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

> > > >
Color New!IIIF Color HighRes Gray HighRes PDF   Japanese English
0510 Ruins of Desert Cathay : vol.2
Ruins of Desert Cathay : vol.2 / Page 510 (Color Image)

New!Citation Information

doi: 10.20676/00000213
Citation Format: Chicago | APA | Harvard | IEEE

OCR Text

CHAPTER LXXX

FROM KAN-CHOU TO THE TIEN-SHAN

My six days' stay at Kan-chou, though made busy by a
number of practical tasks, afforded welcome rest, and I
was able to get many interesting glimpses of the conditions
of life in a typical large Chinese city (Figs. 255, 256).
Owing to the successful resistance which this important
administrative seat and trade emporium had offered to the
Tungan rebels, many quaint old buildings survive here
uninjured. But I cannot pause to describe them nor to
mention more than one of my personal experiences.

When on the morning after my arrival I set about to
allot quarters to my various followers, who complained of
want of space, I was not a little surprised to find that the
large rambling structure which Naik Ram Singh had made
us occupy at nightfall was crammed in almost every part with
coffins duly tenanted. The sight of them here and there
when we hastily settled down at night had not attracted
special attention. But now it was soon revealed that what
my honest Indian helpmate, eager to please me with a
quiet camping-place outside the town, had taken for a
temple was in reality a sort of residential coffin club. It
was the building set apart by a guild of traders from
distant provinces where deceased members might find
quarters for periods more or less prolonged, until their
families could arrange for transport to their ancestral
homes.

Naturally enough my Muhammadans did not much
relish sharing such quarters with their rightful occupants;
and I myself, after attempting to camp in the shady
garden, and finding next morning that my tent had been

334