THROUGH THE DESERT TO KHOTAN
... The view was boundless, there were no traces either of man or
horse, and in the night the demons and goblins raised fire-lights as
many as the stars; in the day time the driving wind blew the sand
before it....--_Travels of Hiuen Tsiang._
Yarkand is the richest oasis in Chinese Turkestan, but we did not
appreciate this fact until we had left the city and saw the open
country covered with wide stretches of rice, maize, wheat and millet;
and I confess that I had to revise my opinion as to the lethargy of
the Yarkandis, or at all events of the peasantry, when I realized the
ceaseless labour required to produce such abundance.
The Yarkand River, the source of which had recently been fixed by the
Filippi expedition, was about six miles from the town, and we crossed
it in broad ferry-boats like punts, which were some forty feet long. We
clambered over a barrier at one end of the boat, and our nine horses,
stepping in nimbly behind us, one after the other, without any fuss,
were packed in tightly, close up to the plank that separated us from
them. Sattur’s _mapa_ was fixed into a second boat with some difficulty
as it was too broad, but finally all our belongings were settled,
and two muscular men--one handling a long pole and the other a
paddle--took us across the river, which is dangerous on account of its
shifting quicksands. Our horses seemed to enjoy the novel experience,
some of them craning over to drink as we slowly approached the opposite
bank. There I anticipated some trouble, as the animals had to turn
round and step out at the end by which they entered. However, they
grasped the situation at once, and very soon we were mounted, fording
a couple of shallow branches of the main stream and stumbling over a
dreary waste of rounded boulders which formed an old river bed. Beyond
this lay trees and villages and a band of British subjects ready to
welcome us with the inevitable tea, fruit and sweetmeats; an attention
that I did not appreciate, as several of our hosts were afflicted with
goitre in its most distressing forms.
At Posgam, where we halted for the night, quarters were assigned to
us in a garden that boasted a magnificent walnut-tree, and we had our
beds placed on platforms outside the attractive garden-house, where my
room, carpeted with crudely coloured products of the loom, had fretted
woodwork windows.
Next day our twenty-four mile march led us entirely through
cultivation, along a broad highway bordered with willows, the rice
fields stretching for many acres on either side. The River Tiznaf
flowed clear over a stony bed, in pleasing contrast to the muddy
streams we had encountered hitherto, and we were told that those
drinking from it never suffered from goitre.
[Illustration: FERRY ON THE YARKAND RIVER. _Page 192._]
In this part of the world it is customary for the villages to open
their bazars on different days and to name them accordingly. At the
_Panjshamba_, or Thursday market, every kind of article is offered
for sale, because the bazars are all closed on _Juma_ (Friday), the day
on which the Faithful visit the mosques, and I was told that at Khotan
the _Chahar-shamba_ (Wednesday) bazar is held only for the sale of milk
products.
We met crowds of people coming to the Posgam market. There were
beggars galore, whole families of them, sometimes accompanied by big
dogs; and tramping along to gain their livelihood were the religious
mendicants, who were striking figures clad in rags of many colours,
wearing sugar-loaf hats and carrying bowls and stout sticks, or
sometimes gourds and rattles. They evidently aimed at the picturesque
in their appearance, and their outward dirt was a sign of inward
holiness and conferred on them the power to drive away demons and heal
diseases. Farther on we came across musicians carrying _tars_, some
having instruments resembling zithers and others drums and pipes, while
parties of Chinese laden with gambling tables struck a sinister note.
The crowd was largely composed of women of the peasant class mounted on
ponies or donkeys and driving their cattle and sheep to market, some
clasping fowls in their arms. Two or three wore a curious globular hat
of cloth of silver, the like of which I saw only once at Kashgar, when
I was told that it was the headgear of a bride. All the world seemed
bound for Posgam, and as we passed through village after village on
our way to Kargalik hardly any one was to be seen, and the little
stalls under the vine-covered trellises that roofed in the bazars were
shuttered up or bare, with the exception of the bread stalls. The boxes
of flowers on the roofs gave touches of light and colour in the form
of asters, balsams and marigolds, while here and there masses of golden
maize were drying in the sun.
On this occasion the Hindus had provided for us a refection of chops
and poached eggs, evidently considering this food more suitable for
a Sahib than the usual fowls, and when we had coped with this I left
my brother to enjoy the reception given by the Russian subjects, and,
attended by Jafar Bai, rode on to our quarters, passing the Chinese
_Amban_ on his way to greet the British Consul-General. This dignitary,
with a most impassive face, drove in an elaborately painted _mapa_,
preceded by a youth carrying a huge magenta silk umbrella with a deep
fringe, while his escort of soldiers, in quaint black uniforms, were
carrying mediaeval-looking spears and halberds.
The house prepared for us stood in a little garden crammed with
vegetables and with enormous specimens of the misshapen and velvety
crimson coxcomb. An outside staircase led to a balcony that ran round
a large upper room with heavily barred wooden windows, which was the
ladies’ abode--a very depressing one to my mind, as it remained in
perpetual twilight, and from it no glimpse could be obtained of the
outside world, though its smells and noises were extremely obvious.
But, as I slept on the balcony, it served me for a convenient
dressing-room, as well as for a retreat when my brother held the usual
receptions of British subjects and Chinese officials in the house below.
About this time all the horses seemed to become lame at once. The
Badakshani chestnut and the grey both took to limping, and the nice
little pony on which I rode astride cut its fetlock badly. Kalmuck,
our last purchase, though sound, was an exasperatingly sluggish horse
and consequently very fatiguing to ride. Jafar Bai, as usual, persisted
that the lameness was due to my brother’s order to water the horses
after they had been about an hour in camp, and was in no way convinced
when it was proved that bad shoeing had lamed one animal, and when the
others gradually recovered in spite of adherence to the English rules
as to forage and watering.
We were now to have our first sight of the real desert, which lay
between us and the Khotan Oasis. On the night before our march across
it we rested in a tiny village on its very edge, some of the mud-built
houses being half-buried by the sand and others having trenches dug
round them to keep it off. An irrigation channel ran between willows,
with patches of cultivation on either side. We put up as best we could
in the courtyard of a serai, the building itself being too crowded with
peasants to accommodate us. Owing to the reluctance which all Orientals
feel to leaving a town, the drivers of the _arabas_, in spite of their
being drawn by five horses apiece, arrived so late that our supper,
eaten by the light of the moon, was extremely scanty.
When we rose in the morning the desert stretched before us vast and
undulating. In Canada in the early spring the prairie, reaching to the
far horizon on either side of the train, had reminded me of a desert,
so limitless, so barren and devoid of life did the largest wheat field
in the world appear. But oh, the difference! The Takla Makan kills all
life unless there is water to correct its baleful influence, while the
prairie holds in its bosom food for millions.
As we rode on our way at six o’clock the early morning wind was
swirling up the sand, obscuring the sky and magnifying everything
strangely. At intervals the _potais_, most of which were in a ruinous
condition, loomed monstrous through the haze, a caravan that I imagined
to be composed of camels resolved itself into a group of diminutive
donkeys, while a gigantic figure draped in fluttering robes turned into
a harmless peasant carrying a staff and water-gourd. We followed the
broad track made by _arabas_ and the hoofs of countless animals; but
I thought how easy it would be to lose the way, were a strong wind to
blow the sand across our route and cover the skulls and other traces
of bygone caravans. In the days of Hiuen Tsiang and Marco Polo there
were no _potais_, and travellers must often have been lost; indeed the
Chinese pilgrim tells us that when he crossed this desert the heaps of
bones were his only means of knowing whether he was following the right
track or not. I was interested to hear that this particular stage had
the reputation of being haunted and that no peasant would traverse it
alone at night. In fact, a Hindu trader told Iftikhar Ahmad that he and
his servants had been greatly terrified a few days before our arrival.
They were travelling after dark and, though there was no moon, a sudden
light in the sky revealed a broad road bordered by irrigation channels
and trees, along which marched an army. The onlookers imagined from
their uniforms that the soldiers were Turks, but they could not see
their faces, and suddenly they vanished, only to give place to droves
of cattle and sheep, which seemed to pour in an unending stream past
the frightened travellers. In the life of Hiuen Tsiang mention is made
more than once of the hallucinations to which he was subject in the
desert, and the following passage occurs: “He saw a body of troops
amounting to several hundreds covering the sandy plain--the soldiers
were clad in fur and felt. And now the appearance of camels and horses
and the fluttering of standards and lances met his view....” I quote
this passage because the Chinaman’s vision in the seventh century seems
strangely akin to that of the Hindu and his servants. As we neared the
large oasis of Guma the inevitable receptions began several miles out
in the desert, and I was struck with the appearance of our host, the
_Aksakal_. He was a tall, handsome man, remarkably like a high-class
Persian, and wore a long mauve coat with a magenta waistband, and
a purple felt hat with broad gold band, a purchase from India. He
installed us in his newly built house, which, being in the middle of
the bazar, was the haunt of legions of flies. It consisted of several
small rooms opening on to a little courtyard planted with shrubs and
flowers, over which lovely humming-bird moths were hovering; but, as
there was no exit at the back and we were at very close quarters with
our servants, I did not altogether appreciate what was evidently the
_ne plus ultra_ of Guma taste. Our rooms and the verandah were painted
in pink and mauve, the window frames bright green with their shutters
picked out in blue and brown, while above the window of the principal
room was a richly coloured and gilded floral design. The entrance
door, draped with green plush, cloth of gold and silver and a piece of
purple and green embroidery, and the chairs, upholstered in orange
and sky-blue velvet, made up a gorgeous whole, in which I felt rather
like a prisoner, as I had to retreat constantly to my apartment, pull
the shutters to, and sit in a dim twilight when the Chinese _Amban_ and
other callers arrived in state.
Guma is noted for its manufacture of paper, and we went to see the
process. The pale green lining of the bark of the mulberry is boiled
in great iron pots and ladled out upon broad stones, to be pulped by
wooden hammers. The mixture is then spread over canvas-filled frames
which are held under water during the operation, and afterwards set
upright in the open air to dry, when sheets of a coarse whitish paper
about the size of foolscap can be pulled off the canvas. This paper is
mainly used for packing; if needed for writing, it is rubbed with glass
to glaze it.
As the oasis is rich in mulberry trees it produces a considerable
amount of silk; but Khotan is the chief centre of this profitable
industry. The women tend the silkworms.
The soil of Guma is so sandy that the inhabitants cannot build the
usual mud-houses, but are obliged to have recourse to wattle-and-daub
structures, composed of a framework of sticks plastered inside and out
with a mixture that is for ever dropping off in flakes, thereby giving
to these dwellings a most unsubstantial air. I noticed that in the
cemeteries the graves were marked by tall withered saplings, to denote
the sites when they are covered up by the all-pervading sand.
The time of our visit coincided with the _Mizan_ or Equinox, which is
supposed to mark the close of the hot weather, and the “kindly fruits
of the earth” were nearly ready for the harvest. The cotton crop was
being gathered, its bursting pods lying on the ground; the handsome
man-high maize and millet were yellowing, and we revelled in delicious
corn cobs, boiled and then smeared with butter and sprinkled with salt,
as I had learned to eat them in Canada. We were also given another
vegetable, the roots of the lotus, which the Chinese look upon as a
delicacy; but it did not appeal to my taste. The pomegranates were a
glorious scarlet and the many varieties of grapes were in their prime;
the melons, peaches and nectarines had passed their zenith.
On the evening before we left Guma our servants, together with the
various travellers who had attached themselves to our party, organized
an entertainment. There was much singing, the performers yelling at
the top of their voices, accompanied by a thrumming of _sitars_, a
thudding of drums and a squealing of pipes. Three of the men executed
a pantomime dance, one being disguised as a woman, another as an old
man, and the third, a handsome young fellow, having no make-up at all.
All three went round in a circle one after the other with curious steps
and much waving of arms, the play being based on the well-known theme
of the girl-wife snatched from an old husband by her youthful lover. I
felt rather like an Oriental woman as I watched the show from behind
a curtain, and was amused to hear later that I was considered to be
a model of discreet behaviour because I had not attended any of the
Chinese banquets.
It was rather disturbing at night to hear the Chinese watchman going
his rounds, beating two sticks together as an assurance to the citizens
that he was guarding them faithfully, but I fancy that he and his
colleagues were of the Dogberry type and would probably pretend not to
notice were any devilry afoot.
Although we saw very little veiling after we had left Yarkand, this
Mohamedan custom prevailing less and less the nearer we approached
China, the women were extremely nervous at our approach, having seldom
or never seen Europeans. They would rush in all directions, hiding
their faces in the long cotton shawls which they wore over their heads,
and would vanish like rabbits into their mud hovels, giving me the
queer sense of being watched by legions of eyes as we rode through
the mean bazars. There were many public eating-houses in this part of
the world, with Chinese painted screens to hide the customers seated
behind them, and with gaily coloured pictures on the walls. The food
was cooked in big cauldrons in full view of the public, and I was
told that the restaurant-keepers, who are Tunganis (Chinese Moslems)
usually become rich, especially in one district, where both men and
women take all their meals in public. As a rule no payment is demanded
until six months have elapsed, and then mine host goes round to collect
his debts, with the not uncommon result that greedy folk who have
partaken too lavishly of the seven dishes provided are obliged to sell
their property in order to pay up. Fuel is certainly a heavy item for
the poor, who use it only for cooking and not to heat their houses;
therefore these restaurants, if used with discretion, ought to make for
economy.
During this journey the weather as a rule was perfect--fresh in the
morning and evening, quite cold at night, and only during the middle
of the day uncomfortably hot. I felt as if I were on a riding-tour
and picnic combined, so little of the discomforts of travel did we
experience, the supply question being easy and our servants doing their
work with scarcely a hitch. At night we generally slept in the open air
under our mosquito nets, and when the full moon rode across the heavens
I was often obliged to bandage my eyes to shut out the brilliant light.
It was on our march between Sang-uya and Pialma that the desert, for
once, showed itself in an unamiable mood. The morning was fine when we
left our comfortable quarters in a Chinese country house, and we soon
entered the region of sand-dunes, our horses racing up and down them
with much spirit, though the loose sand made the going very heavy.
We stopped a picturesque party of wayfarers with their donkeys in
order to photograph them, and gave them money for their trouble. They
posed themselves and their animals as my brother directed, but when
we had finished they remarked that they had expected to be shot, as
they imagined the camera to be some kind of firearm! Not unnaturally
I thought that this was a joke on their part, but later on we passed
a company of beggars, and my brother took a group consisting of a
wild-looking woman leading an ox and a man wearing a red leather
sugar-loaf hat. I noticed that the latter clasped his hands in an
attitude of entreaty as he stood perfectly motionless beside the
animal, and when he received his douceur he burst into speech, saying
with many exclamations that he had verily believed that his last hour
had come. These incidents gave me a glimpse of the docile spirit of the
race, and partly explained why the inhabitants of Chinese Turkestan
have nearly always been ruled by a succession of foreign masters. They
are small cultivators and petty shopkeepers, taking little interest
in anything outside their immediate circle, and their life seems to
destroy initiative and independence, thus rendering the task of their
Chinese rulers easy.
The morning breeze that blew in our faces was pleasant enough at
first, but gradually turned into a gale, which raised the sand in such
great clouds that the sun and sky were obscured with a yellow haze. In
spite of my veil and blue goggles the grit whipped my face and eyes
as we galloped our fastest in order to reach our destination before
matters grew worse. The horses were much excited, being as anxious as
we were to escape from the whirling sand, and it was annoying when
the grey broke loose from the rider who was leading him and cantered
off until we nearly lost sight of him in the thick haze. A couple of
men did their best to head him back, while the rest of us waited, my
chestnut screaming loudly and plunging violently in his eagerness to
join in the chase. The grey behaved in the usual provoking manner
of horses on the loose, circling round and round us, almost letting
himself be caught, and then galloping off a short distance before he
returned to coquet with the other horses. Finally my brother made a
lucky snatch at the trailing halter, and off we went faster than ever,
noting with thankfulness _potai_ after _potai_ as they loomed up out
of the blinding dust. Suddenly a change occurred that seemed almost
like magic. We plunged into a tree-bordered lane with fields of maize
stretching on either side, while overhead the clear blue sky seemed
free from every particle of dust. I looked back at the whirling yellow
inferno from which we had escaped, and in a few minutes thankfully
dismounted in a large garden with irrigation channels through which
the water flowed with a faint delicious splashing. Here our tents were
in readiness, pitched under shady trees, and hot tea was brought that
served a double purpose; for we found it a soothing lotion for our sore
eyes as well as grateful to our parched throats.
The waggons, which had done this last stage during the night, left
again at five o’clock in the afternoon, as the horses would be forced
to do a double stage of some thirty miles, with no water obtainable
on the road. But the animals had had thirteen hours’ rest and the
going was good for the first part of the way, so we hoped they would
be able to manage it. We ourselves were to break the stage at Ak
Langar, some fourteen miles away, and rest there for four hours before
undertaking the remainder of the march, which, we were told, was a
continuous series of lofty sand-dunes. Accordingly, after our evening
meal we mounted at seven o’clock, and leaving the little oasis, rode
off under the full moon across an absolutely barren gravelly desert.
We were told that some years before our visit a governor of Khotan had
placed posts at intervals along this stage, upon which lamps were hung
and lighted on dark nights. Unluckily this benefactor, a _rara avis_
among officials, failing to keep his finances in order, was dismissed
from his post and was now dragging out a precarious existence in the
Chinatown of Kashgar.
We of course stood in no need of lanterns, but in spite of the
moonlight the desert seemed rather eerie, and our horses, unaccustomed
to night marches, were curiously nervous and suddenly shied at some
dark moving shapes that turned out to be camels grazing on the scanty
tamarisk scrub. A little farther on they were startled by a large
dog, which we disturbed at its meal on a dead ass, and here and there
the moon gleamed on the white bones of deceased pack-animals that lay
beside the track. I am not ashamed to confess that I should not have
cared to ride this stage alone, and I did not wonder that the peasants
whom we passed driving laden donkeys were always in large parties.
After a while we came to a ruined _potai_, against which a rough
post was leaning, and learnt that this was the boundary between the
districts of Kargalik and Khotan. We were therefore in the Kingdom of
Jade, and our horses, having become used to their novel experience,
trotted along briskly in the keen night air, pricking their ears and
hastening whenever they espied the remains of a deserted serai sharply
silhouetted in the moonlight; for they were as anxious for their
night’s rest as I was.
With the exception I have mentioned there were no _potais_ to mark this
particular route, so I had not the pleasing sensation of knowing that
two and a quarter miles were accomplished whenever we passed one, and
was feeling extremely sleepy, when a black mass of building seemed to
rear up suddenly ahead of us. It was just upon midnight, and I was most
thankful to dismount and pass into a serai built of hewn stone, the
welcome cleanliness of its rooms being due to the fact that practically
no one halted there, owing to the lack of water. Yet the first sight
that met my eyes was a man drawing up a bucket from a well by means
of a windlass; but Jafar Bai explained that the water was bitter and
harmful to horses.
The natives had given us such alarming accounts of the difficulties
of the latter part of the stage that, tired as we all were, we were
allowed to sleep for only four hours, and it seemed to me as if I had
hardly closed my eyes when Sattur roused me. He brought a lighted
candle by which I dressed; for my room had no window and opened on to
the public courtyard, and a fat pigeon, disturbed by the light, flopped
down from the rafters and fluttered feebly round and round until I let
it out.
When we rode off in the crisp air of the early morning we were
surprised to find that for some miles ahead of us the road lay across
a gravelly plain that made excellent going for horses and baggage
waggons. Close to the serai four huge vultures were feeding on the
remains of a dead camel, and the loathsome birds were so gorged that
on the approach of our party they could only with difficulty flap or
hobble away for a few feet; they watched us until we had passed and
then returned to their interrupted meal. How horrible it must be for
a dying animal to be ringed about with these birds biding their time,
or even fastening on their prey before life is extinct! Owing to the
recent storm the atmosphere was unusually clear, and we enjoyed the
somewhat rare experience of seeing the lower slopes of the Kuen-lun
range, the existence of which was not even mentioned by Marco Polo,
presumably on account of its invisibility, which is notorious.
After a while we rode among low sand-dunes curved and ribbed by the
wind, and then crossed a high ridge that was more like a low hill
than a dune and must have meant a stiff pull for even our five-horse
_arabas_. Below its crest stood a couple of wooden posts, signifying
that we had reached the boundary of the famous _Kaptar Mazzar_ or
Pigeon Shrine, where all good Moslems must dismount to approach the
sacred spot on foot. There in the midst of the sand lay a graveyard
marked by poles on which hung fluttering rags and bits of sheepskin,
and near by was a tiny mosque with fretted wooden door and window
and some low buildings, the roofs of which were crowded with grey
pigeons. Legend has it that _Imam_ Shakir Padshah, trying to convert
the Buddhist inhabitants of the country to Islam by the drastic agency
of the sword, fell here in battle against the army of Khotan and was
buried in the little cemetery. It is affirmed that two doves flew forth
from the heart of the dead saint and became the ancestors of the swarms
of sacred pigeons that we saw. Our arrival caused a stir among them
and a great cloud rose up, with a tremendous whirring of wings, and
some settled upon the maize that our party flung upon the ground as an
offering.
The guardian of the shrine, in long blue coat and white turban, left
his study of the Koran and, accompanied by his little scarlet-clad
daughter, hurried to meet us. My brother asked them to attract their
charges to the graveyard, where he wished to photograph them; but
unluckily the holy birds entirely declined to be enticed in that
direction, paying no attention to the grain flung lavishly or to the
voice of the _mulla_. They merely wheeled round and round in lessening
circles until they descended on to the roofs of the pigeon-houses; for
they were sated with the offerings of the Faithful and extremely fat.
It might be thought that these birds, which are supposed to eat their
own weight daily, would be a menace to the crops of the neighbouring
Zawa oasis, but fortunately food is so abundant at home that they
hardly leave the vicinity of the shrine. They are certainly highly
favoured; for we were told that if a hawk were to venture to attack
them it would fall down dead in the act!
[Illustration: THE PIGEON SHRINE. _Page 206._]
We visited the sheds fitted with flat nests of basket work, on many
of which were fluffy yellow fledglings, and beams were laid from wall
to wall on which the birds could perch. As may be imagined, the smell
and dirt deterred me from taking more than a glance at this pigeon
sanctuary; but our servants had no such qualms, and probably felt
that the longer they stayed the more merit would accrue to them. Sir
Aurel Stein shows that the legend about these pigeons is merely a
variant of Hiuen Tsiang’s story of the sacred golden-haired rats, to
whose burrowings the pilgrim attributed the conical sand-dunes that
lie round this spot. The province, so the narrative runs, was invaded
by a barbarian host that encamped close to the mounds thrown up by
the creatures, whose aid the King of Khotan invoked in his despair.
During the night a huge rat came to him in a vision, promising him
success, and on the morrow, when the men of Khotan fell upon the
enemy, they gained an easy victory, because the rats had gnawed the
harness of the horses, the fastenings of the armour and the bowstrings
of the invaders. From that day the miraculous rodents were accorded
high honour: a temple was erected in the midst of the dunes, in which
sacrifices were offered to them and where all who passed by worshipped
and brought gifts, misfortunes falling upon those who neglected to do
so. The pigeon has now taken the place of the rat of Buddhist legend in
the minds of these primitive people, with whom tradition dies hard.
When we left the shrine we were prepared to cope with the gigantic
dunes that we had been warned to expect; but, not for the first time,
we grasped the inaccuracy of most of the statements made by the
natives, there being only two or three somewhat difficult places for
waggons. At the foot of the sandy waste in which the _Mazzar_ stood was
a stretch of reed-covered marshy ground, watered by a wide stream alive
with water-fowl, beyond which flocks were grazing. We soon saw ahead
of us the remarkably lofty weeping-willows of Zawa, and fetched up
finally at a small garden beyond the village, where we found our tents
ready pitched under the trees and were all thankful for a good rest and
a general tidying up, in anticipation of our entry into Khotan on the
morrow.