CHINESE TURKESTAN: THE TEKKES TO KASHGAR
We found that there had been a great deal of friction between the
Punjabi and Kashmiri elements in Cherrie’s caravan. Fortunately,
matters did not reach too acute a point before we joined them. Upon
going into the matter we learned that the Punjabis in coming with us
had undertaken a separate mission that had become generally known,
and it rendered their continuance with us impossible. They were
excellent men and we parted with very friendly feeling on both sides.
Cherrie had been sick during the two months that had passed since
we left Yarkand. A long-drawn-out bout of dysentery had dragged him
down and greatly hampered him in collecting, but his usual pluck had
pulled him through.
Suydam had done a great amount of work with his Akeley camera, and
was particularly satisfied with what he had taken since coming into
the Tian Shan, for he had made pictures of almost every phase of
Kirghiz, Kalmuk, and Kazak life. The few days which he had put in
hunting had proved amazingly lucky. On the second morning he came
upon a she bear and two well-grown cubs—the adult he brought down,
but the young ones disappeared into the forest. This gave us a male
and a female bear for mounting in the museum. The following day
he saw a large boar. His rifle had acquired a habit of hopelessly
jamming, so that it could not be counted upon with any certainty for
more than a single shot. In addition the rear sight had been knocked
off and was only tied on with string. He took his Kazak shikarry’s
rifle and fired a couple of times at the boar without result. The
boar disappeared into a patch of jungle and after it hurried the
Kazak. He killed it with a well-placed shot. Suydam said that he had
never seen any animal so fat, and Cherrie estimated the weight at 400
pounds.
Ted and I were now preoccupied with the unromantic task of filling
out the groups for the museum with the requisite number of females
and young. When one is not hunting an animal, it always seems so much
more common and easily attainable. You watch a female ibex and think
how simple it would be to shoot one, without, of course, considering
an actual stalk and visualizing the difficulties. Then when you are
stalking a ram, and a herd of ewes intervenes, you say to yourself
how easy it would be if only it were ewes that were in demand. When,
however, you set off in cold earnest to shoot a ewe, it is not long
before you begin to swing around, and wonder whether, after all, it
isn’t just as difficult to bring in a female as a male. A long stalk
after a female ibex seems much more wearisome, for there is not
the same incentive that makes the hard work light. In the accepted
ethics of the big-game hunter, there is quite rightly nothing to be
proud of in bagging a female, but when you are engaged in scientific
collecting the female is of equal importance.
We were much concerned over the prospects for shooting a hind wapiti.
We had seen only two; they were running through spruce woods, and the
bullets I sent after them were without effect. The upper Mointai was
regarded as likely ground, and we planned to have as many strings to
our bow as circumstances would permit. Many hunters, when they have
wounded an animal and it makes off over particularly rough country,
will give a gun to a native shikarry and tell him to follow and
finish their quarry; this neither Ted nor I would ever do, so the men
were much surprised when we not only did not object to their shooting
the group females, but even offered them a reward for so doing. To
begin with, they could not understand why we wanted females. We soon
gave up trying to explain, and although we thought that Rahima had
grasped the situation, our faith was somewhat shaken when he insisted
that if we only waited until we were back in Kashmir we could without
any difficulty secure several female barasingh which would serve
admirably to fill out the wapiti group! Our first attempt after
joining Cherrie and Suydam took the form of a very loosely organized
drive. It was a lovely day, and the smell of the spruce woods took
one back to distant lands and times. On the way out we caught sight
of half a dozen black cock, and Ted brought one down with Cherrie’s
shotgun. The only thing in the drive was a female illik which passed
by Suydam’s stand and was bagged by Ted. We were in need of it, but
there were many around and we had not been at all preoccupied over
the difficulties of shooting one. We saw no recent wapiti sign, which
was disheartening, for the local Kazaks had felt that they were
taking us to their best hunting-ground.
We next went with them to a ridge in the heart of what they
considered their best spying land, and we raked the ravine side with
our field-glasses, without picking up anything save illik. Two buck
were calling; Ted first heard illik calling at Khan Ayalik about the
first of September. We had been told that wapiti started about the
same time, but this the Kazaks denied, assuring us that they did
not begin until the third week in September, and they certainly had
not begun when we left the Tekkes around the middle of the month.
Discouraged with our failure to find any wapiti sign, we decided to
move to Akyas as our last chance.
Cherrie went down to the junction of the Mointai and the Tekkes
rivers to put in his last few days collecting in the valley, while
Ted, Suydam, and I rode across the rolling prairie to Akyas.
Somewhere about half-way we dipped down into a grassy ravine
apparently quite like any one of a dozen others through which we
had passed. We noticed that the drop was more abrupt, and caught
the sound of falling water. We found ourselves in a fairy dingle. A
profound and cool cavern, rock-walled and partly screened by tall
trees, concealed a deep, clear pool of water, fed by a sizable stream
that descended in a shimmery mass through a hole in the rocky roof.
Through the hole we glimpsed a patch of blue sky, but within the
grotto all was cool and dark. On the grass beneath the trees was
charred wood remaining from Kazak fires. We hoped it would be many
a day before civilization invades the country and the cavern is
strewn with papers and empty sardine cans. What served to make the
whole scene particularly refreshing was the unexpectedness of it as
we rode unsuspectingly over the plains. The natives call the place
Keerkool-douk.
At Akyas we renewed acquaintance with the Russian family and the
cheerful small baby, upon whom we bestowed more of the great, gaudy
buttons we bought in Paris.
We found that most of the men were down in the valley, making ready
the winter supply of hay, a primitive process with sickle and scythe.
We managed, however, to gather together a few hunting Kazaks and
Kirghiz, among them the two men who had been with Suydam when he shot
his bear. Next morning early, taking supplies for a few days, we set
off up the Akyas valley, crossing a rough mountain shoulder, where
the river had cut its way in a deep and lovely canyon. Above, we
followed the widened valley until we came upon a rocky stream which
tumbled down into the Akyas from its left bank. A short distance
up this tributary we pitched camp amid some tall spruce-trees.
Rousslia picked a lot of red berries with a leaf very much like our
strawberries. He made them into an excellent shortcake for dinner.
We had no feeling at all about who should shoot the female wapiti. It
was a very necessary part of the museum group, but it was essential
that we should make all speed possible in order to reach the Pamirs
before it became too cold to hunt ovis poli, and we were quite ready
to have the maral bagged by Kazak or Kirghiz. We therefore divided
up into four groups for the hunting. Suydam took a Kazak; Khalil,
to whom I lent my second rifle, went with another Kazak, two more
went by themselves, while Ted and I went with Rahima and one native.
In addition we offered a reward of about ten dollars to any one who
would bring in a maral.
The first hunt proved blank, for although Ted and I saw a couple
of wapiti, the wind was gusty, and they were off before we had any
chance for a stalk. One of the other groups saw a wapiti but got no
shot.
Next morning we were away before daylight, and rode our ponies up
toward the mountain tops rimming the valley. Leaving the horses for
the long day’s doze, we climbed from one vantage-point to another,
conning the hillsides and valleys with our field-glasses. Except for
a few illik, we saw no game. At one spot an interesting engagement
took place close to where I was sitting. A magpie was perched in
the top of a tall spruce-tree, chattering away and admiring itself
in the usual jaunty manner, when all of a sudden its tone changed
and it fluttered hastily over to another dead spruce whose whitened
branches were closely matted together. Simultaneously the shadow of
a hawk flashed across the rocks. He was a brown fellow but little
larger than the magpie. Down he swooped toward the magpie’s refuge,
but the branches were too thick. The chattering magpie hopped through
them to the other side of the tree. Round went the hawk, and another
fruitless dive followed. This went on for some time; the hawk circled
about in the most graceful of curves; now head down, now banking, now
shooting up. He must have stooped more than a dozen times, and twice
he made a pretense of leaving in order to entice out the magpie. The
latter did not seem particularly frightened; its cry was not one of
alarm, and as soon as the hawk had really left, he returned to his
original perch upon the solitary tree. He was not destined to enjoy
it long, for almost immediately two brother magpies came and drove
him incontinently away.
The long noon hours when no game was stirring I passed in reading I
and II Samuel.
In the afternoon we separated, Ted and Rahima going one way, while I
took the Kazak Zeytoon and went in the other. We climbed cautiously
along an accidented wooded ridge, and had not gone far when, upon
reaching the top of a small hill, we saw an illik doe taking her
siesta on the far side. We watched her for some time before she
even became suspicious. As she jumped to her feet, every motion
was an epitome of grace. A few bounds and she stood stock-still.
We were careful not to frighten her, for she might alarm whatever
was ahead. When she was out of sight, we heard several loud, sharp
barks. “Maral, maral,” whispered Zeytoon. I thought it was the illik,
but Zeytoon insisted it was a wapiti. Topping another rise we again
sighted the illik, this time in the act of barking. It seemed a very
loud noise to come from so small an animal.
For an hour we held on along the ridge; I had dropped ten
yards behind, studying some tracks, when I heard Zeytoon hiss;
simultaneously there was a crashing below him on the mountainside.
Running on, I caught a glimpse of a wapiti through the scrub willow
and spruce. I opened fire immediately, but it was difficult sighting
at the maral’s fleeting shape through the trees. I was able to get in
six or seven shots before she got where I could no longer see her.
I felt that I had scored one hit, at least, but Zeytoon was certain
I had not. He was so positive that my own belief was badly shaken.
Nevertheless, I determined to take a chukker to where I had last seen
the wapiti. Before doing so I went on to a lookout point that I had
picked out before Zeytoon stirred up the wapiti. Seeing nothing, I
returned and dragged a very reluctant Zeytoon down through the fallen
timber and the débris of landslides. It was bad going and took time.
Farther down we separated to better pick up the trail. Not long after
this Zeytoon shouted “She is hit!” and almost simultaneously “Here
she is!” I was as much pleased as if it had been a stag. The man who
has done all his shooting as a sportsman only, thinks of shooting
females much as a man in a fox-hunting country feels regarding any
one shooting foxes. But if you have done much scientific work for
museums, you come to feel very differently about the distaff side of
the groups, and when after a long stalk you bag a female, you have a
genuine feeling of satisfaction. I set to work on the measuring and
skinning, while Zeytoon went to try and find Ted and Rahima, near
where they had agreed to meet us. When he came back with them they
were almost as pleased as I had been. To Rahima in particular it
spelled a speedy termination of the Tian Shan hunting, and a chance
to get into the Pamirs before it became too desperately cold.
Zeytoon set to work with a will to help in the skinning. First he
grabbed my rifle and dipped it into the bullet wound, a primitive
custom that I had met with among the natives in Africa and Brazil. In
pulling off the skin from the back, he seized a fold in his teeth
while working with both hands. With such measures we were soon ready,
but it was half past seven before we stumbled into camp. None of the
other expeditions had seen wapiti, except for Ted. He would have had
a shot at a maral had I not fired when I did. She was feeding slowly
toward him and would have soon been within close range. On hearing my
shooting, she disappeared in a moment. He also saw a male wapiti, an
eight-pointer, and could have had a good chance at him had he wished.
We had had amazingly good luck with our wapiti. Ted had seen three
male and five female wapiti; I had seen one male and five females.
Four of the females we had seen while hunting together, so all told
we had seen ten wapiti during the week we had been hunting them.
[Illustration: A KALMUCK WEDDING]
Next morning early we marched back to Akyas, and, picking up the
balance of our caravan, shoved on into Shutta, a long trek. On the
way we passed through the Kalmuk encampment at Aksu. A wedding was
about to take place, and all the inhabitants, gaily dressed, dashed
out upon their ponies. The bride was shrouded in a sheet, and was
riding double, held on the horse by a man whom we were told was her
father. Two girls carried a red banner fastened on a couple of tall
poles. The gaudy head-dress of the women, the brilliant coats and
sashes of the men, the shouting and singing, the wheeling ponies,
all combined to make a lively scene. Ted watched them through his
field-glasses as they rode off down the plains toward the Tekkes.
He saw the women and men divide into different groups, and then the
carrying off of the bride was enacted, for her husband dashed in
among the women and seized her and bore her away on his horse.
A group of Kazak graybeards whom we shortly afterward met amused us.
There were six of them, and each held a small grandson in front of
him on the saddle; the children were, some of them, scarcely more
than a year old, chubby and solemn. We had seen similar cavalcades
before; verily the children are brought up on horseback!
At Shutta our friend the Dauran came out to greet us. Cherrie had
dressed the abscess in his back, cleaning it out and putting powdered
calomel into it. The treatment, although both novel and drastic,
had been most successful and he was now well. He did his best to
persuade us to stay over a few days in Shutta, and when we with
much difficulty convinced him of the impossibility of our doing so,
he said that he would come on with us as escort next day. All the
soldiers wished their photographs taken, and Loya brought out his two
pretty wives and his roly-poly son. There was a young illik in one
of the compounds, very friendly and wandering everywhere at will.
He was, however, not so eager to pose for his portrait as were the
soldiers.
We planned to complete the ibex group at Khan Ayalik. We did not
have the same concern about our ability to do so as in the case of
the wapiti. We felt reasonably certain that with some hard climbing
and lucky shooting we could secure the female and young without
unreasonable delay. It was on the 13th of September, Ted’s birthday,
that we set off for the mountain tops—Ted, Suydam, and myself, with
Khalil and two Kirghiz. Rahima stayed in camp to pack the skins and
horns for the crossing of the Muzart glacier.
We went up along one of the side glaciers where Rahima and I had
put in our first day after ibex. The elapsed six weeks had wrought
great changes; there was more snow on the mountains and the flowers
had almost completely disappeared. We were not long in picking up a
herd of females; they were well up among the rocks and the wind was
tricky, necessitating a long détour and a good deal of climbing. I
had had an attack of fever hanging over me for the last three days;
with the help of plenty of quinine I had managed to head it off, but
I was not feeling up to much.
[Illustration: THROUGH THE MUZART GLACIER]
It was impossible to get within good range, and the nearest animals
were 250 yards distant when at last we were in a position to fire. We
had spread out behind a ridge, and though the range was long, fortune
favored us so that when we came to count heads we had a half-grown
male, two females, and two young. This topped off our big males
and gave us a really admirable group. We got the measuring and
skinning finished with all despatch, but it was well after dark
before we reached camp.
We found Cherrie waiting for us; he had had a most successful few
days collecting along the banks of the Tekkes. Ted now took over the
small-mammal trapping, and until we again separated at Maralbashi,
every night, no matter how late we got to camp, nor how rainy and
cold it might be, he set out twenty traps. Often he would have to
take with him a lantern when he was laying out the line, but in spite
of it all he added much exceedingly valuable and interesting material
to the collection.
Ted and I had worn shorts throughout the whole trip; they give
free action for the knee and help immensely where there is much
climbing to be done. Your knees soon become so tough that they are
as impervious to cold, as is your face. We each had flannel shirts
and leathern waistcoats, and I wore a canvas coat with many pockets,
for I always carry a varied assortment of odds and ends with me when
I am hunting. The best footgear for mountain work is the grass shoe;
with it you can walk more noiselessly and surely than with anything
else, but unfortunately its life is too short to make it practicable,
except when you are in its home country. I wore Kashmir chuplies—a
heavy sandal over a light leathern sock—a good deal, and found them
satisfactory except when they got wet; then they slipped about from
under your foot and were worse than nothing. They had another
disadvantage in that small stones often became wedged in between
the sock and the sandal. I had brought with me a pair of boots with
corrugated rubber soles. Hitherto no rubber shoe had lasted me long
when hunting, and I placed but little confidence in these. The soles
usually ripped off before long. This time I was agreeably surprised,
for these crepe-soled shoes stood up admirably under the roughest
kind of treatment. They were noiseless and gave a good grip upon rock
and hillside. In headgear we had made several shifts. From Srinagar
the whole way to Aksu we wore helmets, for of course they are the
only thing to wear when you have reason to fear the “sun overhead.”
Thereafter for the marching we adopted the Kashmiri puggree, or
turban; very comfortable and much more suited than a helmet for
travel in an araba. While hunting, Ted wore a balaclava helmet, and I
had an old corduroy cap which Mr. P. B. Van der Byl had given me in
London. We had been indebted to him for much friendly advice and help
drawn from his store of experience gathered in the big-game haunts of
every quarter of the globe.
[Illustration: THEODORE ROOSEVELT and KERMIT ROOSEVELT IN TIAN SHAN
HUNTING-KIT]
On the 14th of September we crossed the Muzart Pass, a very different
crossing from that we had made on the 2d of August. Now we had
glorious weather, with the bright sunshine dancing on the snowy
peaks and ice ridges. We were evidently in the height of the caravan
season. On the way from Shutta we had wound through three great
flocks of sheep, totalling 3,000 head. The buyers came from Aksu and
bought on the hoof, hiring the wild Kalmuk and Kazak herdsmen to
drive the animals over the passes. We also saw a big herd of ponies,
and innumerable caravans of donkeys. These later seemed to have
the preference as pack-animals on this route. The little beasts in
the main were loaded with great bales of cotton and cloth and felt
numdahs. We passed over the long glacier without incident, although
there were a number of moments when it looked as if we would lose a
pony; one in particular I made sure had fallen into a crevasse, but
he recovered himself in miraculous fashion. A cold rain set in just
as we reached the other side, but we soon had our tents up and could
retire into them with the comfortable feeling that the Muzart Pass
lay behind us.
Next day we continued down the Muzart River on the opposite side from
that we had ascended, for all was changed here as well as on the
pass, and we had no longer dangerous fords to deal with. We spent our
first night at Khailak, where I was very busy going over the last lot
of ibex skins and putting all the additional touches that you never
seem to finish to your own satisfaction. We went on past the Chinese
wall where we had previously pitched our camp and stopped at the
little village of Kizil Bulak. As we arrived, a cheerful little Beg
came up to greet us. He had come with us as a passenger from Yarkand
to Aksu and brought us out our mail to Jam when we were going into
the Tian Shan. Once again Sadi, for that was his name, appeared in
the rôle of Mercury, and never was more welcome than when he produced
a great packet of letters from the folds of his robes. According to
invariable custom, everything else stopped happening as suddenly as
it had in the palace of the sleeping Princess, while each took his
letters and retired to the nearest shady spot to read them. When you
are off on a hunting trip, especially in a far country, the really
formidable fly in the ointment is your continuous anxiety as to how
things are going with your family at home, and letters help immensely
even if they do not bring you very close to date. We could not have
been any farther away or more cut off from communication than we had
been. I had tried using the Chinese telegraph-line, sending a message
to a friend in Peking and asking him to relay it to New York. My
telegram took eighteen days to get from Aksu to Peking!
Another old friend who rode in to see us was Ismail Bey, the big
local landowner, who had helped us so greatly on our way over into
the Tekkes. We were genuinely glad to see him again, for he is a fine
fellow. Our men always pronounced Bey as Boy, and referred to Ismail
as Big Boy, in contradistinction to a Bey from Khan Ayalik who had
come across with us. The latter they called Little Boy. At first we
were much puzzled as to whom they meant by Big and Little Boy. The
confusion further increased when by a process of elision Ismail Bey’s
name was made to sound as if it were Small Boy.
In the morning we rode over with Ismail Bey to his little oasis,
where he lived in a true patriarchal style with a stalwart old father
and numerous brothers and sisters. The buildings were many and well
kept. We would like to have accepted his invitation and stayed a few
days with him. He had a big hooded eagle which we would have been
glad to see in action, but time pressed far too heavily to admit of
delaying. Ismail gave us a very fine riding pony, for he did not
approve of the one that I was riding, and when we parted we gave him
Ted’s Springfield, for he was now using his Hoffman entirely.
The Bey came on to Arbat with us, in order to arrange a
goitred-gazelle hunt. We were eager to get a group of the graceful
little creatures for the museum, provided it did not entail too much
time.
We had heard that there were a few sheep in the hills near by.
Church, in his book, mentioned seeing three; we had not been so
fortunate, but when Cherrie had come through he also had seen three
and Cutting had gone after them. We would have given much to have
had two weeks in which to hunt these sheep and determine just what
they were. There is a most interesting field open in the study of
the great Asiatic sheep. Some one should follow them straight down
from where they are found near northern Mongolia not far from Peking
to the Altai Mountains, the home of the ovis ammon typica, and then
throughout the length of the Tian Shan range, where there are the
Karelini and very probably one, or possibly two, undescribed species.
Next he should go to the Pamirs, collecting Littledale’s sheep on
the way, and after getting ovis poli finish with ovis ammon hodgsoni
in Changchemmo and western Tibet. It would indeed be an interesting
study to trace the intergradations, from the great wide-spreading
horns of the poli to the heavy close-curled head of the ammon typica.
Ismail Bey had arranged a drive for gazelle in the foot-hills, so
early in the morning we rode down to our stations. Four men did
the driving. Three does came by me travelling like the wind, and I
knocked one of them over at a very close range.
We tried another drive but nothing came through, so Ted and I
separated and started off across the plains to hunt our way toward
Jam, whither the caravan had preceded us. We each of us saw about a
dozen gazelle, but they were exceedingly wary. I don’t believe I got
within 800 yards of one of them. At that distance they would start
moving off, with gradually increasing speed, and to follow them was
but a vexation of the spirit. Unless for the luck of a chance shot,
the most likely place to hunt them would be in the foot-hills, where
you would have some hope for a stalk. The heat-waves shimmered and
danced over the barren rocky floor of the desert, but as I got down
to the oasis the twilight was coming on, and in its magical fashion
lending an austere charm to even the bleak country through which I
was riding.
Another day brought us to Aksu, where we were greeted by our friend
the Dotai. He pressed us to stay over for four or five days, but we
were adamant, and compromised on invitations by asking him to dine
with us, and agreeing to breakfast with him in the morning, and leave
immediately afterward on our trek to Kashgar. Both affairs were as
pleasant as possible. The Dotai was much interested in the ibex and
sheep heads, and we dispensed with interpreters as much as we could
by using the sign-and-sound language, which Ted supplemented by
drawing pictures of the events of the chase, to the great delight
of all our friends. When we told of the bear-hunt the Dotai growled
and waved his hands most dramatically. At another time, in order
to explain the nature of the soup we were having at his breakfast,
he flapped his hands and quacked. Altogether every one had a fine
time, and the Dotai took particular pleasure before the breakfast in
showing us over his flower-garden, where there was every imaginable
flower, most of them in full bloom. In one corner of the garden
there was a Yarkand stag in a pen, a handsome animal but distinctly
short-tempered, in which it was quite different from another Yarkand
stag that had been brought around to our camp in the hope that we
might buy it. This last was tame and friendly, although its horns
were just coming out of the velvet, and at that time stags are
usually in bad humor. We were told of the different localities in
which these deer had been caught, and our informants spoke as if they
were in no way uncommon. Once more we wished we had a couple of extra
weeks in hand.
Some of our Shutta bodyguard had accompanied us to Aksu. They were
a far finer, more soldierly lot than any we met with on the plains.
Our men referred to them as “Peking” men, although of the two best
soldiers we had in the Tian Shan, one was a Kirghiz, and the other,
although he called himself Chinese, his “father’s father knew it
not.” Calling them “Peking” men reminded me of how Father found the
Indians with whom he hunted in the Cœur d’Alene region in Idaho still
calling Americans “Boston men,” in contradistinction to the Canadian
trappers who were French.
We couldn’t get away from Aksu until one o’clock in the afternoon
of the 12th of September, but the evening of the 24th found us at
Maralbashi. If you load your arabas not too heavily, you get across
the country surprisingly speedily. We had a fairly large assortment
of books with us, but the only good araba books were Cumberland’s
“Sport in the Pamirs” and Ted’s copy of “Omar Khayyam.” In all the
other books the print was too fine. Naturally enough, when you
select books for a hunting trip, size is a primary consideration, and
size and large type rarely go together. I found Green’s Hindustanee
Grammar a good araba companion, for in studying you do not read so
closely and continuously. One can read and enjoy books in the wilds
which at home would never occur to you to take on. In this class we
put Meredith’s “Egoist,” a small pocket edition of which kept me in
reading matter for a number of weeks. When in addition to hunting
you are writing articles and preparing museum specimens, you have
not very much time to read. Our library covered a large range of
taste; in the Tian Shan I read, besides “The Egoist,” “Westward Ho,”
“Pickwick Papers,” “Jorrocks Jaunts,” and the “Romany Rye.” We had
brought two volumes of collected poems; one was Kipling and the other
Edwin Arlington Robinson. Into them we would constantly dip, and they
proved admirable companions. They never went back in the yakdans, but
travelled in our bedding-rolls.
We found many changes in the plains. Instead of the great heat at
midday, it was now only pleasantly warm, and marching was more
agreeable in consequence. There is a great abundance of fruit in
Turkestan. The apricot season had passed, but in its place were
peaches and grapes and delicious melons of many kinds. In addition to
the red-fleshed watermelon, there was one with yellow flesh. I could
detect little difference in taste. Then there were various sorts of
muskmelon. Every one was eating melons; we saw one small boy clad
in the altogether eating a huge slice. He was covered with a thick
coating of dust, and down his whole length the trickle of the juice
had ploughed deep furrows.
Along the roadside squatted melon venders, and our araba drivers
were continually purchasing the fruit and sharing the slices among
themselves. When we halted at some dreary little serai in the middle
of the desert, we greatly enjoyed the big watermelons.
In some of the gardens where we camped there were walnut-trees. The
nuts were now ripe, and our host would knock them from off the trees
for us.
One march short of Maralbashi we left Cherrie and Suydam to spend a
few days near some swampy lakes where we hoped they would add some
interesting material to the birds and small mammals already forming
the collection. This promised to be a long parting, for if all worked
out as planned, they would return through Russia, and we would next
meet in New York, a far cry from the swamps of Maralbashi.
In Maralbashi we changed a couple of our arabas and redistributed
the loads. We got there on a Thursday, which is market-day, and as
we rode in we passed swarms of peasants returning from the bazaar.
One mother was holding a small child on the saddle in front of her, a
larger one was astride the pony’s quarters, clasping his mother round
the waist for support. An old couple were driving in a donkey-cart,
the first we had seen, and built on the lines of an araba. Women
were trudging along with children strapped on their backs, nodding
and asleep after the excitement of market-day.
There was still a lot of life in the bazaar; it was just before the
regular night life had started, and belated knots of country people
yet lingered. Two old men were playing chess, with Chinese chessmen,
which are just like checker-men, and are distinguished one from
another by the ideographs carved on them. Sometimes you find fine
ivory sets, yellowed with age and use. The moves are much the same as
in the chess we play. An interested crowd of onlookers were offering
voluble advice.
We were eager to get through to Kashgar in four days, and to do so
called for daily marches of little short of forty miles. In the
Orient stray individuals have a way of attaching themselves to
caravans in the desire of making a journey with more security and
economy; they also enjoy the advantages of companionship, and can
sit up all night chattering and then sleep at odd moments during the
day, a practice to which the Oriental is much addicted. We still
had with us Sadi, the little Yarkandi; so far as we could find out
he was travelling around with us for amusement; he understood a
little Hindustanee and made himself useful in a thousand ways. He
was invariably bright and cheerful at the end of the longest march.
We had also a solemn Chinaman who had joined us at Shutta. He
was evidently a humorist in his way and was a source of continual
amusement. He had a very loud voice and would hop out of his araba
when any wrangle started, and they were not infrequent; with many
gesticulations and loud bellows he would champion whatever he took
to be our cause; but his entering in served only to prolong the
argument, so he would be hauled away and put back in his araba.
The trail from Maralbashi to Kashgar we found very hot and dusty.
There was much desert, some of it barren and stony, and some of it
covered with scrub-tamarisks. When you walked you sank ankle-deep in
dust; it felt as if you were treading on sponge-cake. Hair and beard
turned gray, and dust filled our bedding-rolls. We had a new moon and
toward night we would begin to enjoy the march, for desert and jungle
became mysterious and eerie by moonlight. We usually marched for
twelve or fourteen hours, unspanning for an hour or two at noonday.
At Faizabad, our halt the night before reaching Kashgar, a pleasant,
thin little Chinaman, the Amban, came to call, and greatly surprised
us by addressing us in English. He knew but a few words which he had
learned years before in Peking. He proved most considerate by staying
only a few minutes, for it was ten o’clock when we reached town and
we were ready for supper and bed.
Next morning we hired riding ponies in order to ride into
Kashgar ahead of the arabas, and while waiting for the horses
to be made ready I strolled through the bazaar; there were many
prosperous-looking shops. Hearing some singing, I loitered toward
it. A sturdy fakeer in a white-and-gold embroidered robe, with his
begging-bowl strapped to his waist, was striding along, followed
by his three sons, ranging in age from six to twelve. They were
well-set-up boys, cleanly dressed, and with snowy-white turbans.
Father and sons had nothing cringing about them, nor were they,
on the other hand, insolent; they appeared merely independent and
self-respecting. At almost every shop something was put into the
big bowl. What was most remarkable, however, was the singing; the
father sang the verse and the sons joined in the choruses. It was
totally unlike any Oriental music I have ever heard; indeed, the
whole sounded more like what Meredith describes as “one of those
majestic old Gregorian chants, that wherever you may hear them, seem
to build up cathedral walls about you.” There was a glorious swing to
it, which the father brought out, beating the cadence by the raising
and lowering of a muscular arm. I would have liked to have known the
history of the little band, but could learn nothing of it.
The muezzins were calling the faithful to prayer as we rode into
Kashgar. We were greeted by the Dotai and other Chinese officials,
who had a most elaborate tea prepared for us in a terraced garden
where stood the Dotai’s summer-house. Thence we went on to the
British Consulate, where Major and Mrs. Gillan welcomed us with an
understanding hospitality. I had known Gillan in Mesopotamia during
the war.
The bazaar in Kashgar proved far more interesting than that in
Yarkand. Thursday being market-day, the country folk thronged in
from miles around. The silk and cloth bazaar, all roofed over, was
gratefully cool. One could not help being struck with the handsome
features and dignified bearing of the venders as they sat among
their wares. The twisting alleyways of the boot bazaar were dim and
mysterious. Never have I seen so much footgear gathered into such a
small compass. The sellers were pursuing customers through the crowd,
endeavoring to persuade them to raise the purchase price which they
had offered. The hat bazaar seemed to hold enough caps to cover every
head in Turkestan; some of the caps were elaborately embroidered in
gold and fur-trimmed.
In leisurely fashion, as befitted the occasion, I wended my way
through the fruit and vegetable quarters and into the squares where
squatted the kabab-sellers, with chunks of mutton strung on small
skewers roasting over their charcoal fires. If you felt hungry you
silently selected a skewer, and, buying a piece of unleavened bread,
pulled off the meat and ate with the bread for plate. Roast ears of
corn were also popular.
It was in the job-lot bazaar that I lingered longest. Here was
spread out every imaginable thing: bits of broken iron, lovely jade
snuff-bottles, old tin cans, altar ornaments of the Buddhist faith,
long daggers with turquoise studded handles, empty cologne-bottles,
old Chinese locks, copper jugs of every shape, and a thousand and one
heterogeneous odds and ends.
At length I found my way to the Hukta, an enclosed garden in the
centre of the town, not unlike a very large patio in a South American
house. The sheltered platforms beneath the walls were crowded with
sweetmeat sellers. Under the trees there were four or five groups
listening to story-tellers. In the middle of one gathering two men
were telling a story in dialogue with much gesticulation; near by a
man was holding forth alone, but making up in vehemence for the lack
of a companion. A venerable-appearing old man was reading aloud, and
his listeners were mostly graybeards. He never raised his eyes as
I and my native followers came up, and paid no attention whatever
when one of my men peered over his shoulder to see what it was he
was reading. The fact that his listeners showed much interest in us
disturbed the tenor of his reading not a whit. Not far away another
old man was entertaining a numerous group by reading from the “Elf
Leila Wa Leila”—the “Thousand and One Nights.” In town we found
copies of this classic in Arabic, Persian, and Turki.
Within hearing of the story-tellers and in the shade cast by a row
of elms, half a dozen men were busy massaging clients. At the
invitation of a cheerful old fellow I spread myself upon his quilt,
and enjoyed an excellent massage, while a small naked child sat
beside me, occasionally joining in with a thump in emulation of the
work of his elder.
We were glad to leave Kashgar, for it meant that we were launched
on the homeward stretch with our faces toward Kashmir, but I shall
long remember the many pleasant hours we spent with our friendly
and long-suffering hosts at the Consulate, and the careless rambles
through the bazaar.