National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

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reservoir at the Mazar Khoja Baglin, 30 miles to the west of the town, where it is filled from streams coming down from the hills. The settlements to the south of Kayragh 'are watered from the Shihniz which is lost on the desert to the east ; and those on the north border of the division by the Kosan river which joins the Kaslighar stream.

The limits of Yangi Hissar are Ak Rabat on the south, and Yapchang on the north ; Egizyar Karawul, or outpost to the Chishtagh mountain on the west, and Ordam Padshah, or Ktim Shahidan on the east. The general character of the country is arid desert, with here and there small saline pools, or more extensive reedy wastes ; and everywhere the soil is highly charged with salts which cover the ground with a white efflorescene even under growing crops. On the southern half of the division is a wide waste of this saline soil. It is covered with salt worts and a coarse reedy grass, and is so soft and spongy that cattle cannot traverse it off the beaten track.

il   Within the above limits, the population is reckoned at 8,000 houses, of which 2,000 con-

stitute the city and its immediate suburbs. The rest are thus distributed. Along the _south

It   tract—Kizili 200 houses, Chamalung-200, Kudtik, Tamyari, and Kosh G-umbaz 150, Topoluk

h   400, Kilpichim, Kalpin, and Toghochi 250, Egizyar 300, Tishijan, Sugat, and Pilz 100,

I   Domshtin, Yangiyar, and Ditir 100, and King Ktil 600—total 2,300 houses. Along

i   the middle tract—Konosak, Alttinchi, and Kash Arik 200 houses, Tawiz 200, Karigho 100,

i   Atim-chagh and Campa 100, Shimla 150, Ma ngshin 200, Khoja Arik 300, Syghin 300,

k   and Ariba 250—total 1,800 houses. Along the north track...—Oktay and Cholpangarik 100

0   houses, Chaharshamba Bazar and Saylik 250, Aliii-nfulc 200, Stighohlk 250, Tongliik 250,

ti   Stinoltik 200, Yapchang 250, and other small settlements as Hazrat Begum, Ordam Padshih,

i   Kari Atam, &c., 400—total 1,900 houses. Total population of the division 56,000 souls.

I   The Yangi Hissar settlements are entirely agricultural. The city is a small town of about

id   600 houses composed of dilapidated tenements and decayed fortifications, and its people and

11   surroundings wear an air of poverty, neglect, and decadence ; yet the suburbs are flourishing

i'   gardens and cornfields. On the plain a few hundred yards to the north of the town is the

i   Yangishahr, a strong fort with high turreted walls and a deep ditch. And between the two

ii   are the barracks of the garrison and their families, small fortified enclosures with crenelated

i   walls.

h   In the time of the Chinese this was, as it is still, an important military post, and there '

h   are now more Chinese converts here than in any other part of the country, except at Kashghar
itself. The Amir has a garrison of 500 men here, who are mostly quartered outside the fort, which is the depository of his treasure and the residence of some State prisoners And refugees. Amongst the latter Hydar Tora, son of Amir Muzaffaruddin of Bukhara, who has been kept here under strict supervision for some years as a guest living on the bounty of Yakiib Beg.

Yangi Hissar is an interesting place historically as the scene of the grand struggle for mastery between Budhism and Islam ; and though the former was overthrown, it was not without a heavy price paid by the victors in their best blood, as has been mentioned in the History. The place abounds in the tombs and sacred shrines of the early champions of the Faith, and a few miles to the west of the town, at Chtichim Padshah, is a vast cemetery consecrated to the dust of ten thousand warrior martyrs to the cause. It is a desolate waste spread far and wide over a dreary wilderness of sand bills and hollows, and even now its sepulchral odours and deep solitude impress the visitor with the magnitude of the contest and the fierceness of the fight. In this struggle—which it appears lasted for a quarter of a century before Budhism was stamped out by the conquest of its most flourishing seat at Khutan—several little fortified cities in this division were reduced to ruins. The largest of these, Ordim Padshah= " My King's palace," is now only known by name, for the site of its existence has for eight centuries been buried under the shifting sands ; where still stands the shrine of Ali Arslan Khan and his 300 fellow martyrs, surrounded by a billowy sea of sand dunes which, as the venerable custodian solemnly informed us, " have hitherto, out of respect to the sacred resting place of the holy martyrs, passed on in their course giving the hallowed spot a wide berth ; and please God they will always do so to all eternity.'