National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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Ruins of Desert Cathay : vol.2 |
CHAPTER LX
DISCOVERIES BY THE ' JADE GATE'
I SHALL not attempt to describe day by day the labours
which kept me busy for fully a month along this ancient
Limes. Every watch - station we cleared furnished its
quota of antiquarian spoil, often in novel forms. Even
where my task was merely to trace the old wall across
desert and marshes, there was an abundance of interesting
observations to record about the changes, if any, which the
ground had undergone since the line was first planned.
No better gauge could have been designed for showing
to the geographical student what physical conditions
had prevailed here in Han times. With daily growing
experience the reading of these marks of earlier water-
level, of character and extent of vegetation, of wind
direction, etc., soon became for me a fascinating study.
That it claimed the attention of the antiquarian and
geographer alike was the greatest attraction. Vividly do
I remember all the peculiar features which this apparently
dull and uniform desert ground offered along the hundred
miles or so of the border surveyed in the end, and equally
also the many little surprises and incidents to which the
search for the relics of a long-passed age treated us in the
midst of this desolate region. But space does not suffice
to record them all here, and in order to give some
impression of the work effected and the results it has
yielded, I must restrict myself to a brief account of the
most notable finds.
In order to be nearer to the reinforcements of labourers
and fresh supplies I had called up from Tun-huang, I
shifted my camp on April 17th to the vicinity of the
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