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0226 The Pulse of Asia : vol.1
The Pulse of Asia : vol.1 / Page 226 (Color Image)

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doi: 10.20676/00000233
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CHAPTER VIII

THE SAND-BURIED RUINS OF CHIRA

When I returned from Imamla to the Karatash valley
it was almost the middle of September. The hot summer
was over, and it was time to go down to the zone of vegeta-
tion and the sandy desert of Takla-Makan. So I rejoined
Mr. Barrett, and together we traveled down the Karatash
River to Chira, a prosperous town of about ten thousand
inhabitants. Here, as everywhere in the zone of vegetation,
most of the people are farmers. One rarely sees finer fields
or better fruit than those of Chira. Luscious little white
peaches, dark crimson nectarines, grapes of various sorts,
melons that melted in one's mouth, and delicious water-
melons, both red and yellow, could be bought for a song.
The air was so dry that one could indulge in them freely
without harmful consequences.

At Chira, Mr. Barrett and I, having finished our work to-
gether, undertook separate expeditions. He devoted his at-
tention chiefly to the physiography of the mountain border
of the Lop basin; I mine to a study of the climate of anti-
quity. The best point for beginning my investigations
seemed to be a group of ruins, Uzun-Tetti and others, which
lie in the zone of vegetation a few miles north and east of
Chira, and another group, Dandan-Uilik and Rawak, which
lie far out in the sandy Takla-Makan desert, fifty or sixty
miles north of Chira. Stein, the only archæologist who has
visited the region, describes Dandan-Uilik, the chief of the