CH. XC ANCIENT SITES ABOUT KELPIN 427
below the Malakand, which is soon to bring fertility to parts of the Peshawar Valley that have lain more or less waste for long centuries ?
The remains of old settlements which I traced close to the edge of extant cultivation were too uncertain in date and character to give definite indications of the former extent of Kelpin. But information opportunely secured through ` treasure-seekers ' subsequently enabled me to trace extensive débris areas marking ancient settlements in the wide belt of absolute desert between the arid outer hill chain of Kelpin and the lower course of the Kashgar River. The intense heat and the difficulty of carrying water at this season—our camels had to be spared all work after Ak-su and could no longer help us—made exploration very difficult on this ground. So it was, perhaps, as well to find that far-advanced wind erosion had left little or no remains for excavation at the central site to which our guides brought us after a total march of some forty miles from Kelpin.
It proved to be that of a fortified station surrounded by a large ` Tati ' with plentiful small débris of hard materials, coins, and the like. The ample archaeological evidence gathered here showed that this tract, now wholly abandoned to drift sand and erosion, had been occupied from Han times down to the eighth century A.D. by populous settlements. Canals, still traceable in parts, once carried water to them from the Kashgar River, now dying away much farther south. I was also able to ascertain the line of the ancient Chinese high road to Kashgar, which could still be traced by a succession of ruined watch-towers.
A curious illustration of the pitfalls which beset the archaeologist's field-work may find passing mention. The time of abandonment for this ruined station was so clearly indicated that I felt greatly puzzled when several copper and silver pieces of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries were picked up in my presence from the same ground. The riddle was solved only after my arrival at the village of Tumshuk on the present high road, when the aged Karaul-bashi, or commandant of the local police post, related how about 1876 a rebel force had been routed
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