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0280	Innermost Asia : vol.2
極奥アジア : vol.2

About 45 yards to the south-east I found a low and shapeless mound marking a completely destroyed
structure about 18 feet square which may possibly have been a Stūpa base. Some 11 yards farther
off in the same direction and quite close to the edge of the terrace I traced the foundations of a larger
structure. The walls, built of stamped clay, had on the east been partly carried off by the fall of
the terrace edge. Two fairly large apartments could still be made out here. Some refuse outside
containing reed-straw suggested that the place had served as quarters. At a distance of about
20 yards to the south and on the next lower terrace stood the remains of a rectangular structure
showing walls 2 feet 8 inches thick and measuring 26 feet by 22 within. The walls, built of bricks
of the same size, stood to a height of 4 or 5 feet only, and nothing remained inside the structure.
A row of four low mounds, each about 12 feet across, standing in a row to the south and clearly
representing the bases of little Stūpas that had been completely demolished, suggested that the
rectangular structure had once served as a shrine. The position occupied by these ruins in relation
to the canal head close by left no doubt in my mind that they were the remains of a Buddhist
sanctuary which had served as a place of pilgrimage and worship at this su-bāshi of Yangi-hissār,
just like those at the heads of the main canals irrigating other oases from Khotan to Turfān.⁴
Unprotected by sand or heavy accumulation of debris and in close vicinity to the cultivated area,
these modest ruins had evidently long ago been again and again burrowed into by treasure-seekers.
Nothing was left here for the excavator, nor did our search of the surrounding area yield any
datable relic.

Volume of
Yangi-
hissār
stream. Before leaving I descended over three more terraces to the stream below, which here washes
the foot of vertical cliffs composed of layers of clay and rubble. The water from the mountains
was said to have arrived only five or six days ago; yet the stream already carried over 41 cubic
feet of water per second, and a rapid increase was expected. The regular discharge of ak-su from
this stream during the later spring and summer was variously estimated at 10 to 15 tāsh, which
is more than enough to irrigate the present cultivated area. Before its arrival a sufficient amount
of kara-su is available from springs situated in the bed of the Yangi-hissār-akin and where smaller
drainage beds debouch on either side of it, as well as from springs within the oasis itself to the south
of the high road. Judging from the volume measured in the stream at a time when the melting of
the snows on the higher portions of the range can scarcely have started, I am inclined to believe
that the valleys which feed it with their drainage extend farther into the mountains than is indicated
by Lāl Singh's plane-table sketch reproduced in Map No. 20. A. 4.

March to
Bugur oasis. From Ak-tam we turned to the west-south-west and having skirted the extreme north-western
extension of Yangi-hissār cultivation above the village of Mālu made our way along the foot of the
stony glacis of the hills. The plentiful scrub and jungle through which we passed from time to time
or sighted to the south in the course of an eighteen miles' ride to the north-eastern corner of the
Bugur oasis, showed plainly that moisture is also brought to this area by smaller drainage beds
between the rivers of Yangi-hissār and Bugur. From Tārlak, the first village reached on the Bugur
side, we turned to the south and had to cover some fifteen miles more before reaching the small
town of Bugur, the head-quarters of the district. Almost the whole of the way lay through well-
cultivated land. The Kizil river, to which this large and fertile oasis owes its existence, carried
at the time only spring water, or kara-su, where we crossed it below Tārlak. Such water as was
coming down from the melting snows of the mountains was being caught higher up and turned
into canals. The marshy and deep-cut bed was there over 300 yards wide, and the greater part
of it was said to be filled when the ak-su from the snows arrived. The large volume then carried
by the Kizil-daryā of Bugur is proved by the wide extent of the Kök-chöl marshes, into which

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