CHAP. x.] INTERVIEWS WITH LIU-DARIN 169
reticence to the wish to keep back unpleasant information. Whatever the reliability of the news may have been that reached Chinese Yamens in Turkestan through the wire to Kashgar, it seemed clear that they. realised the great danger to the Government they served. There may have been anxiety about the future ; but if my Kashgar friends' views were right, it was the doubt about their own individual fortunes, not those of their nation, which secretly troubled the minds of the officials in this land of exile.
It was arranged that after the dinner I should photograph my host and some of his people. So Liu-Darin at the end of the feast duly installed himself on a raised chair of office, with his little daughter and son by his knees, and some implements of western culture, in the shape of sundry clocks, &c., on a small table close by. A.. crowd of more or less ragged attendants formed the background. The photos were easy to take, as my sitters kept as quiet as if they were sculptured. Then we parted in all friendship. Liu-Darin talked of retiring soon to his native province of Hu-nan. May he return to it in peace and, as my Chinese patron saint, ` Tang-Seng,' did of old, enjoy the rest he was looking for.
The last days in Yarkand were busily spent in completing the winter outfit . of my men and in sorting and packing my purchases. Accounts too had to be settled, and in this respect I was glad to avail myself of the skilled assistance of Lala Gauri Mall, the Ak-sakal (headman, literally " white-beard ") of the Hindu traders. Apart from the question of price—no small matter in a country where it would apparently be against ill business principles to ask less than double the right amount even from local customers—there is enough trouble in the mere payment. The Chinese currency with its ' Sers ' or ' Tels,' ` Miskals ' and ' Fens,' arranged on a plain decimal system, would be as convenient as can be desired. But its simplicity is of little avail in this outlying province of the empire, which stubbornly clings to its time-
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