the weak cupidity of the Chantos.
We spent the next twenty-four hours in hunting anx-
iously for the ruins. The five of us deployed widely in order
to cover as much ground as possible. First we searched
vainly to the northwest and north in the hope of finding
Rawak; and later, to the south. There finally we found
Dandan-Uilik, only a mile and a half from where we had
first come upon pottery. We had no idea as to the location
of Stein's wells, or as to the depth at which we might find
water if we dug a new one. I dared not waste time in an
THE SAND-BURIED RUINS OF CIIIRA 187
attempt which might prove futile, for the camels had al-
ready spent three rather warm days without water, and a
two days' journey lay between us and the river. I went
on that night some six miles to the south, in the direction
whence the ancient water supply must have come. Before
sunrise the next day we were under way, making straight for
the river. The camels' throats were so dry that they began
to rattle distressingly. The creatures knew that they were
headed for water, and traveled more than half as fast again
as on the outward journey. We reached the Keriya River
that night, doing two days' journey in one, in spite of the
soft sand and the countless zigzags. We men did not suf-
fer as the camels did, but another day would have exhausted
our melons and water, and then we too, like the camels,
should have felt the pinch of thirst. It was fortunate that
we had not depended on Ibrahim Beg's estimate of how
much water we should need. If we had, we might have
joined the company of improvident Chanto treasure-seek-
ers, who, as one hears in every village, have perished of
thirst while hunting for the gold supposed to lie buried
among the ruins beneath the sands of Takla-Makan.
In spite of difficulties, the trip to Dandan-Uilik was a
success. The canals and pottery between the main ruins
and Rawak were seen to indicate that an area seven or
more miles wide from east to west must have been under
cultivation. The length of the cultivated area, including
Rawak on the north and a group of houses which I dis-
covered two miles to the south of Dandan-Uilik, must have
been at least nine miles. In other words, the oasis of Litsa,
in its prime, had an area of nearly fifty square miles. Be-
188 THE PULSE OF ASIA
fore Rawak was abandoned, about 300 a. d., the cultivated
area was but little, if any, smaller than that of modern
Chira, which is estimated to have a population of ten thou-
sand souls. Moreover, the ruins lie in the midst of a great
expanse of dead vegetation, extending a dozen miles to the
east, and an unknown distance in other directions. I trav-
ersed beds of dead reeds and poplars for six miles south of
Dandan-Uilik, and could see dead trees extending indefi-
nitely to the north and west. The reeds were broken off
close to the ground, and were largely covered with sand.
One scarcely noticed them; the poplars, on the other hand,
i stood up boldly. Near the ruins, dead tamarisks were nu-
merous. A few stood on mounds; but the majority were on
the level plain, just as they grow to-day near rivers or in
the moister parts of the zone of vegetation, especially in the
region immediately around the modern oases. I found no
indication that the Keriya River ever flowed to Dandan-
Uilik. Nevertheless, in ancient times the place received a
supply of water large enough not only to irrigate the oasis,
but to support abundant vegetation over the plain on every
side. Apparently, in those days Dandan-Uilik stood among
surroundings practically identical with those prevailing
to-day around the villages of the zone of vegetation.
It has often been assumed by writers on the Lop basin
and on deserts in general, that the encroachment of sand
is the chief cause of the death of vegetation and of the aban-
donment of oases. Their theory holds that deserts by their
very nature devour the regions around them. Doubtless
this occasionally happens, but in the Lop basin, at least,
it is the exception, not the rule. Usually the vegetation dies
THE SAXD-BURIED RUINS OF CIIIRA 189
first, and then the sand of the desert begins to encroach.
Throughout an area of many square miles around Dandan-
Uilik. half, more or less, of the dead vegetation is not cov-
ered by sand at all, or at most only by dunes from two to
five feet high. Such dunes, accumulating slowly as they
must, could not possibly kill vigorous tamarisks, and much
less large poplars. On the borders of the zone of vegetation,
where ground-water is comparatively near the surface, I
saw literally scores of places where the advance of sand
had been checked by plants, and dunes had accumulated
to a height of fifteen feet or more. In such cases, the vege-
tation was interfered with somewhat, but the stronger
plants, including even the reeds, had responded to the exi-
gency, and had lengthened their stems so as to keep above
the drifts. Where the sand had passed by, new vegetation
had sprung up in the hollows to replace the weak plants
which had been killed. If, as at Dandan-Uilik, the vegeta-
tion of a region is all dead, and especially if it has died
where there is not sand enough to injure it greatly, it is
safe to say that the encroachment of sand has nothing
to do with the matter. It is an effect rather than a cause.
The true explanation of the dead vegetation and of the
peculiar location of the ruins of Dandan-Uilik and Rawak
seems to be that the water supply has been diminished by
a change of climate.
After our trying experience in the desert, we rested a day,
October 1, under the poplars beside the Keriya River.
The air was of so perfect a temperature that one did not
feel too cool in the shade or too warm in the sun. From
our camp we looked out between two massive poplars at
190 THE PULSE OF ASIA
the gleaming expanse of the broad, shallow river, with its
sand-bars, snags, and driftwood. Beyond it lay a golden
plain of reeds, and a low belt of green poplar woods. The
scene might almost have been on some slow river in Indi-
ana. But the white and brown flock of fat-tailed sheep,
the shepherd boy wading across the stream in a white gown
and a fur cap, and above all the great two-humped camels
stripping the leaves from the poplars, disturbed the illusion.
The line of low yellow hills a mile away beyond the band
of green was the border of the great red desert, whose slowly
drifting sands have marched persistently forward for two
thousand years or more in the wake of dying vegetation.
In returning to the region of villages, I followed a route
in the sand several miles west of the Keriya River. There
was nothing which could by any possibility be an old course
of the river leading to Dandan-Uilik. There were, however,
a number of isolated areas of dead vegetation lying in large
hollows surrounded by sand. They became more numer-
ous as we approached the zone of vegetation. Along the
border of the zone, half or more of the plants were dead.
Such phenomena furnish strong evidence that not only
among the ruins, but in other parts of the now lifeless des-
ert, vegetation flourished abundantly at no very remote
period.
CHAPTER IX
KERIYA AND NIYA
KERIYA, the Pein of Marco Polo and Pimo of Hwen
Tsiang, 1 is a pleasant district, with a population of about
fifteen thousand souls. I was much disappointed on reach-
ing there to find that my men had not been able to buy any
camels or make any other preparations. The natives were
full of promises and pleasant words, but that was all. The
camel-owners, so it appeared, had formed an "agreement
in restraint of trade," and would offer nothing but the poor-
est animals at the highest prices. I sent for the chief Beg
and asked his assistance, which he promised most readily,
but the next day nothing had been done. I sent for him
again.
"Did you promise to see that some camels were brought
here to-day, and that the merchants who promised goods
to us brought them at once?" I asked.
"Yes," he answered, "but every one was busy this morn-
ing."
"Did you make those same promises to my men two
weeks ago, ten days ago, five days ago, and three days ago ?"
"Yes, but there was much to do. We are busy. Do not
be angry. I will do all that you wish to-morrow."
"Very well; do you promise to do it all to-morrow? "
"Yes, I promise."
"All right. A man who does not keep his promises is a
1 See Appendix.
192 THE PULSE OF ASIA
liar, isn't he ? If you don't get things under way to-morrow,
I will tell the Amban that you are a liar, and then you will
lose your office. You saw how he bowed his head to my
passport [because it was from the Emperor], and you know
that he will do what I tell him."
The Beg went away frightened, and that very afternoon
the merchants suddenly found that they had leisure to at-
tend to our wants. A large number of camels were brought
for our inspection, from among which we selected two that
were suitable. We would not bargain for the animals. We
only said to the owners: "You and the other camel-mer-
chants decide what they are really worth, and we will pay
it; but any man who tells us a lie hereafter will get into
trouble." When the camel-trust met to talk the matter
over, affairs took an unexpected turn. An old man called
Yusup Beg got up, so we were told, and made a long speech.
"Aren't you ashamed of yourselves?" was the sub-
stance of what he said. "You, Tokhta, have a hundred
animals; you, Hashim, fifty; and you, Dursun, two hun-
dred. Can you not sell one apiece for the good name of our
city ? Shame on you ! We are disgraced ! If I had been
here, you should not have acted so. The stranger has come
from afar. He shall see that we are not all dogs and pigs.
I have thirty camels. He shall choose the five that he wishes,
and name his own price."
Yusup Beg was as good as his word. He let us choose
three splendid animals, and seemed perfectly satisfied
when we paid a price which was decided upon by the United
Camel-owners, and which every one said was fair. We paid
the tax which properly should be paid by the seller, but
KERIYA AND NIYA 193
even so, the animals were a most fortunate investment;
for they did us the best of service, and we sold them at a
profit far away at Turfan, where prices are much higher.
During our stay at Keriya, I learned of another reason
for believing that the Keriya River never watered the oasis
of Litsa. Except at times of high flood, all the water of the
Keriya River is spread out on the oasis and disappears.
Below the city, however, numerous springs well out and
give rise to a new stream, which meanders northward
through the desert for over a hundred and fifty miles. In
traveling down the river on the way to Dandan-Uilik, I mar-
veled that so large a stream, flowing perennially through a
low, smooth plain, was not utilized for irrigation. When I
questioned the shepherds, they merely said that there were
no people. At Keriya, two or three well-informed men
told me that attempts had been made to use the water, but
all had failed. The first year the crops were good, but the
second they dwindled greatly, and were not worth raising.
The trouble lay in the salinity of the river. Evidently, such
a river could never have watered the oasis of Litsa with
its large villages of Dandan-Uilik and Rawak.
To-day, the Keriya River ends in the sand halfway from
the town of Keriya to the Tarim River. Beyond its present
terminus the sand of the Takla-Makan desert prevails,
and no caravan except that of a daring explorer like Hedin
can possibly traverse the waterless desert. Nevertheless,
Littledale was told by a Chinese official that formerly there
was a road down the river and across the desert to Kucha;
and Stein says that "a remark of Mirza Haidar, the Mo-
ghul leader and historian, makes it very probable that the
194 THE PULSE OF ASIA
Kenya River reached the Tarim as late as the sixteenth
century." About 1000 a. d., according to the legend which
I heard at both Malakalagan and Keriya, the ancient Bud-
dhists, fleeing from the Mohammedan invaders, went down
the river and so to the north, which would be quite impos-
sible to-day. At a still earlier time, there seems to have been
an important road along this route, as appears from the
small ruins of Kara-dong discovered by Hedin forty miles
above the present flood limit. Stein, who later explored
them, assigns their abandonment to the third or fourth
century of our era, the time when Rawak was abandoned.
He thinks that Kara-dong was "a fortified frontier post or
roadside ' Sarai ' " guarding the road from Keriya to Kucha.
Such a road could have existed only if the Keriya River once
flowed farther than it does now. That it did so flow is
proved conclusively by the dead river jungle which Hedin
found for twenty or twenty-five miles beyond the present
terminus of floods. The greater length of the river does
not appear to have been due to less extensive use of the
water for irrigation, for from the earliest times, Pimo, or
Pein, seems to have been at least as large and prosperous
as modern Keriya.
The obvious inference is that here again we have evidence
of a change of climate.
On October 11, 1905, after four days in Keriya, I started
eastward once more, without having stopped a day longer
than I wished. My caravan, as then constituted, consisted
of five splendid camels, eight horses, and five men, not in-
cluding guides. The numbers sound large to one in the habit
of traveling in less remote lands. As a matter of fact, they
,
KERIYA AND NIYA 195
are unusually small for Chinese Turkestan. I spent the
next five weeks in exploring the lower ends of the Niya,
Yartungaz, and Endereh rivers. All three furnished seem-
ingly conclusive evidence of a secular change of climate.
The whole country for six or seven hundred miles east of
Keriya is so scantily populated that the human factor can
in many cases be eliminated, and we are able to form an
exact estimate of the influence of purely physical causes
on the size and salinity of rivers and on the distribution
of life.
From Keriya I sent the camels directly to Niya, while I
went with the horses by way of the gold-mining town of
Sorgak. The town lies on the enormous fan delta of gravel
which the Niya River has deposited where it suddenly
emerges from the Kwen Lun mountains and crosses the
old fault-line to the relatively level basin floor. Sorgak pre-
sents the essential features of a mining town in the south-
western part of the United States. Perhaps it is a trifle
more barren and unattractive than the worst of our mining
towns, but from a distance it gives the same impression of
rawness to the traveler. It lies in a basin-shaped valley a
quarter of a mile or more from the edge of the deep gorge
of the Niya River, whence water must be brought up on the
shoulders of women, or the backs of donkeys. Not a ves-
tige of verdure can be seen, nothing but gravel with dug-
outs half buried in it. Here and there a blatantly new shanty
with a mud roof and an unseasoned wooden front stands
among the older, duskier structures. The population of
the region is said to be between three and four hundred
families, and the total number of men who work as miners,
196 THE PULSE OF ASIA
including those who stay only a month or two, is about two
thousand a year. The annual output of gold is only twenty-
six thousand dollars, or thirteen dollars per man. Thirteen
dollars a year does not seem to be a sum calculated to en-
courage lavish expenditure. Nevertheless, the uncertainties
of the miner's life and the possibilities of sudden wealth
lead to the same extravagance in Central Asia as in western
America. The bazaar is surprisingly large and busy con-
sidering the size of the population, and it is filled with
idlers. As I walked about to take photographs, I counted
a hundred and twenty men and boys following close be-
hind me, and there were certainly fifty more sitting idle
in places which we passed. I did not count the baby which
lay bound in its cradle in front of a closed shop.
As we rode into Sorgak, I was surprised to see our honest
friend, Yusup Beg of Keriya, coming out to meet us. It
appeared that he was Beg of Sorgak, and had come a three
days' journey from home simply to see that I was comfort-
able. When I wished to give him a present, he told Ibrahim
that his sole desire was that I should write his name in my
"deftar," or note-book, and give him a letter to put in his
box. We were told that he was very unwilling to become
Beg of Sorgak. What did he want of such a place ? He
was old, and had held much higher positions. The Chinese
amban of Keriya, however, though a most corrupt man
himself, insisted upon having an honest man in charge of
the gold-fields. The natives, as well as the Chinese, appre-
ciated his honesty. When it became known that he had
been appointed Beg of Sorgak, seventy families from Kapa,
a gold-mining town a hundred and fifty miles to the east,
KERIYA AND NIYA 197
promptly moved to Sorgak, in order to be under the rule
of a man who did not " eat " money.
Many of the mines at Sorgak are located on the top of
the great gravel fan, far from the gorge of the river. Accord-
ingly, the miners winnow the gravel instead of panning it.
When first I saw this primitive process, the gravel was
dumped in a conical heap two feet high. With their bare
hands, scarred and maimed by frequent cuts, bruises, and
sores, a man and a woman moved the heap forward by
throwing handful after handful to the top. The finer sand
was blown away during the process, and the coarser frag-
ments rolled to the bottom of the cone, where they could
be brushed away. Thus the advancing heap was gradually
diminished in size, and reduced to a somewhat homogeneous
mass of very fine pebbles and coarse sand. At length the
miner put this in a wooden pan, and holding it higher than
his head, poured it into a cloth on the ground, thus allow-
ing the wind to blow away part of the remaining sand
and pebbles. In the midst of the pouring, the young man
stopped and began to whistle. "What are you whistling
for?" I asked. "For the wind," was the sincere answer.
When the wind had done its work, the miner spread the
remaining gritty mass thinly over the cloth, and blew it
away by mighty blasts from his lungs, beginning on the
edges and working inward. All his partners, of both sexes
and all ages, or at least as many of them as could find room,
gathered around the cloth, and, lying on their stomachs,
watched with the traditional gold-miner's excitement for
traces of the yellow metal. A little girl pounced on a flake,
but that was all.
198 THE PULSE OF ASIA
" Only ten cents' worth of gold for the morning's work
of ten of us," was the discouraged remark of the strong-
lunged miner; and his "ten of us "meant only the men
who share the mine, not the women and children who
had helped.
Niya proved to be a pleasant town of about four thousand
inhabitants. On the 17th of October, we found the shady
lanes bordered by rows of thrifty poplars, still almost as
green as in summer. The fields had apparently borne heavy
crops, though all were now bare with. the exception of the
rustling corn-fields, whose half-gathered golden crop made
spots of color on the flat roofs of the warm mud houses.
The people were much like those of other places. They
looked well-to-do and comfortable, though they mildly com-
plained that the Chinese amban of Keriya had lately in-
creased their taxes, and that their late Beg had oppressed
them. After the polite and hospitable fashion of the Chantos,
the new Beg invited me to go hawking. Accompanied by
a merry party of friends, and by two retainers carrying
hooded falcons on their gloved wrists, we rode down the
river. Broad reaches of sluggish water invited wild duck
to halt, and an open plain of low, grassy reeds dotted with
feathery tamarisk bushes afforded shelter to numerous
hares. The sport was poor, but the good humor and jokes
of the hunters, and our exciting races after the falcons, put
every one in high spirits. I realized what good fellows the
Chantos can be, and how much they resemble ourselves in
spite of certain weaknesses.
The Niya River is much like the Keriya. It is not strange
that travelers have been deceived as to the possibilities
KERIYA AND NIYA 199
of this region. For instance, Stein, a most careful inves-
tigator, remarks : " The thought that all this fertile stretch
of ground might well be brought under cultivation had
occupied me as I rode along. It was therefore a pleasant
sight to me when a little below Nagara-khana [nineteen
miles north of Niya] ... I came upon the head of a canal
begun only two years previously under the amban's orders.
. . . Close to the route runs the new canal, a modest work so
far, only six to eight feet broad, yet likely to bring life and
wealth to this lonely woodland. The soil is a fertile loess,
and the level of the ground is so uniform that its irrigation
will be easy when the jungle is once cleared away. For over
eight miles we followed the canal, and I pictured to my mind
the changes it is likely to bring soon to this silent scene."
When I saw the canal, five years after Stein's visit, it had
already been abandoned for two or three years. The water
was so saline that, after the first year or two, agriculture was
impossible.
The first inhabitants whom we found on the lower Niya
River were at the shrine of Imam Jafir Sadik, the most
famous shrine in all Central Asia, where the Niya River
reappears for the last time. There we stopped for two days
while the men offered sacrifices. The shrine was founded, or
perhaps revived, during the wave of migration which spread
eastward from the large western oases between 1830 and
1840. In response to the reputed dream of a holy " mulla,"
a reforming ruler endowed it with all the land of the then
practically uninhabited Niya valley. He appointed a chief
sheikh and four others, one of whom was the grandfather
of my informant, one of the present sheikhs. The town of
200 THE PULSE OF ASIA
Niya, founded at that time, grew until now it numbers over
four thousand inhabitants, and the shrine, to which all the
land still belongs, has grown very rich. A year before my
visit, the Beg of Niya, who was soon removed from office,
cast longing eyes upon such an opportunity for plunder.
He created five new sheikhs, who in a year " ate up " the
property so fast that the number of sheep was reduced from
five thousand to three thousand. A man with three hun-
dred sheep, it should be remembered, is considered rich.
The beggars of Imam Jafir are an important feature. A
sheep is killed daily for them except during the late spring
and early summer, when, as one of the sheikhs said: —
"The pot is no longer boiled. The beggars do not need
it. They wander out into the villages, and for three months
fill their stomachs with mulberries and apricots."
The shrine is regarded with such veneration that the pil-
grims dismount for the first prayer half a mile away. At
this point, where they first catch sight of the shrine, a rude
gateway has been erected, two upright poles with waving
horse-tails, crossed by a third. Farther away from the holy
place exultant pilgrims have set up dozens of still simpler
gateways, tree-trunks placed across the road from one
living poplar to another. Perhaps the gates reflect the feel-
ing that whatever is great must be inaccessible. As a man
at Keriya put it, when speaking of a petition to the Chinese
governor : —
" But how do I know that he received it ? He is a great
man. He is behind many doors." And each door, it may
be added, is opened by a man with an empty palm.
At Niya, when I explained to the native officials that I
KERIYA AND NIYA 201
was searching for ruins buried in the sand, they sent post-
haste to Keriya for old Achilla, a professional treasure-
seeker. After a rapid ride of a hundred and ten miles, he
overtook me a few miles north of the shrine of Imam Jafir
Sadik, at the point where the Niya River finally disappears.
During the next few days, he led me through five or six miles
of ruins which no European had ever seen before.
" How is this ? " I said. " You say you were the guide of
the Sahib who came to this region five years ago. Why
did n't you show him all these ruins ? "
"Oh," was the nonchalant answer, "the Sahib's camel-
man, cook, and hostler frightened me. They were afraid
to go out into the sand, and they wanted to go home. They
said, 'Don't tell the Sahib anything. He knows of the
"stupa " [shrine], and we can't help his finding that, but he
does not know of the other places. Lead him around them.'
So when the Sahib said, ' Adulla, do you know of any other
ruins ? ' I said, ' No, Sahib, even if you cut my throat for
it, I should still say there were no more ruins. I swear by
Allah that I never saw or heard of any.' And then when
the Sahib went himself to hunt, I and the others led him
away from the ruins."
The sanctimonious old man did not seem in the least
ashamed of his lies. Indeed, he was proud of them. Per-
haps he cheated me too. Still, I think he showed me all he
knew, for Ibrahim, who was almost as keen in the search
as I, pumped him night and day.
The shrine of Imam Jafir Sadik is located, as I have said,
where the Niya River "reappears for the last time." The
phrase expresses an important fact. The river disappears
202 THE PULSE OF ASIA
first in the zone of piedmont gravel. At the edge of the zone
of vegetation it reappears, and after watering Niya, sinks
into the ground a second time. Within a few miles it comes
to light again, only to be lost in the course of the next twenty
or thirty miles. Finally, at the shrine of Imam Jafir Sadik,
fifty miles from Niya, it reappears once more, but with such
diminished volume that it persists only five or six miles
before disappearing for the fourth and last time. During
the flood season, an uninterrupted stream flows from the
mountains to the last shepherd hut below the shrine, but
it is very temporary, and does not persist more than two or
three miles beyond the limit of the winter stream.
In an arid region like the Lop basin, water which flows
far underground becomes saline. Even Niya suffers from
salinity. North of the town I crossed fully half a mile of
land formerly reckoned as " first " of the three classes rated
for taxation, but now abandoned as too saline for anything
save pasture. Year by year fields are being given up at a
rate which threatens the extinction of the oasis within a few
generations. As might be expected, the water is even more
saline farther downstream, and permanent cultivation is
impossible. Various attempts, in addition to the one men-
tioned above, have been made to found villages near the
shrine and farther upstream, but all have failed within
three or four years at most. At Imam Jafir Sadik, eleven
families, scattered along the river for four or five miles, raise
a little corn, wheat, alfalfa, and melons, but cannot culti-
vate trees. They choose the sandiest, least saline soil, and
by cultivating a given patch only once in two or three
years, manage to eke out the produce of their flocks. In one
KERIYA AND NIYA 203
exceptionally favorable location, I was told that cultivation
had been carried on irregularly for twelve years, but in
most for only two or three. It would to-day be impossible
to establish a permanent agricultural village below Niya,
just as below Keriya.
In ancient times conditions were very different. Fifty-
seven miles due north of Niya, and seven miles from the
shrine, at the point where the largest floods disappear in the
sand and the most northern living poplars are found, we
came upon the southern houses of an ancient town. Stein
believes it to have been abandoned about 300 a. d. The rem-
nants of the town consist of sites strewn with pottery, the
remains of orchards full of fruit trees and the white poplar,
a " stupa " or Buddhist shrine of sun-dried brick, and the
beams and lower walls of ancient houses, of which I counted
a hundred and sixteen. The town was large and prosperous.
It was inhabited for a long time, as appears from the nature
of the ruins and the size of the trees. Its date is known from
coins, and from many documents in the Kharosthi tongue.
These are written upon wood, and are found in the various
forms shown in the accompanying illustration. Accounts,
official orders, memoranda, and letters were written upon
strips of wood of various carefully defined shapes. Data to be
kept for future reference were recorded on strips like A, E,
and G, which were filed away in rows, or were hung upon
strings run through the holes at the pointed ends. The most
interesting specimens which I found are C and D, parts of two
letters. The communication was written upon the concave
side of a strip such as C; and upon the convex side of a com-
plementary strip of exactly the same size. The two were then
204 THE PULSE OF ASIA
placed face to face, so that the writing of both was con-
cealed. Next, the address was written upon the outside of
the concave sheet of the unique letter. Finally, a string
was run through a hole in the concave sheet, and brought
around through slots to a square depression such as that
of D in the convex sheet. There it was sealed with clay,
and stamped with a seal like those of the illustrations on
the cover of this volume, and was ready for the postman.
According to Stein, the area covered by the ruins of the
Niya River site, as he calls it, is eleven miles north and
south, and four and a half east and west. I found two houses
over two miles south of any seen by Stein, and a large group
surrounded by a broad area of pottery about three miles
north. This makes the length of the oasis at least sixteen
miles. The extreme dimensions of modern Niya are given
on Stein's map as eight miles by three. That is, the modern
oasis is only a third, or at most half, as large as its Buddhist
predecessor of the early part of the Christian era. In more
ancient times the cultivated area may have been still larger.
Far out in the sand, six miles beyond the most remote ruins,
I found some bits of slag from furnaces, and the two meal-
ing-stones held by the camel-man at page 254. The guide,
old Abdullah, had brought us to see some sort of brick fire-
place which he had discovered when he visited the place a
year before on a treasure hunt. He described the location
with great precision, and led us to a spot where we found
traces of his camp, but he could not find the fireplace. We
searched in all directions for two hours; and while he was
away, out of sight, I found the stones and the slag, which
convinced me that the man had not been lying. He searched
>
KERIYA AND NIYA
20j
Ancient designs rudely scratched in coarse red pot-
tery. The animals are from the Niya River ruins,
the conventional design from Endereh. Reduced.
206 THE PULSE OF ASIA
longer than the camel-man and I, and finally had to be re-
called. He did not know what I had found, and supposed
that our quest had been in vain. As he had already told
Ibrahim what a liar he was, he supposed that I would think
that he had been lying again. He came back in a sad fright,
apparently expecting an immediate beating. I gave him
a little coin instead. A look of amazement and incredulity
went over his face, and then, as he realized that I meant it,
he fell on his knees, stroked his beard with a long invocation
to Allah, and wanted to kiss my feet.
The stones and slag which we found apparently belong
to a time more ancient than the ruined houses. Possibly
they are of the same date as the thickly strewn pottery of an
area over two miles long lying around the most remote
houses, but the appearance of the tamarisk mounds in the
vicinity indicates that they are older than the houses them-
selves. The pottery, with the accompanying slag and bones,
is in a much finer state of comminution than is common
among the main ruins. It is possible that it represents
a town more ancient than the Niya of the Kharosthi docu-
ments, or at least the part of a single town which was aban-
doned at a very early date, just as Rawak was abandoned
before Dandan-Uilik.
The condition of the vegetation agrees closely with that
of the ruins. To the end of the present flood channel it is
vigorous; a little farther out in the desert among the upper
ruins, the great majority of the poplars are dead, but retain
their branches, and the half-dead tamarisks form mounds
ten or twenty feet high; among the main ruins the poplars
have been reduced to mere trunks with few or no branches,
KERIYA AND NIYA 207
and the tamarisks are largely dead, although a few still sur-
vive on mounds thirty feet high; and finally, from the area
of finely comminuted pottery to and beyond the mealing-
stones the poplars are mere stumps five or six feet high, or
have been broken off by the wind even with the ground, and
the tamarisks have practically all perished, after in some
cases forming mounds fifty or sixty feet high.
The desiccation of the Niya ruins, like that of the Chira
group, cannot be explained by the encroachment of sand,
the diversion of tributaries, or the lowering of the level
of ground-water by erosion. There is not the slightest evi-
dence that the ancient irrigation system was better than,
or different from, that of to-day. Here, just as at Dandan-
Uilik, it would be the height of folly to carry water seventy
miles into the desert, when it might be employed to vastly
greater advantage where it is now used at modern Niya.
The growth of the present town cannot possibly have caused
the abandonment of the ancient site; for it has grown up
within a century, while the old town was abandoned six-
teen centuries ago. Furthermore, as modern Niya is barely
half as large as the old Buddhist oasis, and as it uses all
the water available, its water supply would manifestly be
scarcely half enough for a town such as that of antiquity.
Indeed, even if modern Niya were non-existent, a river of
the present size could not so much as reach, much less irri-
gate, the main ruins. At least, it did not reach them when it
was free to do so if it could. Up to about 1840, the popula-
tion of Niya amounted to only a dozen or fifteen families at
most, and the consumption of water was negligible. The
river ran freely as far as it would; but even so, it did not
208 THE PULSE OF ASIA
reach the ruins. It must have been accompanied by vege-
tation to the end of its course, just as it is to-day. The
ruins, for the most part, however, lie among vegetation
which has been dead so long that the majority of the trees
have lost their branches, and must have perished centuries
ago. A comparison of the Niya River site with old Dumuka
illustrates the matter. An abundant water supply was cut
off from Dumuka in 1841 at a single blow. The vegetation
is still vigorous, and only the weaker plants have died. If
an equally abundant supply was cut off from the Niya ruins
at approximately the same time, it is hard to see why the
vegetation in the one case should be vigorous, and in the
other should appear to have been dead hundreds of years.
Altogether, it is highly improbable that the river would reach
the ruins even if there were no such place as modern Niya.
The idea of its not only reaching them, but supporting twice
as large an oasis as it now does sixty or seventy miles up-
stream, is still more untenable. Apparently, at the beginning
of the Christian era, the available water supply of the Niya
River — which may be a very different matter from the
rainfall of the region — was at least three times as great as
now. One part or more was needed to balance the absorp-
tion and evaporation of the sixty or seventy miles from Niya
to the ruins, and two or more to irrigate the ancient oasis.
It is highly probable that the site of modern Niya was
inhabited at that time, as it certainly was three or four
centuries later, in 644 A. D., at the time of Hwen Tsiang's
visit. In that case, the water supply must have been four
or more times as great as now.
If we suppose that the climate of Central Asia has grown
KERIYA AND NIYA 209
more arid during the period covered by history, all the diffi-
culties disappear. Under less arid conditions, the Niya River
would not only be larger, but one or two small streams,
which now wither to nothing in the desert to the east, would
join it below the modern oasis. The water would be much
more free from salt, for a relatively small portion would
flow underground. As aridity increased, outlying settle-
ments would be abandoned in the order of their remoteness,
and the vegetation around them would gradually die. When
the remoter oases had been deserted, it may have happened
that the Niyang of Hwen Tsiang persisted for many cen-
turies on the site of modern Niya. Finally, before the time
of Marco Polo, 1295 a. d., it, too, must have decayed and
vanished, perhaps because of slowly increasing salinity
which gradually ruined the fields, as it is now doing once
more after their recovery during a long period of rest. It
is, perhaps, not insignificant that in one of the wooden docu-
ments found by Stein in the main ruins, "we read that
all the 'Shodhagas' and ' Drangadaras,' evidently local offi-
cials of the district, are complaining of the want of water."
CHAPTER X
THE LAND OF WITHERING RIVERS
AFTER visiting the Chira ruins, I had come to the con-
clusion that on the Yartungaz River, east of Niya, there
must be ruins like those found on other rivers. Accordingly,
at Niya I had told Ibrahim and the local Beg to find a man
who could guide us to them. After much inquiry, the two
men were told that a certain old man, named Abdur Rehim,
knew the place. They brought him to me in triumph, but
he asserted that, though he had hunted for ruins at the
lower end of the river in the sand, he never had found any.
Ibrahim and the Beg of Niya, nevertheless, insisted on his
telling the truth and concealing nothing. Finally, he con-
fessed that nine long days out in the waterless sand, he had
found an ancient site marked by a little pottery, but with-
out the slightest trace of houses. We laughed his nine days
down to three, and were so pleased with ourselves that he
dared not change his statement further. So now, ten days
later, when we returned to the shrine of Imam Jafir, he
joined us according to agreement. His spirits were extremely
depressed. None of Ibrahim's promises of meat and rice
as good as those of the Sahib himself, not to mention tea
and sugar, and a camel to ride when he was weary, had
any cheering effect. The fact was, as we became absolutely
convinced the next day, that he had been telling the truth
at first and lying later. Out of fear of the Beg's displea-
sure, he had made up his tale of ruins, hoping that their
THE LAND OF WITHERING RIVERS 211
remoteness and small size would prevent us from seeking
them. Failing that, and not daring to confess the truth,
the stupid, timid man was going to lead us on a wild-goose
chase, and when he got us far enough into the sands, pre-
tend that he had lost the way. Later, we found a man who
really knew of the ruins, which are located fifty or sixty
miles farther upstream than I had supposed. I could not
go back to them myself, but sent Ibrahim, who was exceed-
ingly proud of the neat little sketch map which he drew,
and of the pieces of pottery which he brought back.
After traveling eastward for two days under Abdur
Rehim's guidance, through a region of great dunes a hun-
dred and fifty feet high, we reached the Yartungaz River on
October 28th. The fall colors of the jungle were still glo-
rious. The poplars, wherever their leaves had not fallen,
were pure yellow, often of a lemon tint; the reeds, golden a
few weeks before, had now become brown, with occasional
yellow leaves. Their feathery tufts of seeds, which filled
the air with downy parachutes, presented a wonderful inter-
shading of the most delicate tints of gray and silver. And
the tamarisks, most marvelous of all, showed an array of
colors as varied, though not so bright, as those of a New
England forest. Deep purple shaded through brown into
bright red; or, more rarely, dusty gray passed impercep-
tibly into orange and yellow. Over all there lay a soft red-
dish shade, rare in this sunny land, where most of the
vegetation brightens from green to yellow, and then fades
to brown.
At Yartungaz, the whole population of about fifty gentle
souls was at our service. The clearing, where six families
212 THE PULSE OF ASIA
carry on a little cultivation, looked fertile : there were miles
upon miles of smooth plain; and a large amount of water
lost itself in the sand a mile or two beyond the farms;
but I no longer wondered at the apparent waste of oppor-
tunity. The water of the river, though drinkable, had a
sweetish, insipid taste. It is so highly charged with salts —
borax and potash, I should judge, as well as common salt
and soda — that it supports no permanent human settle-
ment, even where it first enters the zone of vegetation. The
only inhabitants are the few shepherds whom we saw.
They have been here since about 1860. During recent years,
part of them have carried on a little agriculture, either sow-
ing a given field once in three years or more, or cultivating
it two or three years till it is ruined and then abandoning it.
Permanent cultivation, however, is impossible. The Yar-
tungaz River, even more than the other rivers which I ex-
plored, shows evidence of a change of climate. In the first
place, the marked contrast between Haiyabeg, the large
agricultural village of ancient times of which Ibrahim found
the ruins, and the pastoral hamlet of to-day, where the per-
manent practice of agriculture is impossible, shows that the
river has grown more saline. Secondly, the old channels of
the river, including that of Haiyabeg, are all from five to
twenty miles longer than the present stream, and on every
side there are large areas of vegetation which has been dead
for centuries. And finally, in spite of the fact that during
the last five years the villagers have dammed the distribu-
taries of the river so as to keep all the water in the main
stream, and thus make it as long as possible, old beds of
dead reeds, the form of vegetation responding most quickly
THE LAND OF WITHERING RIVERS 213
to changes in the water supply, extend beyond the present
flood limit for over twenty, miles. Dead tamarisks and
poplars extend nearly as far. It is evident that the size
of the river has decreased greatly.
Two days' journey east of Yartungaz, we came to the
hamlet of Endereh, on the Endereh River. In exploring the
surrounding country, I found, that here, too, we have most
convincing evidence of a change of climate. To-day, the
entire population supported by the river amounts to about
eighty. A little land is cultivated w T ith much difficulty be-
cause of the salt, but the main business is the herding of
sheep. To live by agriculture would be impossible. Yet in
ancient Buddhist times, a dense population dwelt along the
eastern side of the river for a distance of at least fifteen miles
north and south, and an indefinite distance east and west.
Pottery, bones, and stones brought by man abound, as I
discovered, in the northern part of this area; while forts,
houses, temples, and gardens are scattered over an area of
many square miles to the south. As the ruins are situated
two hundred and fifty miles east of Khotan, there can be
scarcely any doubt that they are identical with the Tuholo
of Hwen Tsiang, and the Mo and Han-mo of his predeces-
sor, Sung-yun. These places are located nine hundred li,
that is, from two hundred and forty to two hundred and
sixty miles, east of Khotan. Sung-yun, in 518 a. d., speaks
of the city of Mo, six miles west of which lies the city of
Han-mo. Three or four miles south of the latter, there was
in his day a large temple with about three hundred priests,
worshipers of a golden figure of Buddha eighteen feet high.
Hwen Tsiang, in 644 a. d., says that "the old kingdom of
214 THE PULSE OF ASIA
Tu-ho-lo" (Tukhara), which apparently includes the cities
of Mo and Han-mo, "has long been deserted and wild.
All the towns are ruined and uninhabited." Stein, who
explored a part of the central ruins, puts the date of their
final abandonment between 719 a. d. and 800 a. d., on the
unquestionable evidence of some dated bits of Chinese and
Tibetan writing found in a temple. Evidently, the writing
was that of pilgrims, or at least of worshipers. The coins
which he found, and the style of art, seem to Stein to point
to an earlier date as the time of the main occupation of the
ruins. Apparently, they were abandoned between 518 a. d.,
when Sung-yun saw them, and 644 a. d., the time of Hwen
Tsiang's visit. A religious establishment, however, per-
sisted, or was reestablished, after the time of Hwen, and
lasted for a century or two. The case seems to be analo-
gous to that of Dandan-Uilik.
The northern, more remote parts of the ruins of Tu-ho-lo
appear to be decidedly older than the southern part which
Stein visited. In the northern part, called by the natives
Kallussti, the entire absence of any trace of houses, the
finely broken character of the pottery, and the occurrence
of archaic stone hammers and a flint knife suggest great
age. In the southern portions, called simply the "Potai,"
the preservation of portions of the clay walls of houses,
the presence of mulberry, white poplar, and other trees still
standing in orchards, the greater size and ornamentation
of the fragments of pottery, and the occurrence of grooved
millstones indicate a later date.
The features of late date are most noticeable in the most
southerly ruins. Here I discovered a fort about three miles
THE LAND OF WITHERING RISERS 215
south of the main stupa. The discovery illustrates how
completely even large and massive ruins may be concealed
among sand dunes and tamarisk mounds. On my first
visit to Tuholo I hunted for this fort, of which I had learned
the approximate location at Endereh, but failed to find it.
Later, with a new guide, I tried again, and found a large
structure of mud rising twenty feet above us, not over
two hundred yards from our previous route. It was com-
pletely concealed on one side by a huge tamarisk mound.
From the fort I desired to go straight south to some ruins
of which I had heard as being located at Serteck, on the
Cherchen road near Baba Kul. Both guides agreed that
to get there we must go six miles southwest to Korgach on
the Endereh River, twelve miles southeast down the river,
and six miles northeast along the road to Baba Kul. That
meant a journey of twenty -four miles, which would require
two days for the camels. Having never been direct from
Tuholo to Baba Kul, the men did not believe it possible
to do so. They were utterly incredulous when I said that
the distance was only ten miles, and we could reach Baba
Kul in a day. They felt sure that we should get lost and 1
would suffer the agonies of thirst. When we finally finished
our slow, winding course among a maze of huge tamarisk
mounds, we emerged on the open reed fields of the zone of:
vegetation close to Baba Kul. One guide became as sulky as
a spoiled child because his gloomy predictions had proved
wrong. The other, an innocent, boyish old man, clapped
his hands and, laughing aloud, exclaimed: —
"It's so, it's so. Here we are at Baba Kul. We've come
in one day instead of two. The Sahib was right. There b>
216 THE PULSE OF ASIA
a short way, and I never knew it. But how did the Sahib
know ? Have you been here before ? No ? Then it 's a
miracle."
The trees among the northern ruins of Tuholo are sig-
nificant. They prove, in the first place, that a long period
of uninterrupted cultivation must have elapsed in order to
allow some of them to attain a diameter of four feet. And
in the next, they furnish an important suggestion as to the
gradual manner in which the oasis was abandoned. Among
the older ruins to the north, and even in the centre, near
the stupa, the trees have entirely disappeared. This ap-
parently means that they were cut down after the farms had
been abandoned. Here, in the latest ruins, however, splen-
did trees were left standing. Probably the people of this
most southerly village, after having cut down the orchards
left by their neighbors farther down the river to the north,
were themselves obliged to move away and abandon their
own trees. The cutting down of all the trees of old Dumuka
by the people of new Dumuka is a modern parallel case.
If the present Dumuka should now be deserted, its trees
would be left as evidence of the progressive abandonment
of site after site. Among the Niya ruins, exactly as at Tu-
holo, valuable trees were left unused among the later ruins,
although all were cut off farther downstream, where the
farms appear to have been abandoned earlier. The con-
dition of the pottery in the still more ancient part of the
ruins, as we have already seen, gives similar evidence that on
the Niya and Endereh rivers, as well as on the Chira, the old
oases were abandoned little by little, beginning with the re-
moter portions where the water supply was more precarious.
THE LAND OF WITHERING RIVERS 217
After the fall of Tuholo, the population along the Endereh
River probably was reduced to the little hamlets of which
I discovered the ruins at Korgach and Serteck. Later, there
was a slight revival, as appears from the ruins of Bilel Kon-
ghan, a walled village of about a hundred and fifty houses
which I discovered west of the river. The village contains a
mosque, which proves that it belongs to the Mohammedan
period. The natives have no tradition as to its origin or the
reason for its abandonment.
Sometimes they jokingly call it "Nummret Sher," "Poor
Man's City," because the main gate on the south side has
wooden hinges.
" The Beg of this place was so poor," they say, " that he
could not even afford iron for hinges."
The chief importance of Bilel Konghan lies in the fact
that it forms a mediaeval link in the chain of successively
smaller and more decadent settlements which have grown
up one after the other on the Endereh River. At the begin-
ning of the Christian era, Tuholo was a large and prosper-
ous town, comparable in size to the modern Chira, but more
advanced in the arts, apparently. The houses were well-
built structures of sun-dried brick, supported by fine timbers
of white poplar, and were admirably adapted to withstand
the cold of winter and the heat of summer. Agriculture
flourished, and orchards and fields probably surrounded
every house. The people were adepts in the art of pottery-
making, and their artistic sense, though crude, was so far
developed that they ornamented their utensils with designs
like those on page 205. Other decorative arts, such as paint-
ing, wood-carving, and the moulding of clay and plaster,
218 THE PULSE OF ASIA
were practiced assiduously. Wood-turning was common;
writing was apparently so well known an accomplishment
that private persons often wrote letters and kept accounts.
During the first four or five centuries of the Christian era,
Tuholo appears to have lost much of its former size, though
it was still a considerable town, with its forts, temple, shrine,
and golden statue of Buddha. The old arts prevailed to the
end, though the time was at hand when they were to perish.
The fall of Tuholo and the rise of its much smaller
and less civilized successor, Bilel Konghan, were separated
by the Mohammedan conquest. In more favored places,
such as Khotan, the coming of Mohammedanism does not
appear to have materially altered the conditions of life or
the state of civilization. I doubt whether it did so in the En-
dereh region. There were certainly great changes, but they
were exactly such as would naturally accompany desicca-
tion. In architecture, fine timbers of the carved white pop-
lar were replaced by the knotty, unhewn trunks of the wild
poplar, because the increasing salinity of the soil prevented
the growth of good trees. Reeds and tamarisks perhaps
replaced adobe bricks because when clay becomes saline it
loses its adhesive quality. This may account for the decay
of the art of pottery-making, which would also be interfered
with by the fact that the villages, in moving upstream after
water, would necessarily occupy sandy sites, where such good
clay could not be procured as farther downstream. The
decay of pottery-making would entail that of the subsidiary
decorative arts. These were perhaps doomed in any case
by the Mohammedan prohibition of pictures. Mohamme-
danism may have had something to do with the falling off
THE LAND OF WITHERING RIVERS 219
in the art of writing, and in that of wood-carving, though
the latter would be hampered for lack of good material.
Other arts decayed in similar fashion, especially agricul-
ture, the greatest of all. Now, in the decadent present, it is
practically extinguished. The simple peasants of Endereh,
undisturbed by war or religious dissension, have reverted
to the pastoral life of their remote predecessors. They build
their small huts of wild poplars and unplastered reeds, here
and there, as the seasons dictate. All arts are unknown to
them save that of spinning the wool of their sheep.
War and the advent of Mohammedanism may explain
part of the changes at Endereh. They cannot explain the
decay of agriculture, nor the diminution from a population
of possibly ten thousand at the beginning of the Christian
era to half as much a few centuries later, and then to no-
thing, nor the mediaeval recovery of a rude oasis to a popu-
lation of less than a thousand, and the present state of pas-
toralism and a population of only eighty souls. During the
nineteenth century, the people of the large western oases
of Chinese Turkestan pushed out to find new homes. Ad-
vancing eastward from Keriya, they occupied the oases of
Oi-Toghrak, Yes-Yulghun, and Niya, and then, two hun-
dred miles farther from their old homes, Cherchen, Tatran,
Vash Sheri, and Charklik; but the waters of Endereh
and Yartungaz continued to waste themselves in the sand.
They had become too saline to be aught but lost.
Endereh is insignificant in itself; it is of great importance
as an example of the influence which a change of climate
may have upon the habitability of a country, and upon the
occupations and character of its people. In Kashmir we
220 THE PULSE OF ASIA
have seen reason to believe that a change of climate caused
the people to give up pastoral nomadism and to adopt the
sedentary pursuits of agriculture. Such a change must have
vastly increased the number of inhabitants. We cannot
say exactly what its influence may have been upon their
character, but it must have been great. In the far more arid
region of Endereh, a change of climate of precisely the same
nature caused a reversal of the process. Physical conditions
became less favorable, the habitability of the country was
diminished, and the dense population of an agricultural
community gave place to a few scattered shepherds. If
similar results have taken place in other regions, history
may have been influenced most profoundly thereby.
From Endereh eastward for two hundred and fifty miles
to Charklik, our journey was uneventful. We followed the
zone of vegetation quite closely, but zigzagged more or less.
Everywhere, in this remote region, there are unmistakable
evidences of a great change of climate. For scores of miles
where no man lives, we found great tamarisk mounds, dead
poplars, or vast beds of dead reeds. All of the few previ-
ous travelers who have visited the country have strictly
followed the road, which naturally keeps along the southern
edge of the zone of vegetation, where alone water is avail-
able in shallow saline wells, and where, of course, the vege-
tation is more vigorous than elsewhere. Hence they have not
noticed the unmistakable evidences of desiccation which
abound elsewhere.
A hundred miles east of Cherchen we came to the Vash
Sheri River, which rushes swiftly down from the moun-
tains, and, after losing most of its volume in the piedmont
THE LAND OF WITHERING RIVERS 221
gravel, supports the thirty people of Vash Sheri. During the
months of June, July, and August, the melting snow on the
mountains — thirty or forty miles away — increases the
river's volume enormously. Hearing of the large amount
of water wasted among reed-beds, a considerable number of
people have come to Vash Sheri during the thirty years
since it was settled, but most have gone away after a year
or two. In summer, they had more than enough water for
their fields, but during the planting season of April and
May, the supply often ran short. Under the present con-
ditions of climate and irrigation, a population of thirty or
forty is all that the river can support.
Long ago, the number must have been many times as
great. Formerly, the river followed a more westerly course.
At the end of the old channel, and at the same distance as
the modern hamlet from the mountains, I traversed the ruins
of a Buddhist town covering an area two and a half miles
long by one mile wide. Here, as at Niya and elsewhere, the
ruins consist of two parts. The older village covered the
whole area. Its houses have completely disappeared; but
if it were settled as densely as the pottery indicates, or as
densely as the modern villages, its population must have
numbered five hundred or more. The later village, or the
later part of the original village, as the case may be, occu-
pied only the upper portion of the ruins. Traces, sometimes
very faint, of sixteen houses can be seen, and some must
certainly have disappeared or escaped notice. It is safe to
say that near the time of its abandonment the village must
have had a population of a hundred souls, — three times
as many as the modern hamlet, — and that earlier it must
222 THE PULSE OF ASIA
have had far more. So large a number of people could not
be supported to-day without a radical change in the system
of irrigation. Fortunately, the river changed its course as
soon as the desertion of the village allowed the rude dam
of boulders at the head of the old channel to fall into
decay. Accordingly, the irrigation works have not been
subjected to much destruction by floods, and I found them
still almost intact. The difficulty of keeping the river in
its old bed may have been the immediate cause of the
abandonment of the village, but it had nothing to do with
the sufficiency of the water supply of the past as compared
with that of the present. The supply depends upon the
character and width of the river-bed, which are essentially
the same in both cases, the old channel being the wider,
if anything. It also depends on the nature of the irriga-
tion system, which, again, was precisely the same in the
past as it is to-day. Then, as now, the innumerable minor
channels into which the river divides were simply dammed
with banks of gravel dug up close at hand. Thus all the
water was gathered in a single larger channel on one side
of the flood-plain, — a mile wide, — and was led off into
canals, mere ditches dug in gravel or sandy clay, as the case
might be. If the river should again be turned into the
old canals, the available supply of water at the ruins would
apparently be essentially the same as that at the village
to-day.
CHAPTER XI
THE CHANTOS
I^IIARKLIK, fifty miles east of Vash Skeri, was the last
town in the Lop basin where, we came in contact with the
Chantos. We had now been among them more than six
months. Before proceeding to describe the deserts farther
to the east and north, I shall consider some of the more
prominent traits of the Chantos, and shall examine the rela-
tion of some of these traits to physical environment. The
vast majority of the Chantos practice agriculture in the zone
of vegetation or in the terrace villages, as their ancestors
appear to have done for ages. Their environment is almost
exactly the opposite of that of the Khirghiz in the high
plateaus. In the zone of vegetation, peculiar physical con-
ditions permit plants of varied species to grow prolifically
through a long season in certain strictly limited areas,
though elsewhere absolute desert prevails. In the plateaus,
on the contrary, physical conditions cause grass, but no
other useful sort of plant, to flourish for a short season of
two or three months over broad areas. The environment
of the Khirghiz compels him to travel continually, and
to become a self-reliant, hardy, adventurous nomad; that
of the Chanto limits him to one place, where patience and
steady work bring success, and where timidity is no special
disadvantage.
Crosby, in his book on "Tibet and Turkestan," has
pointed out that in the study of history we have not gen-
224 THE PULSE OF ASIA
erally emphasized sufficiently "the special characteristics
due to the unvarying fertility, the enervating facility, and the
great vulnerability of irrigation systems. Societies," he goes
on to say, "have been divided into nomadic, agricultural,
manufacturing, and commercial types. The distinction
that has not been made and studied in its very important
results is that which makes a separate class of the irrigat-
ing agriculturist, — safe against climatic risks; crowded in
small holdings; dependent on combined action for the con-
struction of irrigation works; the ready victim of any vio-
lence which seizes some certain ditch. Contrast him with
his brother who lives by the grace of uncertain rains ; forced
to a prevision which makes the lean year borrow from the
fat; able to live wide apart from his neighbor, developing
thereby an independent individualism which may ripen into
civil order and liberty; each farmer whose land has its Own
water supply capable of making some military resistance."
In view of the famines of the irrigated lands of India and
Persia, and in view of other facts to be presented later, I
question whether the irrigating agriculturist is "safe against
climatic risks." The highly organized, peaceful condition
of many communities where irrigation is practiced raises a
presumption that universal dependence on a few canals
which are virtually public property may be as effective as
"independent individualism" in leading to "civil order."
Nevertheless, Crosby's idea that the inhabitants of irrigated
oases are subjected to peculiar conditions which give rise
to a distinct type of social organization is an important con-
tribution to geography.
Younghusband, less consciously, expresses the same idea
THE CHANTOS 225
in more specific relation to the Chantos. These people, he
says, "are the essence of imperturbable mediocrity. They
live in a land where — in the places in which anything at all
can be grown — the necessaries of life can be produced
easily and plentifully. Their mountain barriers shield them
from severe outside competition, and they lead a careless,
easy, apathetic existence. . . . They are a race of cultiva-
tors and small shopkeepers, and nothing more. ... It is
their destiny, shut away here from the rest of the world, to
lead a dull, spiritless, but easy and perhaps happy life, which
they allow nothing to disturb."
I have made a list of the qualities of the Chantos which
most impressed me, and which I find most frequently men-
tioned in the writings of others. Among the good qualities,
the chief are gentleness, good temper, hospitality, courtesy,
patience, contentment, democracy, religious tolerance, and
industry; among the bad are timidity, dishonesty, stupidity,
provincialism, childishness, lack of initiative, lack of curi-
osity, indifference to the suffering of others, and immorality.
The list might be extended, but so far as it goes, it represents
the general consensus of opinion among writers on Chinese
Turkestan. It is noticeable that strong characteristics,
whether good or bad, are absent. Determination, courage,
aggressiveness, insolence, undue curiosity, violence, fanati-
cism, and the like, are almost unknown among the Chantos.
Neither their good nor their bad traits demand any great
exertion of will or purpose. On the one hand, there is no
public spirit; almost no one exerts himself for the good
of the people as a whole. On the other hand, crimes of
violence, and even theft, are very rare.
226 THE PULSE OF ASIA
If we examine in detail some of the characteristics men-
tioned in the list, it appears that hospitality and courtesy
are the natural results of gentleness and good temper, com-
bined with timidity. I often felt as if the cordiality of
my reception among the poorer people were more or less
a cloak for their fears. They brought their best, in part at
least, because they dared not do otherwise. We stopped
one day at an unusually isolated little farmhouse near the
ruins of Choka to ask some questions about the region.
While the half-blind old peasant talked with us, his wife,
a mild little woman, ran excitedly to and fro. With the
help of her daughter-in-law, who kept in the background
out of sight, she produced a ragged felt, a bowl of sour
milk, and some hot bread, very full of hulls. Being inter-
ested, I sat down, whereupon my men asked whether there
were no fruit.
"No," answered the farmer in some trepidation, "but,"
with an air of relief, "there is corn."
After further excitement in the house, the corn was
brought to us under the trees, little hot yellow ears, roasted
in the husk, and carried from the fire on the extended hand
and long sleeve of the old woman. Fifty feet from us she
halted, called softly to her husband, and handed it over to
him. It would not have been proper for her to come nearer,
in spite of her age. As I ate the corn, tough but sweet, the
fears of the timid peasants faded. Out of real hospitality,
they brought what was to them a great luxury, hot eggs,
roasted in primitive style in the ashes. It was worth a day's
ride to see the genuine affection of the gentle old couple,
and the trustful way in which the man handed over to his
THE CHANTOS 227
wife our present of three cents. Her glee over the money
was equally to be remembered, for it meant as much as a
dollar would to a poor farmer's wife at home.
Patience, contentment, and good temper are so nearly
universal among the Chantos that it is hard to give concrete
examples of them. They are like an atmosphere which one
feels so continuously that he ceases to be conscious of it.
When I forgot to dismiss men with whom I had been talk-
ing, I found that they would stand patiently waiting for
an hour. The merchants in the bazaar, and even the little
melon-venders in the dusty streets, sit quietly for hours
with no sign of restlessness. If you forget to pay a guide
to-day, he patiently waits till to-morrow. That the people
are contented, as well as gentle and timid, is evident from
the readiness with which they submit to any sort of govern-
ment, no matter how corrupt. When the Chinese retook
Kashgar, thirty years ago, after its occupation in the seven-
ties by Yakub Beg, the Turki conqueror from Andizhan
in Russian Turkestan, there was practically no fighting.
"What soldiers there were," says Younghusband, "when
they heard the Chinese were close to the town, hastily
threw aside their uniforms, or disguises as soldiers, and
assuming the dress of cultivators, walked about the fields
in a lamb-like and innocent manner. The Chinese entered
the town, and everything went on as if nothing had hap-
pened. . . . The shopkeeper sold his Mares, and the
countryman plowed his fields, totally indifferent as to who
was or who was not in power." In regard to good tem-
per, little need be said except that it is the rule among the
Chantos. Quarrels, it is true, occur now and then, and the
228 THE PULSE OF ASIA
people are not in the habit of smiling much. Nevertheless,
the quarrels are usually mild, though noisy; and one feels
that, on the whole, the people are good-natured. The very
profanity of the Chantos expresses their mildness. I had
some most profane camel-men and guides, but the strongest
expression that I heard was, "Damned bad old pig."
In discussing the shrines and hospitality of the Chantos,
I have given some illustrations of their religious tolerance
and democracy. The former trait is not at all in accord with
the general tendency of Mohammedanism, while the latter is
highly characteristic of that faith among the people of west-
ern and central Asia, but not among those of India. There-
fore it is hard to determine to what extent these character-
istics are due to religion or to some other cause. Among the
Chantos, men of all ranks eat together and share in social
pleasures. Great respect is paid to official and religious
rank, but even the humblest boy has the opportunity to rise
to any post that he is capable of filling.
The industry of the Chantos is a point upon which all
writers do not agree. Those who have had the best oppor-
tunity for observation, however, such as Shaw, Hedin, and
Stein, give the people the most credit. Of course the Chantos
are idle in winter, when there is no work which they can
do, but they work unremittingly for week after week in
summer. My Chanto servants, with one exception, were
faithful and industrious. Shaw sums up his impressions of
Chanto industry thus: —
"The laborers give a good day's work for a good day's
wages. There were some men employed making a melon-
garden . . . behind my house at Kashgar. . . . They had
THE CHAXTOS 229
to move a large quantity of earth, and they went at it
heartily like Englishmen. My Guddec servants [from India]
used to notice how differently they worked from the Indian
coolies' listless, idle way. What [three men] did in one day
Mould have taken a dozen coolies to do in the same
time. . . . They labored just as hard when their employer,
a shoemaker, . . . was out of the way, as when he was
present, ... as I myself noticed."
Turning now to the bad qualities of the Chantos, I have
already referred to timidity and untruthfulness. In the
latter respect they do not seem to be so bad as some other
Orientals, for instance the Kashmiris and Persians. My
men, thanks to the fine qualities of their half-breed Ladakhi
chiefs, Rasul and Ibrahim, never cheated me at all, so far as
I could detect. One annoying trait which the Chanto would
probably class under courtesy rather than dishonesty, and
which probably is really due to timidity, is the vexatious
way in which the native always agrees with any one more
powerful than himself, or gives the answer which he thinks
the other expects. As Dunmore puts it: —
"If I were to say, 'I suppose it's always hazy and cloudy
at Sanju ?' — the native would reply, 'Always.' And if [my
companion] half an hour afterwards were to say, ' I sup-
pose it is very seldom you get such cloudy, hazy weather
here,' the same native would reply, 'Very seldom.'"
Provincialism and childishness are not exactly bad quali-
ties, but they do not add to a people's strength. Whenever
we met a wild animal, I was struck with the childish way
in which even old men would shout and wave their hands
"to see it run." Lack of initiative and of curiosity are to be
230 THE PULSE OF ASIA
called bad only in a mild way. The people do not seem to
care to learn to do anything new. They might learn much
from their Chinese masters, but no one has sufficient ambi-
tion. For instance, more than once I held conversations like
the following: —
"Do you smelt copper here?"
"No; we don't know how, but the Chinese do."
This, be it remembered, is after the Chantos have had an
opportunity to learn during many centuries of Chinese rule.
The curiosity of the Chantos is of as mild a type as most
of their other characteristics. They often marveled at our
queer clothes and way of living, but they were never obtru-
sive, and rarely showed any inclination to examine things
closely. At Karaki, one day, on the way from Khotan to
Keriya, an unusually curious crowd collected around my
door. Though I asked them many questions, no one seemed
inclined to ask any in return, until two blear-eyed Chinese
workmen, with faces bleached with opium, appeared. When
I asked where they came fjom, they replied, "Urumchi,"
and at once wanted to know if I had been there, and where
I came from. Then two better-educated young Chinese
merchants came in. They questioned me so rapidly and
intelligently that I almost became vexed at their turning
the tables so completely and treating me to my own med-
icine. When they had admired the lightness of my glasses,
the texture of my coat, and especially the convenience of
a pen which carried its own ink, all of which it had never
occurred to the Chantos to notice, I hinted that I was busy,
and both Chantos and Chinese departed most politely.
The Chanto is by no means a hard-hearted man, but he
THE CHANTOS 231
never has grasped the idea of responsibility for any one
except himself or those who can do him good. It was a
puzzle to my servants when I told them to find out whether
a man lying in the middle of the road was sick, or only tired.
In crossing the Karakash River near Khotan, our ferry-boat
ran aground a hundred feet from the shore. The poorer
people waded to the land, a few richer ones rode on the
backs of the boatmen, and I, being a "Sahib," had to forego
the pleasure of wading, and have a horse brought to me. In
the confusion I saw a woman with a baby fall down in water
up to her knees, to the imminent risk of the baby, which
mi'dit easilv have been drowned as the mother floundered
to get up. Three or four men and women were near her,
but it did not seem to occur to any one to lend a hand.
The saddest result of the weakness of will of the Chantos
is immorality, flagrant and well-nigh universal. Khotan and
Keriya have the reputation of being the most immoral cities
in Asia, and other places are but little better. Not only is
there an enormous proportion of women who confessedly
lead lives of impurity, but divorce and temporary legal mar-
riages are extremely common. These are so cheaply and
easilv arranged, and marriage ties are so lightly esteemed,,
that a so-called respectable woman may have three or four
husbands in a year, and a husband similarly may legally
marry several successive wives in a year, and two or three
score in a lifetime. Of course, in many cases the same hus-
band and wife live together permanently, especially among
the peasants, but it is easy to see the deplorable results to
which the prevailing system must lead. Dunmore is perhaps
putting it rather strongly when he says: —
:
232 THE PULSE OF ASIA
"Parents seem to have as little affection for their sons and
daughters as the children have love and respect for their
fathers and mothers; consequently, as soon as the sons are
able to take care of themselves, they never look upon their
father's house as their home. In fact, such words as 'home,'
or 'family ties,' are unknown to these people, who are not
capable of forming any legitimate attachments."
Strong family affection certainly exists, as in the case of
the little old couple who fed us with corn. My camel-man
pleaded for days that his sixteen-year-old son might be
allowed to accompany him, and later said, "Thank God,
my son is not here to suffer in this desert." Again, our rich
host in Khotan sent his son to India in charge of a pious
"mulla," that the boy might learn to be manly. Neverthe-
less, Dunmore's arraignment of the Chantos is largely
correct. Their weakness of will has led to practices which
utterly destroy the sanctity of family life, and utterly pre-
vent the growth of the higher, sterner virtues.
In endeavoring to judge fairly the most notable traits of
the Chanto character, we are confronted by the question
of their origin. It is easy to dismiss them as innate racial
traits, but that answers nothing. No one believes that the
ancestors of any race possessed exactly the qualities which
the race now possesses. The question to be answered is:
What part of the Chanto character is due to religion, what
to contact with other races, and what to physical environ-
ment ? I cannot answer it. I only propose to give certain
reasons for believing that physiographic environment has
been an important factor.
While there can be no doubt that Mohammedanism favors
THE CHANTOS 233
immorality and various other forms of weakness, it would
be unfair to attribute all the vices of the Chantos to that
cause. Various tribes of Arabs, Turkomans, and even Khir-
ghiz have relatively high standards of morality, although
they are stricter Mohammedans than are the Chantos. They
preserve the standards as long as they retain the nomadic
habit, though, significantly enough, they are said by the
Russians and others to begin to deteriorate when they settle
into an uneventful oasis life like that of the Chantos, and
I myself saw evidences of this in Russian Turkestan.
The essential fact in the life of the majority of the Chantos
is that they live in densely populated, but small and isolated
oases. Their surroundings are pretty and attractive, but not
varied enough to be inspiring. A short period of hard labor
suffices to provide sustenance for the whole year, and the
rest of the time is given over to prolonged idleness, with lei-
sure for more of evil than of good. The population of the
Lop basin is strictly limited by the water supply. The peo-
ple possess a great advantage over those of most irrigated
countries, however, because the loftiness of the mountains
causes the maximum flood to come in midsummer. Hence,
though few in number, the people live in comfort. In most
irrigated countries, such as eastern Persia or Transcaspia,
for example, the mountains are so low that the snow largely
melts at the end of winter, and the. maximum flood comes in
the early spring when the grain is being sown or is beginning
to grow green . Thereafter the water supply decreases until
fall. Every drop is hoarded. Most of the water must be
given to the grain fields, which produce the main support of
life. Very little is left for fruit trees and vegetable gardens,
234 THE PULSE OF ASIA
and almost none for trees to be used as fuel and timber,
or for plants for forage. In good years, the average poor
inhabitant of Transcaspia or Persia raises grain enough for
his family, and a small supply of fruit and vegetables, suffi-
cient for his own needs, but usually not enough to sell. He
cannot feed much live-stock, at best only a couple of donkeys
or oxen, and three or four sheep or goats, if he is fortunate.
His only fuel is weeds, laboriously gathered by the women
and children, or dried dung, with which he ought to manure
his fields. It suffices to cook his bread in out-of-door ovens,
but not to warm him or his house. He has practically no
means of getting anything but a bare sustenance — bread,
with a little milk and a few vegetables, and more or less
fruit. Only with the greatest difficulty can he scrape to-
gether enough produce to sell at the local bazaar in exchange
for clothes to keep him warm in his tireless mud hut in
winter. He is always on the verge of starvation, and has
no hope of change.
In the Lop basin, conditions are far more favorable. The
amount of grain that can be profitably sown, and hence the
population, is limited by the spring water supply as abso-
lutely as in Persia, but fortunately the supply keeps increas-
ing as the season advances. The maximum flood from the
loftiest mountains does not come till June. The amount of
water is then so great that not only do even the poorest farm-
ers have enough and to spare, but a large amount goes to
waste and aids the underground water in supporting the
reeds, tamarisks, and poplars which characterize the zone of
vegetation. When once his grain has been sown and watered,
the Chanto has little anxiety, for he knows that, however
THE CHANTOS 235
bad the season, the increasing flood will at least support the
fields upon which he mainly depends. With the surplus
water of midsummer he can raise all the fruit and vegetables
that he wants, and can have a grove of poplars for timber,
some walnut trees for nuts, mulberries for silk-worms, and
fields of alfalfa for hay, of cotton for clothes, and of corn to
supplement the wheat. Meanwhile, without care on his part,
the surrounding zone of vegetation is producing various
plants which in winter provide him with abundant firewood
for himself and with grazing for the animals which, perhaps,
have spent the summer in the rich pastures among the moun-
tains. However poor he may be, he can always raise a little
more than the bare necessities of life; he can vary his diet
with abundant milk and some meat; and he can have plenty
of fuel and warm clothes of quilted cotton or sheep-skin.
The Chanto peasant, unless he is also a shepherd, has no
reason to travel beyond the neighboring bazaar. His friends
are near at hand. In summer, when the desert on every side
is hot and deadly, his garden and the shady village streets
are cool and pleasant. In winter, when it is cold and dreary
outside, his house is well heated and comfortable. There is
nothing to tempt him out of his small oasis; nothing to
waken him or to arouse determined effort. His work in
summer may be hard for a time, but it rarely hurries him, or
causes him anxiety. He knows that the water will be turned
into his ditch on such a day: his crops must be cut at such a
time, and all the family must work, but bad weather never
seriously interrupts the harvest, and a delay of a day or two
will do no harm. And so year after year, and generation
after generation, the Chanto goes his care-free, monotonous
236 THE PULSE OF ASIA
way, and grows gentle and mild and weak of will. He has
no contact with the world outside his own oasis, and there-
fore fears whatever is new or strange. The Chanto's mind is
so habitually idle, — that is, it receives so little stimulus from
his ordinary surroundings, — that new sights and new ideas
do not interest him, and he is strangely free from curiosity,
nor does his easy, quiet life often tempt him to quarrel. In
winter, he sits idle with nothing to occupy his thoughts, and
naturally eating and drinking and the pampering of his body
become the chief things in life. It would be strange indeed,
if, under the given physical conditions, the Chanto were
other than the courteous, submissive, self-indulgent creature
that he is.
To nullify the evil influences of the physical environment
of the Chantos, two influences may prove helpful, namely,
the stimulation of variety of scene, and of steady work. The
shepherds get something of both, and, in their way, seem to
be better men than the peasants. And even in the cities,
where the worst elements gather, there are, as we have seen,
occasional men of real strength of character. In the future,
great changes may perhaps take place, for the Lop basin
has immense undeveloped resources. Chief among these is
the vast amount of water wasted in the zone of piedmont
gravel. Only a fraction of the water which flows out of the
mountains reaches the oases, probably not half in the west-
ern portion of the basin, and not a tenth in the eastern por-
tion. The Yartungaz, Endereh, and Molja rivers, east of
Niya, support practically no population, though they are as
large as the Niya River, which, in spite of enormous prevent-
able losses, supports nearly five thousand people. The Kara
THE CHANTOS 237
Muran, still farther east, though as large as the Keriya,
which supports about fifteen or twenty thousand, is entirely
unutilized; and there are many other equally significant
cases. The difficulty is that the water never comes to light
after sinking into the piedmont gravel, or if it reappears in
springs in the zone of vegetation, it has become too saline
for use in irrigation. If hard-bottomed canals of concrete
could be constructed, such as those now being built in the
western part of the United States, both difficulties would be
avoided. The present oases could be greatly increased in
size, and new ones could be opened. The tremendous fall
of the water among the mountains ought to be utilized for
manufacturing purposes. The abundant cotton, silk, and
wool of the oases could be converted into cloth; the fruit
and vegetables could be preserved, and the milk made into
butter and cheese. And beside all this, the mountains con-
tain gold and other useful metals.
When all the possibilities of the Lop basin are utilized, its
capacity to support life will be vastly increased. And per-
haps it is not too much to hope that the conditions of life will
then be changed for the better. The isolation of each sepa-
rate oasis will tend to disappear; life will become broader;
and the necessity for steady work and greater self-control
will arise. Moreover, another and probably more potent in-
fluence is likely to be felt in the further influx of another
race with new ideas, which must take place if the resources
of the basin thus expand. It is hardly to be expected that
any occidental nation should take much interest in so re-
mote a region. If China, however, follows the example of
Japan, and wakens to self -consciousness, the great unpopu-
238 THE PULSE OF ASIA
lated arid regions of Mongolia and Turkestan on her north-
ern and western borders will offer easy and promising ave-
nues of expansion, analogous to those presented by our own
arid southwest. Development will probably nowhere take
place more rapidly and surely than in the Lop basin, for
nowhere else does so much water go to waste.
CHAPTER XII
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP
OIX hundred years ago, Marco Polo found one of the worst
parts of his great journey from Italy to China in the desert
of Lop east of Charklik. For thirty days, so he tells us, he
traveled northeastward, over sandy plains and sterile moun-
tains, through a desert inhabited only by evil spirits, which
were said to lure travelers to destruction with extraordinary
illusions. If, during the day, the Venetian says, any one
should remain behind till the caravan had passed out of
sight over a sand-hill, he would unexpectedly hear himself
called by name in a familiar voice. Thinking the call to
come from friends, he would follow it away from the road,
and soon be left to perish of thirst. In the night, which,
especially in warm weather, is the best time for journeying,
travelers might hear the march of a huge cavalcade close at
hand. Believing it to be their own party, they would follow
it, only, at daybreak, to find themselves lost in the desert.
Sometimes the spirits were said to assume the appearance
of a body of armed men, who filled the air with the sound of
musical instruments, drums, and the clash of arms, frighten-
ing the timid travelers so that they fled helter-skelter into
the desert, to lose themselves and die of hunger and thirst.
The Chinese, also, tell wonderful tales of the desert of
Lop. They speak especially of a part consisting of boundless
muck, which swallows up man and beast. And the Lopliks,
or people of Lop, who live at the western end, tell sterner
240 THE PULSE OF ASIA
stories of the torture from thirst, the frantic search for water,
and final death of the few of their number who have at-
tempted to cross the desert in summer or fall, when the
scanty water supply is in most places undrinkably saline.
Yet in ancient times, up to the second or third century of
our era, Chinese records show that the main trade route
from China to the West traversed this now desolate region.
Such contradictory statements suggest that great changes
have taken place during the past two thousand years, and so,
too, does the fact that on ancient Chinese maps Lop-Nor is
located a degree north of its modern position. This latter
circumstance has given rise to much controversy. Przheval-
ski and other Russians, on the one hand, hold that the mod-
ern lake, the Kara Koshun of the natives, can properly be
identified with the ancient Chinese lake of Lop-Nor; Von
Richthofen and Hedin, on the other, hold that it cannot.
Question has also arisen as to whether the ancient expan-
sion of Lop-Nor, of which there is unmistakable evidence,
persisted into historic times, or had come to an end before
man occupied the country. In the hope of contributing
something toward the solution of these questions, I planned
to travel completely around the unexplored part of the
ancient lake, crossing the Lop desert in its widest part. As
a result of the journey, I became convinced that two thou-
sand years ago, the lake was of great size, covering both the
ancient and the modern locations; then it contracted, and
occupied only the site shown on the Chinese maps; again,
in the Middle Ages, it expanded; and at present it has con-
tracted and occupies the modern site.
Now, as in Marco Polo's day, the traveler must equip
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP 241
his caravan for the desert at Charklik, also known as Lop,
two days' journey southwest of the lake. The little town
of twelve hundred Chantos and Lopliks, reinforced by a
Chinese garrison, seemed quite a metropolis after our two
months in the almost uninhabited region to the west. Our
four busy days there were enlivened by a case of justice
which shows the respect paid to foreigners. Ibrahim and
several local men of influence came to my room excitedly
one day, bringing with them Handum Bai, our camel-man,
whose face was covered with blood, and a sullen merchant,
who had lately come to Charklik from Handum's home
in Keriya. It appeared that the merchant owed money to
Handum. He admitted the debt, but when the camel-man
insisted on his settling the matter, he refused to pay more
than a small part of what the other claimed. A hot dispute
ensued, and finally, so it was alleged, the merchant set on
Handum, and knocked him down in the bazaar. The camel-
man did not seem to object to having a black eye and a
bloody mouth. What troubled him was that he had been
assaulted in the sight of all the people. I proceeded to hold
a trial to determine how much money was really due, and
who began the fight. Angry Handum made a vigorous plain-
tiff, the sulky merchant an unpromising defendant, and the
most venerable of the local gray-beards a sapient jury. I
served as judge, and everybody played counsel. When the
witnesses were called to testify, every one began to shout
at once.
"Sh! Sh!" said the gray-beards. "Where do you think
you are ? This is not the bazaar, but the house of greatness."
By dint of much persuasion, we induced the witnesses to
242 THE PULSE OF ASIA
speak one at a time, and to address me instead of arguing
with one another. When I began to write down the gist of
what they said, a look of surprise went over the crowd, and
the old men murmured admiringly : —
"Ah, see that ! He is writing. Now we shall have justice."
The evidence left no doubt as to the guilt of the defend-
ant. He owed Handum two dollars instead of thirty cents
as he claimed, and it was he who began the fight in the
bazaar. When I pronounced judgment, he sent his fright-
ened nephew home in great haste to get the money. For
the sake of a lesson to the people, I let' the prisoner be kept
in custody till the local Beg could be summoned. He came
at once, putting aside all business.
"This merchant," I said to him, "has assaulted my camel-
man causelessly in the sight of all your people. Please take
charge of him and do what is right."
An hour later, a message came from the Beg.
"I have inquired into the matter with stripes." The mes-
senger added that according to the request which I had sent
privately, the prisoner had been dealt with leniently, "with
stripes not many or painful, but enough to serve as a warn-
ing." The warning was timely, for I planned to leave two
men and all the horses in Charklik for two weeks; and after
our experiences of the obstructiveness of the natives at
Keriya, it seemed well to have the people know that my men
must be treated respectfully whether I was present or absent.
On December 23, I started eastward once more, along
Marco Polo's track. The caravan consisted of three of my
own men, a Loplik guide, and five camels. We had forty-
five days' provisions, chiefly in the form of mutton, rice,
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP 243
bread, onions, and tea for ourselves, as well as a quantity
of linseed eake to be fed to the camels, when necessary, at
the rate of two pounds a day. For personal luxuries, there
were raisins, eggs, and chickens, but in general my fare was
no better than that of the men.
For the first three days, our way led eastward along the
gravel at the southern edge of the zone of vegetation to
Mi ran, or, as the natives often say, Miyan. The Miran
River rises in typical fashion in the main snowy range of
Kwen Lun, breaks through the front range in a deep gorge,
traverses the piedmont gravels in a terraced trench, and
disappears during much of the year in a broad flood-plain of
gravel. Where the river enters the zone of vegetation, I dis-
covered the ruins of a large town. Perhaps " discovered " is
not the right word. The famous Russian explorer, Przheval-
ski, had long before recorded the fact that a ruined fort is
located at this point on the map. He climbed a tamarisk
mound near the cultivated fields of Miran, and with a field-
glass saw the walls of a fort a mile or two away. He did
not visit it, nor describe it, nor give any idea of its size.
Accordingly, it was a great surprise to me on Christmas
day, 1905, to find myself encamped among the ruins of a
large town.
Geographically, Miran closely resembles Vash Sheri. The
reasoning applied to the one applies with increased emphasis
to the other. Archaeologically, Miran is far more important.
The ruins are not only much larger, but a new type of archi-
tecture is developed, the chief structures being elevated ten
or twenty feet on solid pedestals of sun-dried brick. At pre-
sent, Miran is not permanently inhabited. The fisherfolk of
244 THE PULSE OF ASIA
Abdal, on Lop-Nor, twenty miles to the north, come in sum-
mer to cultivate the reedy fields, and, by using all the water
available in spring, raise grain for about fifteen families.
The fields can be cultivated only once in three years, for in a
single season of irrigation, a cake of clay two or three inches
thick is deposited — a cake so stiff that crops cannot grow
in it until it has been softened by two years of sun and rain.
The natives think that the clay is gathered after the river
begins to spread over the huge gravel flood-plain, ten miles
long and one or two wide. In reality, the river is charged,
with fine clay when it leaves the mountains, where it is said
to be equal to the river which supports the large village
of Charklik. On reaching the flood-plain, the water sinks
rapidly into the coarse gravel, but, as the current is swift,
the fine clay is borne along, until at Miran the river is liter-
ally a stream of mud.
Formerly, conditions must have been far different. The
old Buddhist Miran was neither a hamlet, such as to-day
might be located here, nor a village like old Vash Sheri, but
a town. It covered an area of at least five square miles, all of
which, judging from the canals and pottery, and still more
from the number and location of public and religious struc-
tures, must have been thickly populated. The houses, being
made of clay, have disappeared, with two exceptions. Thir-
teen other structures remain, of which one is a fort, four hun-
dred feet square; one is a lamasery, the outer walls of which
are adorned with clay reliefs of Buddha; two are stupas, or
shrines; and the other nine are solid rectangular masses of
sun-dried brick, capped in most cases by the walls of what
may, perhaps, have been monastic dwellings, or Buddhist
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP 245
temples. These establishments appear to have been kept
up after the prosperity of the town had vanished, as I infer
from the extremely flimsy nature of the repairs superposed
upon the solid structure of the older part of the fort.
Ancient Miran, in its prime, must have required a water
supply many times as large as that now available. It is
reasonable to suppose that, being the most important place
for hundreds of miles, from both a religious and a military
point of view, Miran had an irrigation system as good as
the country afforded. The water at first came from an old
river-channel east of the town, and later, apparently, from
the present channel on the west. The dams and canals are
preserved as at Vash Sheri, and do not differ from those of
to-day. The main older dam is composed of tamarisks and
small boulders thrown loosely together; and there is said to
be another, which I could not find, composed of boulders
alone. The canals are either simple ditches, or are raised
a few feet upon dykes. In every case, the material is that
which happened to lie close at hand. On the upper Miran
River there are no inhabitants, and no opportunity for the
diversion of part of the water. The present supply, sufficient
for fifteen or twenty families, is all that the river is capable
of furnishing under the system of irrigation which prevails
now, and was in vogue in Buddhist times a millennium or
more ago. If the rainfall were increased, say, by half, the
amount of water reaching Miran would be multiplied in
far larger proportion. Being confined to a single channel,
the water would scarcely suffer more loss from evaporation
and from sinking into the ground than it now does, and all
the extra supply would be available at Miran. The diffi-
246 THE PULSE OF ASIA
culty from the excessive amount of sediment would vanish,
Though the absolute quantity of sediment might conceiv-
ably be greater than now, it would be diluted with a far
larger amount of water, and spread over a much larger area.
The hard cake would be reduced from two or three inches
to perhaps a quarter of an inch, not enough to interfere with
cultivation. Miran, even more than the other ruins, seems
to verify the hypothesis of a change of climate during historic
times.
After staying at Miran two days, we turned to the north,
and a day's journey brought us to Abdal, on the bank of
the Tarim River, near Przhevalski's Lop-Nor, or the lake
of Kara Koshun, as Hedin prefers to call it. This hamlet
is occupied by Lopliks, a clear-skinned, dark-haired people,
probably Chantos with a large admixture of Mongol or
Tibetan blood. They talk a Turki dialect but little different
from that of the Chantos, like whom they dress. They have
the same gentle, hospitable ways as the rest of the people of
the Lop basin, but seemed to me more independent and self-
respecting. I was amazed at the way in which some of them
drew maps of roads, lakes, and rivers in the sand, represent-
ing the proportions and directions correctly to a degree rare
among uncivilized people. Perhaps their ability comes from
the necessity of keeping in mind the exact length and direc-
tion of the multitudinous and intricate canals and little lakes
of the reedy swamp of Kara Koshun. They make their liv-
ing as fishermen, paddling their dug-out canoes of poplar
from pond to pond through narrow lanes bordered by reeds.
Till eighty years ago, or less, when Charklik was founded,
or better refounded, none of the Lopliks practiced agricul-
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP 247
ture; according to their own account, they all lived on fish,
waterfowl, and eggs, with a change in the spring to the soft
tips of reeds and rushes, but never a taste of bread. At that
time, and still more in earlier days, the number of Loplik
fishermen was many times as great as the present total popu-
lation of two hundred and fifty. The diminution, according
to their own story, is due to the gradual drying up of the
rivers and lakes, and the consequent decrease in the number
of fish. Part of the people have moved away, so they say;
part have died of small-pox. They fear this disease so in-
tensely that when any one is supposed to be ill with it, they
put food beside him, and then flee to a new village, aban-
doning their reed houses, and even their scanty furniture.
At Abdal, I was quartered in the single mud house among
a dozen reed huts. The kindly people, knowing of our ap-
proach, and perchance thinking of the vast hoards of money
supposed to belong to all Sahibs, had chopped a hole through
a foot or two of ice, and caught some fish. I asked to have
them cooked and served in Loplik fashion. Presently the
mistress of the house appeared with a steaming bowl of fishy
unsalted water.
"What's this?" I asked.
"Why, that's the way you wanted it — our way. We
always drink the water that the fish have been boiled in."
I omitted the Loplik first course that day, though the
boiled fish were excellent.
The fact that a woman should set food before a strange
man showed that Mohammedan law is not strictly observed
here. The greater freedom of home life was refreshing. It
was like a breath from the west when a girl of twelve, who
248 THE PULSE OF ASIA
elsewhere would have hidden her face in the end of her
sleeve and run away, rubbed her head against the arm of
a young giant of twenty-five, and teased : —
"Big brother, let me do it."
He was showing me how fishing-nets are made from the
fibre of the "Lop plant," which, by the way, is one of the
finest fibres in the world, as much tougher than hemp as
hemp is than cotton. Other things, such as the absence of
mosques and of daily prayers, showed that we had reached
the extreme limit of Mohammedan influence. Ibrahim, who
was a most devout follower of the Prophet, was disturbed
because, as he said, "The Lopliks are good people, but they
don't have much work with God." At Keriya, when first I
mentioned Lop, he had asked if it were true, as people said,
that the Lopliks wore nothing but the skins of wild animals,
and that they were such adepts in the art of eating fish that
they could put in the meat at one side of their mouths, and
at the same time spit out the bones at the other.
On leaving the friendly Lopliks, we entered what is prob-
ably the greatest uninhabited continental area in the world,
outside the polar regions. In an area equal to that of Great
Britain and Ireland, where the population numbers forty
million, there is not a single inhabitant. Much of it has never
been visited by any explorer, or even by the natives. For
thirty days of steady traveling, we saw absolutely no sign of
living man. Except in rare cases, there was no vegetation
which even camels could eat, and no water save bitter pools.
By traveling in the dead of winter, when the temperature
fell to zero every night, and by carefully chopping out and
melting blocks of hard, white ice from the midst of the yel-
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP 249
Iowish, mushy material covering most of the pools, we man-
aged to get water which, in that part of the world, is called
drinkable. We were troubled with thirst most of the time,
and the indigestion caused by the salt water lasted a month
or two after we ceased using it. No creature but the wild
camel can drink the wretched liquid habitually. Even upon
that hardy animal it has a marked physiological effect. In
Kuruk Tagh, after leaving the Lop desert, I once dined
on wild camel. The meat was fairly good, like very coarse
beef. Though perfectly fresh, in one sense of the word, it
had become distinctly "corned" because of the salt which
had accumulated in the animal's body from the water.
For eight days eastward from Abdal, we kept close to an
old strand of Lop-Nor, following a caravan road used about
once a year. To the south, barren gravels stretched inter-
minably toward the mountains; to the north, the brownish-
white expanse of the old lake-bed stretched sullen and un-
explored to a sea-like horizon, or faded to nothing in dusty
haze. Nothing relieved the monotony except a sharp lacus-
trine bluff, sixty feet high, rising suddenly from the insig-
nificant zone of vegetation. The zone was a mere strip of
brown reeds, dotted with bright-blue pools of brine, un-
frozen because so saline. At Koshalangza we halted to make
preparations for the plunge into the utterly unknown region
to the north. I estimated from the map that, barring acci-
dents, we ought to reach the salt spring of Altmish Bulak in
six days. The spring lay ninety miles away in an air line, at
the foot of the Kuruk Tagh, or Dry Mountains. There was
no knowing, however, what delays we might encounter, or
how long we might have to hunt for the spring. In such bit-
250 THE PULSE OF ASIA
terly cold weather the camels could go ten days without
water, or, at a pinch, twelve. Accordingly, we cut twelve
days' supply of ice, and tamarisk fagots enough to last eight
days if used very sparingly. This, with thirty days' provi-
sions, twenty days' linseed cake, and the camp equipment,
made the camels' loads so heavy that it was impossible for
any one to ride.
We were anxious about the camels, for they had now trav-
eled three months on comparatively poor food with no long
rests. The smallest, a truly pretty little animal, had lately
developed huge and evidently painful red blisters on its soft
padded feet. To prevent its becoming useless, the men cut
off the upper portion of a pair of high, native boots, such as
we all wore, and cleverly converted the lower parts into
camel-shoes. The poor animal screamed like an angry,
frightened child when the men tied its legs together, and
rolled it over on its side; but it seemed decidedly grateful
when, on rising, it found that its feet were no longer so
painful. We were nearly overcome with laughter, for the
little camel shook its ungainly feet as a cat does hers when
a small boy ties papers on them; and then walked off with
its hind legs a yard apart.
A hearty laugh was good for the anxious men. At Chark-
lik I had told them that we were going to a difficult and
dangerous region where no man had ever been, and they
could turn back if they wished.
"No," they answered, "we have seen that with a piece
of paper and a 'Mecca-pointer' [compass] you can find
a road where there is none. If we die, we die. Allah is mer-
ciful."
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP 251
At Koshalangza I gave them another chance to go back,
but they swore that they were not afraid.
For four weary days we stumbled northward across the
interminable salt plain of the old lake-bed. An ordinary
frozen plowed field would have seemed like a macadam
road in comparison. Imagine the choppiest sort of sea with
white-caps a foot or two high, and freeze it solid. When we
camped in what we hoped was a soft spot, and tried to drive
in the iron tent-pegs, most of them bent double. We had to
use an axe to hew down hummocks of rock salt a foot high
before we could get places smooth enough for sleeping. Each
night when we pulled off our soft-soled boots, — the only kind
in which we could keep warm, — we realized what effect the
bastinado must produce. The slowness of our stumbling
progress, the boundlessness of the sea-like horizon, the bitter
morning wind, and the uncertainty as to when we should
find something different made us feel that the old lake-bed
must be endless.
The roughness of the salt plain may be explained as fol-
lows: During the long-continued process of drying up, the
ancient lake of Lop deposited an unknown thickness of al-
most pure rock salt. When the salt finally became dry, it
split into pentagons from five to twelve feet in diameter, the
process being similar to that which gives rise to mud-cracks
when a mud -puddle dries up, or to basaltic columns when
lava cools. The wind, or some other agency, apparently de-
posited dust in the cracks; when rain or snow fell, the mois-
ture brought up new salt from below; and thus the cracks
were solidly filled. When next the plain became dry, the
pentagons appeared again. This time the amount of mate-
252 THE PULSE OF ASIA
rial was larger, and the pentagons buckled up on the edges
and became saucer-shaped. By countless repetitions of this
process, or of something analogous to it, the entire lake-bed
became a mass of pentagons with ragged, blistered edges.
Twice we encountered faint, broad hollows, where for a
mile or two the plain was damp and comparatively smooth.
Traveling in such places was much easier than elsewhere,
but, remembering the Chinese tale of muck which swallows
horse and rider, we avoided them as far as possible. It was
well that we did so. Nothing could be more dangerous than
these smooth, soft places which felt so comfortable to our
weary feet. A few days later, beyond the main body of the
lake-bed, we came upon a small, isolated salt plain which,
as we progressed, assumed a fresher, whiter appearance and
began to look slightly damp. I was riding the biggest of the
camels, whose load of wood and ice had now been partly
used. Suddenly I found myself turning a somersault back-
ward off the animal. His hind legs had broken through the
saline crust, and had plunged a yard deep into soft, oozy
muck. As he struggled ponderously to extricate himself, his
front legs also sank in ; and oily water came bubbling up in
muddy pools about the prostrate creature's belly. Two other
camels fell into the mire at the same time. In the haste with
which we began to tear off their loads I forgot to investigate
whether my neck was broken. Relieved of their burdens,
the two smaller camels extricated themselves. My big, heavy
animal, however, was so completely mired that we had to
put ropes around his legs and pull his feet out on to felts,
which we had spread on the soft mud to keep him from sink-
ing in again. It was a grim jest on the part of nature to lead
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP 253
us into an unfrozen, watery salt-bog in zero weather, in a
region so cold and dry that we were carrying ten or twelve
days' supply of ice for drinking-water. If the mud had been
a little softer, we should have lost the camels and perhaps
ourselves. If we had ventured to traverse the soft, smooth
areas to the west of our line of march across the great salt
plain, we should probably have found ourselves in danger
of being swallowed up on every side, and might never have
returned to corroborate the Chinese tales of bottomless
muck.
On the fourth morning of our weary march, we were
cheered by encountering a shore-line, marked by a steep
bluff thirty feet high. On climbing to its top, we supposed
that we had left the old lake-bed behind. After walking a
quarter of a mile among aeolian mesas of clay, however, we
dropped down another bluff, and were in the salt plain again.
We had crossed a finger-shaped peninsula, ten or twenty
times as long as it was wide. All that day and till noon of the
next we encountered similar peninsulas, or elongated islands,
separated by bays and sounds of similar dimensions. The
axes of all were directed northeast and southwest, as the map
shows. Apparently, during a dry interfluvial epoch preced-
ing the last marked expansion of the lake, the violent winds
of the region, which prevailingly blow from the northeast,
had carved out great hollows between countless mesas, as
they are doing now in many other places. Later, when the
lake again expanded, it penetrated the hollows and widened
them into a network of parallel sounds and bays, dotted
with an archipelago of elongated islands and peninsulas.
The flat-topped islands, with steep red and green bluffs
254 THE PULSE OF ASIA
surrounded by the clear blue water of the bitter sea, must
have presented an uncommonly unique type of scenery.
Beyond the fatiguing plain of salt, we found easy travel-
ing for a time. A fantastic red plain, the soft, dry bed of
an older expansion of the lake, glittered with innumerable
gypsum crystals, or was again sparsely studded with weird
seolian mesas from thirty to sixty feet high, made of hori-
zontal layers of pink and greenish clay. On the sixth day,
the red plain gave place to a maze of mesas. As we were
traveling at right angles to their long axes, we were obliged
to make countless huge zigzags in order to find breaks
through which the camels could pass. Nevertheless, we made
fourteen miles that day, and by sunset were close to the
mountains of Kuruk Tagh, and only four miles from Alt-
mish Bulak according to my estimate, or eight as it after-
ward proved to be. Shortly before we camped, a cheer went
up from the men.
"Wood has come! wood has come!" they shouted. Sure
enough, a few bits of driftwood lay in a long-dry flood chan-
nel. It was the first sign of life, or of the work of running
water, that we had seen for six days. No, not quite the first
sign of life. We had found in the salt a half-buried plover,
dead for centuries, ever since the time when the bottom of
the lake was still soft and formed the muck of the Chinese
tradition ; and elsewhere, in the side of a mesa, we had seen
the deeply buried roots of some reeds which flourished long
ago in the expanded Lop-Nor of one of the earlier glacial
epochs. Otherwise, for nearly a hundred miles, the entire
country was as barren as a well-used road.
"We came just as though we had been here before," said
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP 255
the men when we reached Altmish Bulak on the seventh
noon. The camels had suffered from hunger more than from
thirst. In spite of seven days without water, they would not
drink till they had filled their stomachs with reeds and
prickly camel-thorn. For ourselves, the greatest difficulty
had been lack of fuel. The night temperature had averaged
nine degrees below zero Fahrenheit, with a minimum of sev-
enteen below. Two or three sticks, fed slowly together, had
not made a very satisfactory fire, but we dared not use more
for fear of some delaying accident. Some nights I had to write
with a pencil, because my fountain pen froze in my hand,
though I held it as close to the fire as possible. One night I
actually had to eat dinner with my plate in the fire to keep
the food from freezing. Yet, thanks to vigorous exercise,
none of us suffered from cold, except when the wind blew.
At Altmish Bulak we rested a day, chopping new ice, cut-
ting fagots, and getting ready for a start the next morning
toward the ruins of Lulan, thirty miles to the southwest.
When Handum Bai went to bring in the camels, he could not
find them, though he and the others searched till dark. Only
one remained, the little foot-sore animal, which we had kept
at home that afternoon to have its shoes patched. During
the next twenty-four hours we watched and tended that
camel like a sick child. The chances were that we should
never find the others. If we threw away everything except
food, furs, and instruments, and abandoned all hope of fur-
ther exploration, the weary little animal might be able to
help us to Tikkenlik, the nearest settlement, a hundred and
fifty miles away. If it became exhausted, as there was every
chance of its doing, or if it succeeded in its vigorous attempts
256 THE PULSE OF ASIA
to run away and seek its mates, we should be in a sorry
plight. If we should have to go on foot to Tikkenlik, carry-
ing even the minimum of food, furs, and ice, and following
a circuitous route in order to hunt for springs at the foot
of the mountains of Kuruk Tagh, it would probably take us
twelve, or perhaps fifteen days to get there. Failure to find
water, sickness, or untoward accident, such as injury to the
compass, might mean that we should never get there.
I decided to spend two days in hunting for the camels,
and then, if we were unsuccessful, to try for Tikkenlik. The
track of the runaways must be visible somewhere in the soft
sand or gravel. I told the men that when we found the track,
the discoverer was by no means to go off alone in that vast
pathless desert, but to come back to camp for a companion,
and for food and ice. During that anxious night, it was hard
to refrain from repeatedly getting up to make sure that
the little camel had not escaped. In the morning, we found
that Handum Bai had gone off alone, nobody knew when
or where. We finally found his track, and that of the camels,
leading off to the southwest down the slope of piedmont
gravel. It did not deviate to right or left like the track of
animals in search of food, but ran straight away as though
the creatures had been led. Handum's track showed that he
had been running, an amazing thing for an Oriental to do.
Ibrahim and our Loplik guide followed the track some miles,
but came back at three o'clock with no news. As Handum
had opened none of the food-bags, and had left his coat in
camp, I began to feel more anxious about him than about
the camels. If he lost his way, or went too far, a night with-
out food, water, fire, or furs, and with a temperature of ten
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP 2.37
degrees below zero, after a day of severe exertion, would prob-
ably kill him. Accordingly, I started the two men off again,
with the tired little camel loaded with everything necessary,
including fagots and ice. They were to follow Handum's
track till dark, camp where their fire could be seen from
afar, go on till near night the next day, and then, if neither
Handum nor the camels had appeared, turn back, leaving a
cache with his coat, and plenty of wood, food, and ice.
The Ladakhi cook and I remained in camp. Abdur Rah-
man, as he was called, feeling lonely and disconsolate, pre-
pared for the hoped-for return of his companions by cooking
the favorite Ladakhi dish, lumps of highly spiced, heavy
dough boiled in fat, and eaten if possible with buttery Hima-
layan tea. Coming to my tent after sunset, ostensibly to tend
the fire, he was whiling away the time by telling me about it
when we heard a faint halloo borne on the strong west wind.
Hurrying to the top of a bushy hillock, whither our anxious
feet had worn a path that afternoon, we peered into the dark-
ness, and, after vainly shouting into the teeth of the wind,
kindled a big fire. At last, after a disquietingly long interval,
the voice sounded again, near at hand, and in a moment the
firelight showed Handum Bai, with bowed head, striding
wearily through the reeds with the huge two-humped camels
behind him.
He was out of his head. Fatigue, hunger, thirst, and anxi-
ety had unsettled the poor man's wits, never any too keen.
All that we could gather was that he was trying to explain
why he had gone off alone, contrary to orders. The next day
he was able to give a more coherent account, though it was
weeks before he was himself again. Apparently, the camels
258 THE PULSE OF ASIA
would not have run away if Handum had heeded the cook's
warning that they were beginning to stray at three o'clock
of that fateful day. At bedtime, eight o'clock, Handum Bai
was in anything but a pleasant frame of mind,
"If the camels are lost and we die here in the desert," he
told us that he had said to himself, "it will be my fault. This
is the mating season, and our camels have surely gone off
after the wild camels which come here to drink. They may
go a hundred miles without stopping. If I wait till morning,
and go with another man, the camels will have such a start,
and we shall go so slowly, that we shall never catch them.
The Sahib will be angry if I go alone, but he will be still
more angry if the camels are lost and we all die."
Waiting till the moon rose, between nine and ten o'clock,
he stealthily crept out, taking nothing but some matches.
How he found the track I do not know, but find it he did,
and ran beside it all night. Once his unprotected hands got
so cold that, finding a small bush a foot high, he stopped to
make a little blaze. At the same time he ate a bit of snow
which had been preserved under the bush, the last remnant
of a couple of inches which had fallen six weeks before,
during the only snow-storm of the winter. Otherwise he
neither ate, drank, nor rested.
"I vowed when I started," he said, "neither to eat nor
drink till I found the camels, or got back to camp. And I
vowed to run all night as hard as I could, and to spend the
day in coming back to camp. I knew it would take all day
to come back if I ran all night, because it would be uphill.
And I knew a night in the open would kill me."
It was well that Handum Bai acted as he did. The un-
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP 259
deviating track, and a wild camel seen by him, left no doubt
that our animals had been led off by wild ones. Ours prob-
ably never came near the others, for it is well known that the
wild camel is extremely afraid of anything which suggests
man ; for instance, the saddles which we always allowed to
remain on the animals' backs during the winter to keep the
creatures warm. Two of our camels fought on the way, as
Plandum Bai knew from the tracks. Fortunately, the saddle
of the big leader was knocked off, and, becoming caught
to the animal's hind foot by a loose rope, not only acted as
a clog, but made a broad track, easy to follow. At daybreak,
Handum entered a region where the wind had cut the clay
plain into little mesas like those described above, only more
thickly set, a hopeless labyrinth of narrow passages. He
despaired of finding anything, and was about to turn back.
Suddenly, however, he spied a dark spot, conspicuous
among the pale green and gray of the region. It was the big
camel's head rising over a table of clay. The saddle had
stuck in a narrow passage between two elongated mesas,
and the animal was caught in a veritable trap. He bit so
furiously that Handum could not catch him, and was
obliged to go off for the others, which, deprived of their
leader, were straying slowly not far away. Finally, with a
rope from the neck of a small camel, he caught the big one,
and was ready to return. As he looked around to find how
to get back to camp, he suddenly noticed the sun rising in
the west, as it seemed to his confused mind, and wondered
what the evil spirits were doing. He started off, however,
on his old track, only after half an hour to find himself back
where he started. He rubbed his eyes. The spirits must be
260 THE PULSE OF ASIA
leading him, he thought. He had sense enough to examine
all the tracks carefully, and discovered that he had followed
his own track made in catching the milder camels. If the
spirits had been clever enough to raise a little wind and cover
the tracks, it would have been the end of Handum Bai, and,
perhaps, of the rest of us. As it was, he chose the right track.
Once he tried to ride, but found it too cold. In the late after-
noon, he foolishly attempted to make a short cut, thus failing
to meet the other two men, and almost getting lost again.
Toward sunset, he thought that over the rock-ribbed plain
of gravel he saw the reedy plateau of Altmish Bulak, rising
ten feet above the surrounding dry flood -plain. After dark,
he supposed himself near camp, but hearing no answer to
his repeated shouts, was about to pass on and camp near
the mountains, perhaps to perish of cold. He was planning,
so he said, to make the four camels kneel in a square, and
crouch down in the middle out of the wind. Then our fire
flared up far to the right, and he was saved.
The two men whom I had sent off with the feeble camel
found Handum Bai's track the next day, and returned in
the afternoon without incident. Judging by what I later saw
of the topography, the man must have traveled twenty-five
miles each way in his chase after the camels, — fifty miles
in twenty hours without food or water. The experience was
to me a revelation of the inexorableness of the desert. It was
still more remarkable as an illustration of the intensity and
endurance which lifelong contact with the desert in the care
of his camels had developed in Handum Bai, a man of the
mild Chanto race. None of my other men would have done
so hardy a deed — only Handum, who from early child-
THE UNEXPLORED SALT DESERT OF LOP 261
hood had endured heat and cold and fatigue in the desert,
far from the enervating influence of the easy agricultural
life of the fertile oases. Such intensity is often supposed to
be a result of Mohammedan fanaticism and fatalism. More
probably it is the result of life in the desert. There none suc-
ceed except those who, though often lazy and dilatory, are
capable at times of becoming almost monomaniacs, fanatics,
animated by the will to do some deed in spite of heaven or
hell.
CHAPTER XIII
THE DRY RIVER AND THE DRY MOUNTAINS
OUR journey from Altmish Bulak to Tikkenlik was weari-
some because of the seolian mesas and the sand dunes, but
otherwise it was not difficult. On the first day, January 17,
we fell into the muck, as described above — a piece of good
fortune, as I soon saw. We had evidently stumbled upon
the last remnant of one of the four little lakes marked on
ancient Chinese maps as lying in an east and west line north
of ancient Lop-Nor. That night, after a detour of two miles
to the east, we camped near the old lake shore among some
huge red and green seolian mesas, a hundred feet high.
Around us in every direction, smaller mesas, only ten feet
high, were capped with traces of old reed-beds, which must
have covered a broad plain surrounding the lake. While the
men, in a hunt for firewood, were picking up pieces of the
rare poplars and tamarisks which once dotted the plain, I
spied some sticks on top of one of the biggest mesas; and
after a dusty scramble, found that they were parts of an an-
cient reed "satma," or shepherd's hut. A millennium or two
ago, some Buddhist peasant, from Lulan perhaps, watched
his sheep feed among the reed-beds far below, while he lay
idly in the shade above the heat and flies of the jungle, and
cooled by fresh breezes from the blue lake. Half a mile
away, his neighbor, or his master, had built the good-sized
house which I found that same night on the top of another
great mesa.
THE DRY RIVER AND THE DRY MOUNTAINS 263
The following day, we traveled eighteen miles to the ruins
of Lulan, discovered by Hedin. Everywhere we found
patches of pottery and other signs of human occupation.
On leaving the ruins, which Hedin has described most mi-
nutely, we again found pottery for a distance of fifteen miles,
until we left the area of dead vegetation and entered the
zone of piedmont gravel north of the Kuruk Dariya or Dry
iliver, an old bed of the Tarim River, which once brought life
to the country before it was diverted southward to Abdal.
Forty miles farther west, we again crossed to the south side of
the Kuruk Dariya, and at once found pottery and other signs
of human occupation. During the first few centuries of the
Christian era, luxurious vegetation and prosperous villages
covered the country for scores of miles, as may be seen on
the map; to-day, all is desolation, not a trace of verdure, not
a sign of any living thing, nothing but unending stretches of
weary mesas, large and small, studded with the stubble of
reeds, the dead trunks of poplars, and the gnarled remnants
of old tamarisk mounds. Here, perhaps, more than in al-
most any other part of the Lop basin, the signs of desiccation
are unmistakable; but they must be interpreted with care,
for the Tarim River could again be brought here.
On the morning of January 24, eight days after leaving
Altmish Bulak, we saw the first living poplars since leaving
Abdal four weeks before. By three o'clock, we reached a
great line of sandy mounds fifty feet high, shrouded in a most
vigorous growth of tamarisks, unmistakably a rampart built
up by the wind along the northeastern edge of the zone of
vegetation, which is supported by the interlacing Konche
and Tarim rivers Our month of guideless wandering among
564 THE PULSE OF ASIA
salt plains, old lakes, labyrinthine mesas, and dead cities
was over; ahead of us lay life and the land of fresh running
water, in place of death and the land of scattered salt springs
whose water we loathed. We wondered silently at the con-
trast between the landscapes on the two sides of the great
tamarisk barrier. To the east lay an infinitely varied monot-
ony of intricate mounds and hollows, some composed of
yellow or reddish sand, and others of clay, white, pink, and
pale green — faint, dull colors, broken only by the dark
spots of dead tamarisks and the gaunt skeletons of perished
poplars: to the west, a smooth, rich river plain, extending
as far as the eye could see, orange, yellow, or straw-color in
the reedy portions, dark purple where tamarisks prevailed,
and a delicate grayish brown among the splendid poplars.
"You said there were no people here," was the men's first
comment. "How can that be? There must be people in a
place with all this wood and water and good land." And
I too marveled that what looked so fair should be unin-
habited.
We found a sheep-trail the following morning, but it came
to an end after a mile or two. Most of the day we strug-
gled in a pathless wilderness, making the hardest march of
the whole journey. Occasionally we zigzagged pleasantly
among poplars and tamarisks; often we made vexatious
detours around the frozen shores of rush-filled ponds; but
most of the time we painfully forced a way through thickets
of reeds and tamarisks twelve feet high, and so dense that
at every step we had to force the stiff, dusty stems apart.
Toward evening, we succeeded in getting out of the jungle
into the comparatively open area of dead vegetation between
THE DRY RIVER AND THE DRY MOUNTAINS 265
the Uek branch and the main stream of the Konche River.
There, once more, to my surprise, we found pottery scat-
tered about. The ancient villages must have been verv
widely distributed. The following day, we avoided more
ponds, which, like all the rest, were four or five feet lower
than the shore-line marking what was said to have been
their level in 1900. Columns of smoke had been visible in
the distance ever since we first came in sight of vegetation,
but the distance seemed interminable. Finally, however,
toward noon of the second day, we reached a fire not far
from the Konche River. A timid shepherd in cap, coat, trou-
sers, and boots of ragged, undressed sheep-skin was engaged
in burning off the reeds so that his flocks might feed on the
tender young shoots in the spring. He left his chubby, five-
year-old son to carry on the work, while he cheerfully led us
to the Tikkenlik road. When we parted, he laughed aloud
with pleasure at the unexpected good luck which gave him
a coin to put in his mouth, and some bread to stow away in
the top of his big cap.
Tikkenlik proved to be a scattered little village. Its five
hundred inhabitants, Lopliks and Turfanliks, live partly
in mud houses and partly in houses of reeds. It is notable
as being the only permanent village, as distinguished from
tiny fishing and shepherd hamlets, on the lower four hun-
dred miles of the Tarim River, or the lower two hundred and
fifty of the Konche; and it is the only place where there is
any serious attempt at agriculture. It is essentially the mod-
ern representative of Lulan. The two may fairly be regarded
as measuring the success of their respective ages in utilizing
the dwindling lower portion of the stream whose headwaters
1
266 THE PULSE OF ASIA
drain all the western and northern portions of the Lop basin.
As we have already seen, there is no reason to believe that
the ancient inhabitants of the basin were more skillful in the
art of irrigation than their modern successors. Because of
their isolated location, neither Lulan or Tikkenlik has ever
suffered very greatly from war, and great disasters have not
been due to human causes. Manifestly, the present condition
of Tikkenlik is far inferior to that of ancient Lulan. This
may be due either to a lack of settlers and of enterprise, as
is usually assumed in such cases, or to physical causes. Let
us examine conditions to-day as compared with those of two
thousand years ago.
Previous to 1889, there was nothing which could properly
be called a town, or even a respectable village, on the lower
Tarim and Konche rivers. The only inhabitants were a few
fishermen and shepherds, whose temporary dwellings and
crude utensils of skin and wood leave only the slightest
traces, not at all comparable to the houses and pottery of
Lulan. In 1889, a Chinese amban, seeing so much good land
and water going to waste, as he thought, attempted to found
a town. He dug a canal and opened a tract of land at Jan
Kul, thirty miles west of Tikkenlik, on the Tarim River.
People from Turf an, Korla, Kucha, and elsewhere flocked
in to get land. By 1890, the population numbered over two
thousand ; and Jan Kul, as the people say, " became a town,"
that is, a bazaar was established and an amban installed.
Almost immediately, however, the fields became saline, and
in 1892 the place was abandoned, most of the settlers return-
ing whence they came. Meanwhile, in 1891, about a thou-
sand people had come from Turfan to Dural, eight miles
THE DRY RIVER AND THE DRY MOUNTAINS 267
south of Tikkenlik on the Konche River. Accordingly, a
large fort was built there, and in 1893 the amban of Jan Kul
was removed to Dural, which in turn "became a town."
For three years the " boom " continued, but by 1897 the soil
had become so saline and the crops so poor that the colonists
began to move away. In 1898, to offset this loss, over two
thousand rebellious Dungans were induced, or forced, to
come from Shi-Ning, eight hundred miles to the east, and
settle at Dural. The water was so saline, however, and new
land so quickly became unproductive, that in 1900 they mi-
grated ninety miles northwest, to Kara-Kum, another site
which had just been opened on the Konche. Thereupon, in
1901, the amban was removed to Kara-Kum, and in 1904
the last and poorest of the people of Dural abandoned it and
came to Tikkenlik. Kara-Kum became even larger than its
predecessors, and from 1901 to 1903 is said to have had a
population of five thousand. Nevertheless, the salt proved as
bad there as elsewhere, and in 1904 it, too, was abandoned,
though the amban and forty or fifty people still remained
at the beginning of 1906. Jan Kul, Dural, Kara-Kum, and
Tikkenlik represent four abortive attempts during sixteen
years to utilize the water of the lower Tarim and Konche
rivers. The attempts are especially significant because they
failed at a time when the rivers of Turkestan were unusually
high, about 1900, as well as when the rivers were low, about
1893. Tikkenlik, being but four or five years old, still sur-
vived in 1906, but it was deteriorating. Its five hundred
people were either moving away, or else betaking them-
selves to sheep-raising or fishing, the means of livelihood
of the former hamlet before the attempt to establish a town.
268 THE PULSE OF ASIA
They told me that Indian corn, one of the great staples of
Chinese Turkestan, will not grow at all. It is replaced by
a large-grained variety of white millet. Wheat fares better,
but only the first year. If a given field is cultivated two or
three years in succession, it becomes worthless. Evidently,
the permanent occupation of the lower Tarim and Konche
regions by a fixed agricultural population is, under present
conditions of irrigation, impossible even at Kara-Kum, the
site farthest upstream. At Lulan, over two hundred miles
farther downstream, where evaporation has had still more
opportunity to concentrate the salt in the river, conditions
must be much worse. The complete failure of the Chinese
attempts was not due to misgovernment, or to war, or to
lack of settlers eager for land ; but entirely to the extreme
salinity of the rivers.
Turning now to the past, we find that though the diffi-
culties of the present prevailed in early times, they were
much less acute. At one period or another, as is proved by
the pottery which I found, a permanent and somewhat dense
population occupied a tract extending at least a hundred
and twenty miles east and west along the dry bed of the riv-
ers, and having a width of from ten to forty miles. The
people were not shepherds, for keepers of sheep do not carry
large quantities of breakable pottery with them from place
to place. They must have been permanently settled, and
presumably they practiced agriculture. The date of the
densest population is uncertain, but from the absence of
structural ruins over a large part of the pottery-strewn area,
it is probable that the pottery represents a very early time,
possibly some centuries before the Christian era.
THE DRY RIVER AND THE DRY MOUNTAINS 269
Macartney has gathered the earlier notices of Lulan
from Chinese sources. According to the "Tsien Han-shu,"
or "History of the First Han Dynasty," Lulan came into
intercourse with China between b. c. 140 and b. c. 87.
When the history was written, at some date between b. c.
100 and a. d. 50, the district had a population of 1570 fam-
ilies, 14,100 people, with 2912 trained troops — fifteen or
twenty times as great as the population to-day. The land,
according to the history of the Hans, is "sandy and salty,
and there are few cultivated fields. The country relies on
neighboring kingdoms for cereals and agricultural products.
It produces jade, abundance of reeds, the tamarisk, the
clococca, and white grass. The people remove their cattle
for pasturage wherever they can find sufficiency of water
and herbage. They have asses, horses, and camels. They
can manufacture weapons like the people of Tso-kiang."
This sounds as though there were but little agriculture.
There appears to have been some, however. In b. c. 77, the
king of Lulan, Hui-Tu-Chi, petitioned the Chinese emperor
to establish a military colony in the city of E-tun, where,
he said, "the land is productive and rich." The emperor
sent forty cavalrymen " to cultivate the fields at E-tun, and
soothe the people."
Our next information as to Lulan is derived from certain
manuscripts and other articles found by Hedin in the ruins.
The written documents date from about 264 a. d. to 270
a. d., and probably indicate approximately the time of the
abandonment of at least the particular group of villages in
question. Coins found in the ruins belong to two kinds, one
struck between b. c. 118 and a. d. 581, and the other between
270 THE PULSE OF ASIA
a. d. 9 "and 23. Some of the manuscripts have been deci-
phered by Himly, who says : —
"The inhabitants [of Lulan] must . . . have been en-
gaged in agriculture, for one of the principal items in the
manuscripts consists of weights and measures of seed-
corn; some of them also name this or that kind of corn.
Possibly there once stood on the site where the manu-
scripts were found an old revenue office, or a sort of ' grain
bank' [such as those now found in China], where grain
was bought and stored, or received as security for loans."
Other manuscripts state that " such and such a quantity of
seed-corn has been handed in, or so many men have been
furnished with provisions for a month." One runs thus :
" The approaching army is to be met at the frontier [or at
the shore] by forty officials; and the farmsteads are many."
Later information as to Lulan is given by the pilgrim
Fa-hian, a. d. 400. According to Beal's translation, he says:
"The country of Shen-Shen [Lulan] is rugged and barren.
The clothing of the common people is coarse, and like that
of the Chinese. . . . The king of this country honors the
law of Buddha. There are some four thousand [ ?] priests."
Finally, Hwen Tsiang, a. d. 645, merely mentions the name
of Lulan, or Nafopo, as a place through which he passed ; but
apparently it was of no importance. In view of the facts
recorded above, and of various historical notices of the wars
of Lulan, which it would be tedious to relate, it appears that
two thousand years ago, more or less, the Lulan region was
for century after century inhabited by a settled population
many times as dense as that of to-day. The critical question
is whether such a population could persist so long and attain
THE DRY RIVER AND THE DRY MOUNTAINS 271
so high a degree of civilization, if they lived as the present
inhabitants do, with practically no agriculture. On the one
hand, we have the unequivocal statement that "there are
few cultivated fields. The country relies on neighboring
kingdoms for cereal and agricultural products. It produces
jade, . . . and the people manufacture weapons." This
may mean little or much. One might say with perfect truth,
" England has but little cultivated land. It relies on America
and Australia for grain. It produces coal, and the people
manufacture iron and steel." This would not mean that
there was no agriculture in England. On the other hand, we
have the mention of people sent " to cultivate rich and pro-
ductive land." Again, " seed-corn " and " many farmsteads "
are mentioned. Neither Hedin nor I found any trace of
canals or of ancient fields, which indeed would hardly be
expected. He, however, found some wheat straw, suggest-
ing that agriculture had been carried on; and I found some
eleagnus trees, and a considerable number of large trunks
of the white or cultivated poplar, lying with part of their
roots where they had fallen. The timber of the larger houses
is white poplar, so the tree must have been common. It
never grows wild in the Lop basin, and is sensitive to salt.
Its presence is unequivocal evidence that irrigation, and
hence agriculture, was carried on continuously in one place
for periods at least long enough to allow of the growth of
trees two feet in diameter. On the whole, it seems safe to
say that, although the river was probably so saline as to
make agriculture difficult, conditions were distinctly more
favorable than at present. In a case such as this, there is
danger that an author's prepossessions may determine his
J/
272 THE PULSE OF ASIA
opinion as to the adequacy of evidence for or against
his favorite theory. Two things, notwithstanding, seem
to me to present insuperable obstacles unless we accept
the theory of a secular change of climate. In the first place,
if there has been no change, why did many thousands of
the people of the past succeed so well in making the coun-
try habitable, while the people of to-day have failed utterly
in the same attempt ? In the second place, the agreement
of the phenomena of Lulan with those of other parts of
the Lop basin indicates that the same changes have affected
the whole country.
Before leaving Lulan, the trade routes which formerly
passed through it deserve notice. According to ancient
Chinese records, the main caravan route from China to the
west came from Su-Chow through Sa-Chow (Tung-Hwang)
to Lulan. There it divided, one branch going to Kashgar by
way of Khotan and the south side of the Lop basin, and the
other to the same place by way of Ak-Su and the north side
of the basin. Up to about the third century of our era, the
road from Sa-Chow to Lulan was of great importance. It
contributed to the prosperity of Lulan, as appears from the
results of Himly's study of certain objects and manuscripts
found there by Hedin. Himly says: "The objects appear
to have belonged to a wealthy Chinese merchant, who sup-
plied commodities of every description, let out carriages
and beasts of burden on hire, besides conveying letters to
Tun-Kwang [Tung-Hwang, Sa-Chow]. Travelers going to
the latter city used horses, carriages, and oxen." A hundred
and twenty-five years later, in 400 a. d., the pilgrim Fa-hian,
who followed the same road, says of it: "In this desert
THE DRY RIVER AND THE DRY MOUNTAINS 273
[between Lulan and Sa-Chow] are many evil demons and
hot winds: those who encounter them all die without excep-
tion. There are no flying birds above, no roaming beasts
below. Everywhere as one gazes, as far as the eye can reach
in search of the onward way, it would be impossible to
know the route but for the dead men's decaying bones
which show the direction." In the course of a few centuries,
a great change apparently took place, causing the abandon-
ment of one of the chief trade routes of antiquity in favor
of one much longer, but better supplied with water. Hedin
found what appear to be the cairns marking this ancient
road, and also another set branching from the main route
about halfway from Sa-Chow to Lulan and leading off to
the northwest, probably to Turf an. When I crossed the
line which the old main road must have followed, I picked
up a flat ring of iron about two inches in diameter, appar-
ently part of a bridle. In the region where the road was
located, Hedin's camels had to go eleven days without
water, and mine seven. Even if the Tarim River followed
its old course to Lulan, the traveler who attempted to fol-
low the ancient road from Sa-Chow either to Lulan or Tur-
fan would be obliged to make a waterless march of over
a hundred miles. It seems highly improbable that one of
the main trade routes of antiquity from China to the west
ever followed such a course, especially when a better
was available farther to the north or south. It would be
most surprising if a man of Lulan made a business of let-
ting out horses and oxen to perish on such a road. If,
however, the climate of antiquity was such that the number
of springs was larger, and that the existing salt springs were
274 THE PULSE OF ASIA
fresher than now, the location of the road becomes highly
reasonable.
Two short days' journey northward from Tikkenlik
brought us to Ying-pen, the ruins of a little fort and village
discovered by Hedin on the ancient trade route west of
Lulan. The population was evidently very small, perhaps
ten or twenty families. Hedin thought that the water sup-
ply came from the Dry River, not far to the south. As the
ruins lie sixty feet above the river on the fan at the mouth
of the Bujentu valley, the supposition is not tenable. It
would require a canal ten or twenty miles long, of which
there is no trace; and such a canal would be out of all pro-
portion to the size of the village. The only other alternative
is that the water should have come from the Bujentu valley,
which leads southward from the Kuruk Tagh or Dry Moun-
tains. Accordingly, I went up the valley, and found a canal,
which I followed for two miles to its head. It was simply
a ditch dug in gravel, and protected on either side by a row
of tamarisks, long since dead. I also found a reservoir with
walls of gravel in which the water was stored near two of
the shrines called " stupas." Like all the other ancient irri-
gation systems which I saw, that of Ying-pen differed not a
whit from those of to-day. At present, the place is uninhab-
ited. When I questioned some antelope-hunters who often
visit the region, they said that where the Bujentu valley
leaves the high mountains, there is an old fort called Shindi,
on an ancient road, apparently, from Lulan to Kara-Sher.
At this point the valley always carries water, which reaches
Ying-pen only in flood. There is not enough, however, to
support a single family. If there were, some of the people
THE DRY RIVER AND THE DRY MOUNTAINS 275
who had to leave Jan Kul, Dural, and Kara-Kum would
have used it. Yet, formerly, the water of the Bujentu valley
supported a small village. Here, as in other cases, there
appears to have been a mediaeval, or Mohammedan period
of revival after the earlier abandonment of the site by the
Buddhists.
North of Ying-pen rises the steep escarpment of Kuruk
Tagh. At its top there is said to be a district which, though
called "Davan," or "Pass," is in reality a gently rolling,
grassy pasture land, the eastern prolongation of the Tian
Shan plateau. In order to avoid this, we made a detour to
the east to Kuzzil Singer. The scenery was almost identical
with that of eastern Persia so far as the main physiographic
forms were concerned. We traversed desolate plains of
barren gravel, from which rose low, half-buried mountains,
worn into rounded shapes if viewed as a whole, but ex-
tremely sharp, jagged, and naked if examined in detail.
Some of the hills were wonderfully streaked with patches
of red and white shale, which had been enclosed in the black
mass of ancient and now much faulted lava flows. The
whole region was made up of gravel-filled basins, in which
the gravel had often risen so high that it covered the lower
passes of the mountains. Long ago, when there had been
less deposition of gravel, the basins were separate. Now
they have coalesced, and all drain, or would drain if they
had water enough, into two main salt plains, or ancient
lakes, named Ugunnto and Uzun Bulaki Shor. There
are no permanent streams east of the high plateau, and the
few springs are for the most part saline. The region is well
called the Dry Mountains. It is a typical example of the
276 THE PULSE OF ASIA
influence of prolonged erosion under conditions of great
aridity.
At Kuzzil Singer we were the guests of four Chanto
brothers, camel-hunters. They and their families are the
only inhabitants of the whole region for nearly a hundred
miles in every direction. It was they who killed the camel
on whose flesh we dined one day. They shot it at Altmish
Bulak, where our animals ran away. One of the brothers,
the oldest, Abdur Rehim by name, came with us as guide.
He led us westward along the northern base of the plateau
of Tian Shan to Lake Bagrash Kul. This large lake is
peculiar in its archipelago of enormous sand dunes, three
or four hundred feet high, standing in the water at the east-
ern end. Apparently, at some time, the river of Kara-Sher,
now the main feeder of the lake, flowed to Korla without
entering the lake. Naturally, the water shrank to a low
level, as is evident from the dunes which accumulated in
what had been the lake-bed. Now the water has risen, ap-
parently because the river has been diverted to it again. We
crossed the lake on the ice in a day and a half. There for
the first time since leaving Niya, almost five months before,
we had the feeling of being in a region where man predomi-
nated over nature. On the ice we met carts full of wood and
charcoal from the mountains, and driven by surly Dungans.
Beyond the lake we came upon encampments of Mongols
almost hidden in the grassy plain. And soon we met the
Chantos and Chinese of the dirty, mongrel town of Kara-
Sher.
Although the Dry Mountains and the Choi Tagh, or
Desert Mountains, to the north of them are almost uninhab-
THE DRY RIVER AND THE DRY MOUNTAINS 277
ited, they furnish their own peculiar evidence of desicca-
tion. I saw traces of ancient habitation at Pochinza, near
Kuzzil Singer, and at Kumush, a little farther north, but
they were too small to be conclusive. At Chukur, north
of Bagrash Kul, we passed some ruins, and the people said
that there are traces of old canals which indicate that cen-
turies ago the fields were two or three times as large as
those which can be cultivated to-day. Similarly at Ushak
Tal, in the same vicinity, I found that the main ruins of
an old Buddhist village lie four or five miles below the
centre of the modern town, at a point to which the present
stream will not run at all in dry winters, and only in a very
small volume during dry summers.
For Kuruk Tagh and Choi Tagh as a whole I cannot do
better than quote from Abdur Rehim, the guide of Kuzzil
Singer. My own limited observations agreed entirely with
his. Abdur Rehim was a tall, lank hunter, who for the
forty years of his life had lived in the desert, far from all
neighbors except his brothers. He knew every mountain,
plain, and spring within a hundred miles of his home, and
every spot where a little vegetation flourishes, or rather
perishes, in a damp spot surrounded by salt. His lonely life,
and his long, hard journeys after game, had given to him,
as to his brothers, a degree of energy and self-reliance
which I have never seen equaled in Central Asia. And
more than this, he was a man who, though he talked but
little, thought deeply.
"In old times, were the springs larger or smaller than
now, or were they just the same ? " I asked him one day.
"Larger," he answered without hesitation; and when I
278 THE PULSE OF ASIA
questioned why, he went on, without prompting or further
questioning, to say: —
" When I was a boy and first went with my father to hunt,
or to care for sheep, all the springs were larger than now.
Where they now flow a quarter of a mile, they then flowed
half. Reed-beds that are now a foot high were then two,
and there were more of them. And there were more wild
animals; we saw three or four then for one now. I think it
must be because there is less water. It used to rain hard
enough to form running streams six or seven times a year,
and now it does so only two or three."
After speaking thus of the decrease in rainfall during
the past four or five years, without taking due account of
the difference between the impressions of a boy and of a
man, he went on to something more important and reliable.
"And long, long ago, before the time of my grandfa-
thers, perhaps in the days of the old forts at Ying-pen and
Pochinza, there must have been much more water. In the
high mountains there are many places where little stone
shepherds' huts, with the roofs all fallen in, stand in valleys
where nobody has ever known of there being any water.
And all around them are the droppings of cattle. The near-
est water is sometimes five or ten miles away. Surely nobody
would ever build a house in such a place. So I think there
must have been running water in the valleys when the
houses were built. How many such houses have I seen ?
Oh, many. I never counted, but the mountains are full of
them.
" And then, away from the great mountains there are dry
springs everywhere, places where the salt deposit of a spring
THE DRY RIVER AND THE DRY MOUNTAINS 279
and a few reeds can be seen. No one has ever known of
there being any water in these places, but from every side
old paths of camels and antelopes come in, just as they do
to places where there is always water. The animals used to
come to the dry springs regularly to drink. Now, nothing
ever visits them except a stray animal once or twice a year
to eat the few reeds. Near almost every one of the dry
<p r ings there are little shelters made of rocks and tamarisks,
just such as we make now when we lie in wait for game.
Nobody would make those beside a dry spring. They were
made long ago: we don't know by whom.
"Nobody ever asked me about this before, and I have
never talked of it. But I have seen many things when I
have been hunting, and have thought about them. So,"
— according to the Turki idiom, — "that's what I know in
my stomach."
CHAPTER XIV
THE WAXING AND WANING OF LOP-NOR
J.N traveling through the Lop basin we have everywhere
found evidences of pronounced changes of climate during
historic times. It will now be well to sum up the evidence,
and to ascertain how far the conclusion which we have
reached is in accordance with the phenomena of Lop-Nor.
The most widespread proof that there have been climatic
changes during the last two or three thousand years is found
in the death of vegetation over large areas. On the lower
slopes of the Kwen Lun Mountains the dissected condition
of deposits of loess shows that a cover of grassy vegetation
prevailed at no remote time, but has now died. In the zone
of vegetation, for a distance of seven hundred miles, plants
of all kinds show signs of drying up : the tamarisks usually
stand upon mounds; the poplars are dead or dying except
in the moistest places; and beds of dead reeds cover scores
of square miles. It has often been asserted that in many
parts of the world the destruction of forests has been the
cause of a diminution of rainfall. In the Lop basin, it is
manifest that the opposite has been true: a diminution in the
water supply has been the cause of the destruction of forests.
Another line of evidence shows that ancient roads such as
that from Keriya northward, or the great trade route
through Lulan, have been abandoned because there is now
no water along them. Again, in the Dry Mountains and else-
where, springs once frequented by animals or by men have
THE WAXING AND WANING OF LOP-NOR 281
now disappeared. Both to the north and south of the Lop
basin, regions which once were the home of nomadic shep-
herds are now uninhabited because there is not enough
water and grass.
When we turn to the rivers, it appears that in the seven
hundred miles from Khotan eastward, seventeen are worthy
of notice by reason of their size or because they support
oases. Of the seventeen all but four come to an end in the
zone of vegetation, and hence it is impossible to determine
whether they have diminished in length. The remaining
four all once flowed from eight to twenty-five miles farther
into the sand than they now do, as appears from dead
vegetation. Thirteen of the seventeen rivers have on their
lower courses the ruins of towns dating from the Buddhist
era, a thousand or more years ago. In almost every case, the
ancient towns were larger than their successors, this being
notably true of Niya, Yartungaz, Endereh, Cherchen, Vash
Sheri, and Miran. And finally, with the possible exception of
old Cherchen, Charklik, and Karadong on the Keriya River,
the older ruins are situated so far out in the desert, or upon
rivers so small or so saline, that it would be impossible
again to locate towns of equal size in the same places, unless
a far better system of irrigation were introduced. There is
not the slightest trace of such a system, although if it had
existed, its canals would surely have been more durable
than those built under the present crude system. More-
over, in three places, Vash Sheri, Miran, and Ying-pen,
almost the entire irrigation system of old times is preserved,
including both dams and canals; and it is evident that the
ancient methods of utilizing water were precisely like those
252 THE PULSE OF ASIA
of to-dav. The abandonment of the ruined towns cannot
have been due to the encroachment of sand, for in some
places, such as Miran, Vash Sheri and Ying-pen, there is no
sand; in others, such as Endereh, the amount is small; and
even in places such as Dandan-Uilik, where there is much
sand, it appears to have encroached upon the inhabited
area after, not before, the vegetation had begun to die for
lack of water. It is possible that in one or two minor cases
the diminution of the water supply may have been due to
the diversion of part of the headwaters of a stream, but in
most cases this is impossible. Manifestly, such diversion in
one place would cause a larger stream and more abundant
vegetation elsewhere ; but as a matter of fact, the amount of
vegetation has diminished everywhere. Neither the theory
of the diversi 
