IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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| IIIF Color HighRes |
| The heart of a continent : vol.1 |
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Citation Information
1887.] MONGOL CUSTOMS. 95
south at Huru-su-tai. At seven and a half miles we passed a small stream of good water.
In the next few days we passed along a plain lying between the Hurku Hills and the southern parallel range, for which I could get no name. We saw a peak of the Hurku Hills, which my Mongol called Baroso-khai, and in some clefts, near the summit, we could see patches of snow.
We passed several Mongol encampments, and one day a Mongol official came to visit me. He was an old man, and not interesting, showing no signs of ordinary intelligence. He had bad eyes, and I gave him some of Calvert's carbolic ointment to rub on the eyelids, for which he did not appear at all thankful. He fished about in the leg of his long boot, and produced from it a miscellaneous collection of articles—a pipe, a small piece of string, some camel's wool, a piece of paper, and various odds and ends, and eventually my ointment was done up in a suitable packet to his satisfaction, and stowed away again in the leg of his boot.
The Mongols carry about half their personal effects in their boots, and my man, Ma-to-la, one day produced from his boots every little scrap that I had thrown away during the march, such as bits of paper, ends of string, a worn-out sock, and numerous other trifles. Everything is so precious to these Mongols in the desert that they never waste anything, and I soon learnt the value they put on every little article.
Liu-san one day took me to task severely for giving away an old lime-juice bottle to an ordinary Mongol. He said such
valuable gifts ought to be reserved for the big men. So the next " swell " I came across was presented with a lime-juice
bottle with great state, and he was given to understand that he was not likely to get such gifts as that every day in the week, and that he was lucky to have come across such a generous gentleman as myself.
As we passed Mongol encampments, men used to come
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