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0413 Ruins of Desert Cathay : vol.2
Ruins of Desert Cathay : vol.2 / Page 413 (Grayscale High Resolution Image)

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doi: 10.20676/00000213
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CHAPTER LXXV

BY THE GATE OF THE 'GREAT WALL'

The next morning, July 19th, did not change my pleasant
impression of Ta-han-chuang. The meadows were bright
with rich grass and flowers; for here, some 7700 feet above
the sea, spring had not yet lost its freshness. Strolling up
a little plateau while the baggage was being loaded, I found
it occupied by the fort from which yesterday's military re-
ception had come. There was at its north-west corner a
big and ruinous watch-tower (Fig. 222), which when seen
from afar looked as if carried away bodily from that
desolate desert Limes. Crenellated walls adjoined it in a
square enclosing the ramshackle quarters of the garrison.
They turned out again promptly in their scarlet cloaks,
the child-soldier included, as seen in the photograph.
Small plots of vegetable gardens bordered the half-
decayed post, and below to the east I found the springs
which feed the life-giving stream, issuing on grassy patches
within a broad and dry river bed.

The march to the great 'Gate' was long and weary;
for on the bare stony Sai, supporting only the scantiest
tufts of scrub, the sun beat down fiercely, and, with the
ground sloping down eastwards and no wind, for once,
stirring, the heat and glare increased steadily. The
distant vista of the Chia-yü-kuan towers had vanished.
Fata Morgana instead raised up on the eastern horizon
long dark patches suggesting groves of trees, with the
heated atmosphere below shining like a sheet of water.
To the south rose chain above chain with glittering snowy
peaks, more imposing even than those we had seen from
Tu-ta-fan. The long barren range which flanks the high
VOL. II 273 T