in chiaroscuro, which with its contrasts deeply impressed itself on my memory.
At last towards noon the coffin was finished. The whole of Kashgar's European colony followed it through the narrow dusty lanes to the modest dwelling which the goodwill of the Chinese officials had let Father Hendricks occupy for years past as a matter of charity. The body rested alone in the locked-up house, but the grizzly-haired Chinese shoemaker, the solitary convert whom the old priest claimed, had faithfully kept watch on the house-top. The two rooms where the poor ` Abbé ' had led his quaint domestic existence looked as dim and dusty as ever. Books, maps, paj5erasse of all sorts mingled in utter confusion with household objects and implements used for his chief practical occupation, the making of Kashgar wine. There was the humble altar at which he used to say his solitary masses, and not far from it the open trap-door giving access to the roughly dug cavity which served as wine-cellar and laboratory.
Not easily shall I forget this odd collection of litter, accumulated in the course of years and mingling with successive layers of Kashgar dust. It was like a cave by the seashore where the play of the waves had deposited strange débris from distant coasts. While the body, terribly reduced by long sufferings, was reverently transferred by Cossack hands to the coffin, I thought of the strangely faithful reflex which these surroundings offered of the departed's mental world. Learning, indeed, he had in plenty and experience of many people and lands ; yet orderly use of this knowledge was as difficult as quick discovery of any particular object in this accumulation. But what only personal intercourse could reveal was the old priest's child-like kindness of heart and warm interest in all whom chance had brought near him.
The cortège which followed his remains to the grave was as large as European Kashgar could furnish. Orenburg Cossacks, tall strong-looking fellows from Vernoye, carried the coffin, while the rest of the Consulate guard marched in front. Bare-headed they did the slow journey to the small Russian cemetery, about a mile away, between
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