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Sand-Buried Ruins of Khotan : vol.1 |
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I wondered whether they ever see flowers such as carpet the
Pamir grazing-grounds.
The 22nd of October was needed as a day of rest for men
and beasts, and I was glad to grant it in a locality where
there was at least plenty of shelter. The sky was heavy with
clouds, and cold blasts swept up the valley from time to time,
enveloping it in a haze of dust. After a morning spent over
notes and letters I went for a walk along the stream through
cheerless fields and with nothing in view but the bare grey
spurs that line the valley. On my return I found the whole
grown-up male population of Pisha assembled in the courtyard
of the mud dwelling where my men had established themselves.
It seemed that for many years past Pisha had known no such
time of excitement and novel interest. In Hakim Shah, the
oldest man of the valley and father of the local Yüzbashi, I
found an intelligent interlocutor. He claimed an age of fully
a hundred years, and his wrinkled face and snowy hair seemed
to support his assertion. Though bent by the burden of his
years, the old man was still active enough in mind, and he
talked glibly of the days of early Chinese rule before the
Muhammadan revolt. He had once in his life been to
Khotan, and was evidently in the eyes of his people a man
well-up in the affairs of the world.
My men had been told that a difficult and long march lay
before us. So on the morning of the 23rd they were quicker
than usual about the start. When I got outside my tent a
little after six o'clock I saw to my delight a gloriously clear
sky. The cold was also a surprise. Even at 7 a.m. the
thermometer showed 23° F.; the little watercourse near my
tent was hard frozen. As soon as we had climbed the edge of
the plateau some 500 feet above Pisha, a grand view opened
out upon the whole ice-crowned range. Kuen-luen Peak No. 5
now lay in full view to the south-east, and its glacier-crowned
head appeared quite close in the absolutely clear atmosphere.
For about eight miles we rode over a broad, barren plateau that
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