National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

dark centre dot ; border, red, lined purple. R. robe,
purple, bordered gold, lined white (?) ; flounce purple
(?). Āsana, green, blue, red. L. lower corner missing.
027. Flesh and hair as preceding, eyes wider open. R.
upper robe green, bordered red, lined purple. L. robe,
pink, bordered green, lined white. Āsana, green and red
with rosettes of seven purple dots. Flounce purple. Upper
and lower L. corners missing.
All from same mould. Size complete 11″ × 6¾″ × 1″.
Pl. XLIX.

Ch. 023, 024, 026, 028. Clay relief plaques ; monk
seated in European fashion in niche as Ch. 01, with both
feet flat on mat. Shaven but region of hair black. Eyes
open, dreamy and slanting. Mouth open in painful smile,
showing white teeth.
Under robe covers breast, loosely open at neck, crosses
over body from L. to R. and hangs in heavy folds over
R. arm. Upper robe covers L. shoulder and arm, is drawn
loosely across to R. hip, covering lower part of body and
legs to ankles. Small portion drawn over R. shoulder from
back. Flounce of under robe hangs below, caught up over
feet. Knees and feet wide apart, and partly opened scroll
on knees by hands which grasped rolled portions R. and L.
023. Flesh pink ; hair, eyebrows, upper eyelashes and
pupils of eyes, black. Under robe purple with white
overlap at neck, green border ; red waist-band ; purple

flounce ; green lining. Upper robe, pink, bordered white.
Shoes black, mat pink, scroll white.
024. Flesh green-grey with purple neck and patches,
hair, &c., as preceding. Under robe, purple to red ; girdle,
thence downward, green. White overlap at neck. Upper
robe, pink, bordered dark green (?). Shoes, mat and scroll
as preceding, but scroll has eight lines of finely written
Chinese characters. Niche complete.
026. Flesh, pink ; hair, &c., as preceding ; under robe
as 023. Upper robe, dark purple, bordered red. Shoes
black ; mat buff. Niche missing at lower L. side.
028. As preceding, excepting under robe bordered dark
green ; girdle light green. Upper robe, light green with
spot pattern composed of three straggling patches of colour,
red, blue and green, suggestive of the Chinese characters
on robe of Ch. 031 ; border, red. Niche complete. 10⅝″ ×
6¼″. Pl. XLIX.

Ch. 034. Clay relief plaque. Figure of same type as
Ch. 023, but pose of 'royal ease'. Rosary clasped
against centre of body. Scroll completely rolled up, in
L. hand on knee.
L. foot on mat which appears as four vandykes, each
consisting of three or four overlapping layers in purple,
red, green, and blue. Under robe purple-brown, bordered
red. Upper robe light green, bordered red ; no portion
on R. shoulder. Niche complete. 10½″ × 6¼″. Pl. XLIX.

SECTION III.—BY THE HAN LIMES TO AN-HSI

Departure
from
Ch'ien-fo-
tung.

On April 8th I left the sacred caves after a very cordial parting with their priestly guardian.
I had, four days before this, started R. B. Lāl Singh south-westwards up the slope of the high range
with instructions to reach, if possible, the defile through which the river of Tun-huang debouches
on to the huge gravel glacis of the Nan-shan. Thence he was to carry his survey across its out-
lying hill chains to the T'a-shih river ( Map No. 38. D. 4) and then to rejoin me at An-hsi. I had
arranged to send all spare baggage by hired transport from Tun-huang to that place along the main
road, already surveyed in 1907, and myself to strike across the desert to the north-east.

Purpose
of surveys
east of
Tun-huang.

My object was to reach the line of the ancient Limes near a point east of the ruined watch-
station T. xxxv, up to which in March, 1907, we had been able to trace the border wall of Han times,¹
and then to follow its remains through to An-hsi. This little town, the southern bridge-head as
it were of the Chinese 'high road' to the 'New Dominion', was to serve also as a rendezvous for
Muḥammad Yāqūb, whom I had sent from Tun-huang to carry a survey down the Tang-ho to its
junction with the Su-lo-ho and then along the right bank of the latter to An-hsi. The ground over
which my own proposed route would take us, between the course of the Su-lo-ho on the north and
the Tun-huang–An-hsi road on the south, had so far remained wholly unsurveyed, and the
inquiries made during our stay at Tun-huang had failed to elicit any information whatever about it.

Boggy
ground N.
of road to
An-hsi.

On the day of our start we made our way from the mouth of the Ch'ien-fo-tung valley, across
a barren alluvial fan of gravel, to where subterranean drainage breaks out in marshy springs near
the lonely roadside station of Ko-ta-ch'üan-tzŭ.¹ᵃ Next morning, after filling our two water-tanks,
we set out to the north-east with a view to eventually striking the line of the Limes in the vicinity
of the dune-covered area where seven years before we had lost its traces. Progress, first over