THROUGH DESERTS AND OASES
OF CENTRAL ASIA
Strike me dead, the track has vanished.
Well, what now? We’ve lost the way,
Demons have bewitched our horses,
Led us in the wilds astray.
PUSHKIN.
[Illustration: A _YA-YIEH_ OR YAMEN RUNNER. _Frontispiece._]
THROUGH DESERTS AND
OASES OF CENTRAL ASIA
BY
MISS ELLA SYKES
F.R.G.S.
AUTHOR OF
“THROUGH PERSIA ON A SIDE-SADDLE” AND “A HOME HELP IN CANADA”
AND
BRIGADIER-GENERAL SIR PERCY SYKES
K.C.I.E., C.B., C.M.G.
GOLD MEDALLIST OF THE ROYAL GEOGRAPHICAL SOCIETY
AUTHOR OF
“A HISTORY OF PERSIA” AND “THE GLORY OF THE SHIA WORLD”
MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
ST. MARTIN’S STREET, LONDON
1920
[Illustration]
MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
LONDON · BOMBAY · CALCUTTA · MADRAS
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THE MACMILLAN COMPANY
NEW YORK · BOSTON · CHICAGO
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THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, LTD.
TORONTO
COPYRIGHT
PREFACE
Few works dealing with Chinese Turkestan and the Pamirs have been
published of late years, although the Heart of Asia, where the empires
of Great Britain, Russia and China meet, can never fail to excite our
interest. Furthermore, the great trade route which ran from China to
the Roman Empire lay across Chinese Turkestan, from which remote land
silk was introduced into Europe.
The present book has been written in two parts. The chapters composing
Part I., which describe the nine months’ journey in deserts and oases,
in mountains and plains, have been written by my sister, while I am
responsible for those dealing with the geography, history, customs and
other subjects.
We are indebted to Mr. Bohlin of the Swedish Mission in Chinese
Turkestan, and to _Khan Sahib_, Iftikhar Ahmad of the British
Consulate-General, Kashgar, for much assistance; and also to Dr. F. W.
Thomas, of the India Office, who has read through the historical sketch.
A good deal of new material will be found in the various chapters, and
as far as possible the subjects so ably and exhaustively dealt with by
Sir Aurel Stein have been avoided.
To my sister belongs the honour of being the first Englishwoman to
cross the dangerous passes leading to and from the Pamirs and, with the
exception of Mrs. Littledale, to visit Khotan.
We greatly enjoyed the nine months we spent in Chinese Turkestan and
on the “Roof of the World,” and if we succeed in arousing the interest
of our readers in this old-world backwater of Asia, and at the same
time convey something of its distinctive charm, our ambitions will be
fulfilled.
P. M. SYKES.
CONTENTS
PART I
CHAPTER I
PAGE
ACROSS THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE IN WAR TIME 3
CHAPTER II
BEYOND THE TIAN SHAN TO KASHGAR 18
CHAPTER III
LIFE AT KASHGAR 39
CHAPTER IV
ROUND ABOUT KASHGAR 66
CHAPTER V
OLLA PODRIDA 86
CHAPTER VI
ON THE WAY TO THE RUSSIAN PAMIRS 103
CHAPTER VII
THE ROOF OF THE WORLD 129
CHAPTER VIII
THE ARYANS OF SARIKOL 148
CHAPTER IX
THE ANCIENT CITY OF YARKAND 175
CHAPTER X
THROUGH THE DESERT TO KHOTAN 191
CHAPTER XI
KHOTAN THE KINGDOM OF JADE 209
PART II
CHAPTER XII
THE GEOGRAPHY, GOVERNMENT AND COMMERCE OF CHINESE
TURKESTAN 235
CHAPTER XIII
AN HISTORICAL SKETCH OF CHINESE TURKESTAN: THE EARLY
PERIOD 248
CHAPTER XIV
AN HISTORICAL SKETCH OF CHINESE TURKESTAN: THE
MEDIAEVAL AND LATER PERIODS 263
CHAPTER XV
AN HISTORICAL SKETCH OF CHINESE TURKESTAN: THE
MODERN PERIOD 275
CHAPTER XVI
A KASHGAR FARMER 300
CHAPTER XVII
MANNERS AND CUSTOMS IN CHINESE TURKESTAN 308
CHAPTER XVIII
STALKING THE GREAT SHEEP OF MARCO POLO 324
INDEX 333
ILLUSTRATIONS
_Note._--The illustrations, with one exception, are from reproductions
of photographs taken by the authors.
FACE PAGE
A _Ya-Yieh_ or Yamen Runner _Frontispiece_
Cart used in the Osh District 26
Daoud and Sattur 41
Watering Horses in the Tuman Su 56
Kashgar Women and Children 58
Water-Carriers at Kashgar 60
Shoeing in the Kashgar Bazar 62
A Kashgar Grandmother 64
Priest at the Temple of Pan Chao 67
Kashgar City (showing the city wall and Tuman Su) 68
Women at the Shrine of Hazrat Apak 69
Chinese Soldiers at the Kashgar Yamen 74
Jafar Bai displaying the Visiting Card 77
Study of Kashgar Women 82
Ruins of the Buddhist _Tim_, Kashgar 85
The Shrine of Bibi Anna 93
Fording the Gez River 109
Kirghiz Women in Gala Dress 118
Loading up the Yaks 124
Bringing in an _Ovis Poli_ (Nadir with rifle) 146
(_a_) The Game of _Baigu_--the Mêlée 150
(_b_) The Game of _Baigu_--the Pick-up 150
(_c_) The Game of _Baigu_--the Victor 150
Nasir Ali Khan, a _Muki_ of Sarikol 156
Sarikoli Dancers 158
Muztagh Ata--The Snout of a Glacier 162
A Kirghiz and his Daughter 164
Kashgar Musicians 170
Our _Arabas_ on the Yarkand Road 176
A Hunting Eagle 182
Ferry on the Yarkand River 192
The Pigeon Shrine 206
Beggars at the Gate 212
A Dulani _Shaykh_ 222
Dulani Musicians 224
A Dulani Woman and her Son 226
The Tian Shan or Celestial Mountains 236
The Tungani Commander of the Troops at Khotan 242
Tamerlane 268
A Load of Clover from Isa _Haji’s_ Farm 302
The Sons of Isa _Haji_ ploughing 304
A Magician and his Disciple 314
A Kashgar School 316
A Woman throwing Mud to effect a Cure 320
_Ovis Poli_--the 51-inch head 328
Hunting-Dogs with Kirghiz owner 330
MAPS
Supplementary Sketch Map showing Country to the East of
Route Map 275
Map to illustrate Authors’ Routes (_In pocket at end of volume_)
ERRATUM
Page 134, line 22, _for_ “there was no sign of a division” _read_ “it
was broken up into islands.”
PART I
CHAPTER I
ACROSS THE RUSSIAN EMPIRE IN WAR TIME
The cities are called _Taskent_[1] and _Caskayre_,[1] and the people
that warre against _Taskent_ are called _Cassaks_[1] of the law of
_Mahomet_, and they which warre with the said countrey of _Caskayre_
are called Kirghiz, Gentiles and idolaters.--ANTHONY JENKINSON.
On March 5, 1915, my brother and I started off on our long journey to
Kashgar, the capital of Chinese Turkestan, where he was to act for Sir
George Macartney, the well-known Consul-General, who was taking leave.
Owing to the War, we were obliged, as the first stage of our journey,
to travel to Petrograd by the circuitous route through Norway, Sweden
and Finland. The small Norwegian steamer, the _Iris_, in which we
embarked at Newcastle, made its way up the coast of Scotland to a point
opposite Peterhead in order to avoid mines and submarines, after which
it crossed to Bergen. We passed two choppy nights in stuffy cabins
with the portholes tightly screwed up, and I was too prostrate with
sea-sickness to care when the engines of our steamer stopped dead
during the first afternoon. My brother rushed up on deck to see if we
were held up by a German submarine, which might mean the unpleasant
experience of internment for him, but after a couple of hours we went
on again, and no explanation of the delay was given us.
Some three months later this same vessel was attacked in reality, two
torpedoes being fired at her, and only the zigzag course skilfully
pursued by the captain saved her from destruction. Amundsen, the
discoverer of the South Pole, was on board, and wrote to the papers
describing the incident, and strongly reprobated Germany’s policy
towards neutral shipping, which, he declared, had converted him to the
side of the Allies.
To return to our journey, we finally steamed in safety up a long
fiord, and Bergen stood up picturesquely against its background of
snow-covered hills. We thought that the pleasant-mannered Norwegians
were decidedly Scotch in appearance, and a sturdy youth, quite of the
type of a Highland gillie, soon guided us to the Hospidset Hotel, which
had originally belonged to the Hanseatic League in Bergen. In old days
the apprentices lived in this house, being locked up safely at night,
and though the building has undergone considerable restoration, it is
still a characteristic piece of architecture.
Next morning we tramped round Bergen in our snow-boots, finding the
steep roads very slippery with frozen snow, even the inhabitants
falling headlong now and again. Here and there children were merrily
tobogganing, dashing recklessly across the main street through which
the trams were running, and hurling themselves down steep inclines on
the other side in a way that made me shudder. They were all sensibly
clad in woollen garments, their rosy faces peering out from fur caps
or fur-trimmed hoods, and it did one good to see them. A graver note
was struck as a funeral passed by, with all the mourners on foot; and
the pastor, in a stiff ruff with muslin frills at his wrists, seemed
to have returned from the sixteenth century, and might have posed for
a portrait of Calvin. Sleighs were everywhere, drawn by sturdy little
ponies that raced along at a great pace with jingling bells and kept
their feet wonderfully.
We left by the night train for the twenty-seven hours’ run to
Stockholm, changing at Christiania, and next day were speeding through
a land of snow and pine inhabited by a hardy-looking, fur-clad race.
Fish seemed a staple article of food, and we were offered salted
prawns, herring-salad, raw sardines and anchovies; veal, ham and
tongue, with pickles or cold fried bacon, forming the meat course.
There were no sweets or fruit, but for compensation we had delicious
coffee and cream. In the restaurant car the bread and rolls were
fastened up in grease-proof paper, sugar in tiny packets, and biscuits
in sealed bags, in order to prevent unnecessary handling.
It was night when we steamed into the “Venice of the North,” a city
which must be lovely in the summer, as it rises from its waters; but
at the time of our visit the river was covered with floating blocks of
grey ice, and all the world was skating or ski-ing.
The people were not unfriendly to us, but from more than one source we
learnt that, owing to their hereditary fear of Russia, the Swedes were
generally partisans of Germany, in contradistinction to the Norwegians,
who, as a nation, were warmly in favour of the Allies.
We had a five o’clock dinner (three to five o’clock being the usual
time, reminding one of early Victorian customs), and then settled
ourselves into the comfortable sleeping coupés which we were to
inhabit for two nights as far as Karungi, the direct route across the
Gulf of Bothnia being inadvisable for obvious reasons. There were four
racks for light luggage in each compartment, a convenient washing
apparatus and a table, and we could open our windows, whereas in Russia
we found the windows screwed up until the spring.
But there was one thing in which the Russian trains, with their
three bells rung for departure, compared favourably with those of
Scandinavia, and that was that the latter gave no real warning
when they were about to start. The engine whistled and moved off
immediately, with the result that I was always nervous about walking up
and down the platform, for the iron steps leading up to the carriages
were so slippery with frozen ice that I feared to risk a fall if I
scaled them in a hurry.
A Russian girl travelling in the carriage next to ours had given her
ticket to the care of a French lady, a complete stranger to her, and,
strolling along the platform with a fur collar round her neck but no
fur coat, was unluckily left behind. The railway officials sent her
ticket back to her and took care of her belongings, and I trust that
some good Samaritan aided her, but she must have had a most unpleasant
experience. I asked a Swede who talked to me why the trains gave
practically no signal when they started, and he said that there was
some reason which he had forgotten.
The country lay deeper in snow the farther north we advanced, and on
either side, as far as eye could reach, the undulating ground was
covered with vast forests of fir and pine. At intervals we passed
little towns and villages, the small wooden houses, painted in many
colours, giving the impression of toy-dwellings. The brightly clad
fur-capped little girls with long fair plaits of hair seemed as if they
had come to life from the fairy books of my childhood, and one could
almost credit the existence of gnomes and trolls in those limitless
uninhabited tracts of pine. Soldiers in blue-grey or navy-blue
uniforms, with white sheepskin caps or picturesque three-cornered cloth
hats, stood about on the platforms up and down which we tramped in our
snow-boots whenever the train halted. As there was no restaurant car we
obtained our meals at the station buffets, halts of about half an hour
being made at 10 A.M., 3 P.M. and 10 P.M. In the absence of waiters the
hungry crowd of passengers helped themselves, selecting from a tray
laid out with different kinds of fish, cheese, pickles, etc., or piling
their plates with hot pork or veal. I made invariably for the big
cauldron of excellent soup with vegetables, and there was always coffee
and milk, bread and cakes in abundance, and no pushing or hustling on
the part of those travelling.
At last we reached Karungi, the frontier between Sweden and Russia,
and scores of sleighs were in waiting at the station to convey the
passengers the short distance to the Russian Karungi. The fine-looking
Russian Consul, clad in a splendid fur coat and cap to match, was
most obliging, and cheered us greatly with the news--alas, quite
inaccurate, as we found out later--that the Allied fleets had silenced
all the forts in the Dardanelles! My brother went off to pass our
heavy luggage through the Swedish Customs, and I had some difficulty
in collecting our small possessions on to one sleigh, because half a
dozen men and boys, clad in nondescript garments of fur and leather,
hurled themselves upon hold-alls and dressing-cases and bore them
off in all directions, utterly regardless of my remonstrances. The
only thing I could do was to follow the most responsible-looking of
my self-constituted porters, and when he deposited his burden on a
sleigh I induced him to accompany me in a hunt among the lines of
shaggy little ponies, finding the tea-basket in one place, a hat-box
or a bundle of sticks and umbrellas mixed up with another passenger’s
luggage, and so on. The Consul told me to come and drink coffee in the
buffet, exclaiming reassuringly, “You can leave everything safely, for
in this part of the world the people do not know how to steal.”
At last we drove off in the keen air across a level waste of snow,
traversing a frozen river which forms the actual boundary, and in half
an hour, with many a bump and jolt, we reached a gate through which,
after we had shown our passports, we were admitted into Finland.
We had now a wait of some six hours, which we spent in walking on the
crisp snow or sitting in the little station buffet, where I observed
that coffee had given way to tea, the Russian national beverage, drunk
in glasses with a slice of lemon and much sugar. From now onwards the
_pièce de résistance_ of our chief meals was sturgeon. I liked it
fairly well when stewed or fried, but it was usually tough when served
cold. Some of these enormous fish are said to weigh two or three tons.
When the train made a tardy appearance it could not accommodate all
the passengers, and many were perforce left behind to follow the next
day. The first halt was at Tornea, to which point travellers used to
drive until the extension of the line to Karungi after the outbreak
of the War, and, though we were in the Arctic Circle and it was early
in March, the air seemed quite mild as we rushed across Finland, our
wood-fed engine belching forth immense whorls of smoke. At Vyborg we
entered Russia, and at midnight of the second day reached Petrograd.
In the Astoria Hotel it was remarkable to see every one drinking
_kvass_, a somewhat mawkish beverage made from bread or from
cranberries, in lieu of wine or spirits. In Finland alcoholic
refreshments were obtainable in the restaurant car, but now we found
ourselves in a country which the will of an autocrat had made so
strictly teetotal that we were unable even to purchase methylated
spirit for our tea-basket!
Some of our Russian acquaintances spoke with enthusiasm of the
beneficial effect of the Tsar’s edict, one competent observer pointing
out that the Russian women were just beginning to take to drink, which
would have meant the ruin of many thousands of homes. On the other
side, there were murmurs among the well-to-do, who were deprived
of their favourite beverages unless they could obtain a doctor’s
certificate of ill-health, which did not, however, seem difficult to
arrange. I was asked more than once whether King George was about to
follow the lead given by the Tsar, Russians not being very clear as to
the limitations of a constitutional monarchy.
Soldiers were to be seen everywhere, sometimes drilling near the great
red Winter Palace, sometimes as reservists, with numbers chalked
upon their backs, or again as small parties of wounded in charge of
kind-faced hospital nurses. I heard pathetic accounts of the extreme
poverty of the men who were being nursed back to health in the English
Hospital directed by Lady Georgina Buchanan, who had had the kindly
thought of fitting them out when they were dismissed to their peasant
homes; the totally disabled being trained in basket-making. Both at
Petrograd and at Moscow, our next halting-place, those actively engaged
in nursing spoke highly of the courage and gratitude of their patients.
In the latter city an English girl of only nineteen and a Russian lady
of the same age, neither of whom had had any training in nursing, were
in charge of a hospital containing forty-five wounded soldiers. They
did all the bandaging themselves, assisted at every operation, and
supervised the peasant women who performed the more menial share of the
work. My devoted compatriot told me that the men called her “Little
Sister,” and were marvellously brave when operated upon, saying that
her presence gave them courage. Owing to the absence of the great
majority of the trained nurses at the front, these capable amateurs
were of the utmost service. We heard that the Russian medical faculty
disapproved of inoculation for typhoid, giving the somewhat inadequate
reason that “there were so many worse diseases,” and consequently the
soldiers suffered terribly from this scourge.
My brother and I did the sights of Petrograd, with its many
gold-covered domes, cupolas and spires, but I will refrain from
describing the gorgeous interior of St. Isaak, the pictures of the
Hermitage, or even the deeply interesting house in which Peter the
Great lived while building his “window opening to the West.”
Moscow, with its hundreds of gilt-domed or purple or blue or green
cupolas, that bizarre orgy of colour and fantastic design called the
Church of Ivan the Terrible, and the ancient Kremlin built to resist
Tartar inroads, gave me, as indeed it does to most travellers, the
impression of a semi-Oriental city.
We were in the very heart of Russia, and no one could fail to be struck
by the intense devotion--I refrain from calling it superstition--of
the people. In the dim magnificence of the small but lofty Coronation
Chapel, which has its walls literally encrusted with jewelled icons,
crowds were kissing the hands and feet of the sacred pictures all day
long, in defiance of every hygienic principle. Long-haired priests in
embroidered copes were chanting services, and as the body of a saint,
dead centuries ago, had just been exhumed, it was confidently expected
that many miracles of healing would be wrought by the remains. Gilded
and jewelled banners to be carried in procession stood in the ornate
chapels, which had gorgeous doors through which no woman might pass. On
the great day of his coronation the Tsar passed through these portals,
anointed and crowned himself, then issued forth, the Father of his
people, to perform the same ceremony on the Tsaritsa.
The monarch, in common with the humblest of his subjects, uncovers
himself as he passes under one of the entrances to the Kremlin,
above which stands a particularly holy icon. Indeed in every room of
every Russian house, even in the hotels, hangs some pictured saint
with a little lamp in front of him, while the railway stations and
waiting-rooms are all provided with sacred guardians.
To these people the War was then a holy one. The chambermaid of
our hotel, who spoke German--a language it is forbidden to use in
public--told me with tears that her only son had been killed at the
front, that his father had died of grief when the news reached them,
and that her daughter, working at a hospital, had had no news of her
soldier-husband for three months and naturally feared the worst. “But
we must not grumble,” she ended bravely; “it is terrible for all of us,
but with God’s help our Tsar will conquer his enemies and we shall have
peace once more.”
Russians struck us as being somewhat silent in the streets, and we
never heard any one whistle. It was explained that they have the same
superstition about whistling as have the Persians, and look upon it as
“devilish speech.” In connection with this we were told that on one
occasion an American bishop and his chaplain were visiting a monastery
in Moscow, and to the horror of the monks the chaplain kept on bursting
into snatches of whistling. But one of the holy men was equal to the
occasion and, walking close behind the unconscious offender, made the
sign of the cross repeatedly in order to avert any evil consequences!
The lack of efficiency in Russia was very noticeable. For example, to
cash our letters of credit in a bank was a tedious business, the money
being slowly counted with the aid of an abacus. The shopkeepers also
depend greatly on these aids to arithmetic. It was moreover a land of
tips. In every private house the servant who helped you on and off with
your fur coat and galoshes expected a _pourboire_, and on leaving a
hotel we were surrounded by a throng of waiters, porters of different
grades, and a bevy of small boys, all intent on fees.
During the next section of our journey to Tashkent the trains were
by no means as comfortable as before. Our only light was a guttering
candle in a lantern placed high above the carriage door, and, what was
worse, the double windows were screwed up for the winter, all the air
we breathed passing through most inadequate ventilators in the roof.
After some thirty hours of semi-suffocation it was a relief when the
train stopped at Samara, and its great bridge over the Volga. Before
we crossed, soldiers with fixed bayonets filed into the corridors and
lined the train, and henceforward sentries stood with fixed bayonets
on all the platforms. Instead of going through to Tashkent, our train
stopped for eighteen hours, so we drove perforce to the best hotel in
the place. There I was ushered into a bedroom which had only a mattress
on the bedstead; but a cheery maid soon produced sheets, pillows and
towels, these articles from now onward being charged separately in the
bill: she also filled up the water-tank which discharged itself into
the basin by a kind of squirt, liable to drench the unwary. A hot bath
is an expensive luxury in Russia, costing from three to five shillings;
but I never appreciated it at its proper value. The bath, filled with
water too hot for me to plunge my hand into, was invariably taken in a
tiny room without ventilation in which a stove was fiercely burning,
and the attendant, armed with a thermometer, was always greatly
astonished when I demanded a copious admixture of cold water. Half
the room would be occupied by a divan covered with a sheet on which
to repose after the bath, and once or twice I had some difficulty in
getting rid of the maid, so anxious was she to wrap me in a second
sheet, with which Russians drape themselves before they step into the
water.
Samara is an important provincial town, but the whole place looked poor
and shabby, partly because the coloured plaster coating of the houses
was dropping off in unsightly patches. The wide streets radiated from
a small public garden in which stood a statue of Alexander II., the
Liberator, and, as it was Sunday, all the world was promenading in its
best clothes along the slush-covered pavements, the thaw having set in.
The peasants looked picturesque in short sheepskin coats, worn with the
wool inside, fur caps with lappets to protect the ears, long leather
riding-boots, putties tied up with string and thick leather gloves.
The shaggy hats of black or white sheepskin made their wearers look
like brigands in opera, and beside them the women, in long black coats
much kilted at the waist, with their heads tied up in woollen shawls,
appeared decidedly tame.
We made our way down to the Volga and walked on the frozen river, which
was a mile wide, watching the drinking-water of the town being drawn
from various holes in the ice.
At the railway station that evening we found a large crowd on the
platform assembled to give a hearty send-off to a trainload of soldiers
evidently hailing from the neighbourhood. The men were travelling to
the front in horse-boxes, and leant over the wooden barriers wildly
cheering and waving their caps, full of health and spirits, and one
could hardly bear to think that many would never return, or, sadder
still, would come home incapacitated for the rest of their days.
Owing to the War there were no restaurant-cars attached to the trains,
and as the time-tables were unaltered we had halts of only ten or
twelve minutes three or four times a day, when the passengers made a
frenzied rush to get what they could at the inferior station buffets.
We usually bought something in the way of meat, cheese and bread, and
carried it back with us to our carriage, after we had gulped down
plates of the excellent cabbage soups called _stchee_ or _borsch_.
The only long halt we made--one of forty minutes--was at a station
with no buffet whatever. The farther east we went the less food could
we procure: sometimes packets of inferior Russian biscuits were the
only stock-in-trade of the buffet, and if it had not been for our
soup-packets we should have been half-starved. As it was, we were often
unpleasantly hungry, hot water being the only thing that we could be
sure of obtaining.
In spite of this the journey was full of interest. We were travelling
across limitless steppes, and the melting of the snow in patches showed
that spring was at hand, when the sun would break forth from the grey,
lowering skies. Near Orenburg we noticed many tons of hay ready to be
despatched to the front, and as we halted at Alexis I suddenly saw the
ungainly forms of camels. Nearer and nearer they came, padding across
the snow, drawing sleighs laden with hay, and with a leap of the heart
I realized that we were once again in the East, that Europe was left
behind, and that we had entered that vast mysterious continent of Asia,
cradle of the human race and birthplace of its great religions.
The following day we passed the Sea of Aral, with masted ships riding
at anchor in its port; and by now all traces of snow had gone, and
the sandy steppe was scantily dotted with coarse grasses. Sometimes
we traversed stretches of salt-encrusted ground, and in places the
rolling sand-dunes were planted and bound together with rushes in order
to prevent them from encroaching upon the railway, or long lines of
fencing answered the same purpose for the snowdrifts.
We saw few signs of life, and the loneliness of the steppe made me
realize something of those vast empty spaces of Asia which from lack
of water will for ever be dreary wastes forsaken by mankind. Yet a
picturesque crowd was usually assembled at the stations. Hairless-faced
men with high cheek-bones were clad in long padded coats reaching
to their heels, or wore sheepskins, their rope or straw-soled shoes
being tied with leather thongs criss-cross from knee to ankle over
thick woollen stockings. Among a variety of headgear the quaintest
resembled early Victorian coal-scuttle bonnets tied under the chin.
They were made of brightly coloured velvet, with broad fur-lined
brims, a fur-lined flap behind and lappets over the ears, and looked
most comical when worn by brawny Kirghiz, who strode up and down the
platforms trailing long whips in their hands.
The warm weather was now beginning, and the Russian women who sold
tea and hot water from big brass samovars had discarded their winter
clothes and appeared in flowered cotton dresses with gaily coloured
handkerchiefs over their heads. Their children were running about
barefoot, and I was amused at watching an encounter between a lightly
clad urchin and a smart little boy who was travelling in our overheated
train. This latter, who had a long fur-lined coat, a fur cap and
galoshes over his boots, held up his foot for the admiration of the
platform youngster, who laughed good-humouredly, and stretched out his
dusty toes in response.
In spite of the warm sunshine, ours were the only windows open in the
whole train, and when, after leaving Samara, my brother had obtained
fresh air by freely tipping a most reluctant conductor, an official
higher in rank came to enquire whether it was not a mistake and whether
after all we did not wish to be screwed up again! I could not imagine
why our fellow-passengers did not follow our example, because, before
we reached Tashkent, the sun flamed down from a cloudless blue sky;
the hoopoe, harbinger of spring, chased its mate; the crested larks
sang, and the children offered big bunches of the little mauve iris.
Ploughing was visible in places, and a faint green flush was spreading
over the vast plain, which near Tashkent gave way to grassy downs on
which cattle grazed.
At the imposing-looking station of Turkestan we made enquiries
respecting the flags that we noticed hanging out on all the platforms,
and to our joy were told that they were in honour of the taking of
Przemyzl. An officer of military police with whom my brother talked,
said that this victory had come at an opportune moment, as there was
considerable unrest among the native population.
We were sorry not to see the tomb erected by Tamerlane in the old city
of Turkestan to the memory of a Kirghiz saint, for M. Romanoff, an
authority on Mohamedan art, who has visited a large proportion of the
mosques and shrines of Central Asia, considers this splendid building
to be a masterpiece.