144 AT ANCIENT LOU-LAN CII. VIII
icy winds had already put him more or less hors de combat before our arrival at the site.
I myself with a much reduced party set out through the unexplored desert to the south-west. A seven days' trying tramp brought us safely to the ice of the Tarim. Progress was far more difficult than on the journey from Lop-nor, owing to the steadily increasing height of the ridges of drift-sand encountered. No more ruins, only occasional relics of the Stone Age, were met on the way. Even the rows of dead trees which marked old river courses, so frequent before, here soon disappeared. The resulting difficulty about fuel made itself seriously felt while minimum temperatures fell to 48° Fahrenheit below freezing-point. Interesting geographical observations attended this journey, which ultimately carried us back to Charkhlik and Miran; but of them no account is needed in this place.
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