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cart traffic. Beyond Liang-chou no natural difficulties of any sort are encountered, as the road
passes from one fertile tract to another. Abundant streams, fed by the perpetual snowfields of the
Nan-shan, water these submontane tracts and render them capable of supporting a fairly close
population. The volume of the two main rivers of Kan-chou and Su-chou, which gather most of
these streams, is large enough for their united course to penetrate a considerable distance northward
into the desert region of Southern Mongolia. To the east of Kan-chou a notable change in climatic
conditions permits cultivation to be carried on along the foot of the mountains even without
irrigation.⁵
Natural pro- Relatively narrow as this fertile submontane belt is, stretching from Liang-chou to Su-chou,⁵ᵃ
tection of
road along its produce is amply sufficient to provide for the needs of any number of men and animals that trade
Nan-shan.
and military movements might bring along it. But what must have made this great natural thorough-
fare still more advantageous for the Chinese advance towards Central Asia is the protection it
enjoys from physical features on both flanks. All along it to the south-west rises the high snowy
Richthofen chain, like a mighty rampart. The very few alpine tracks which cross it are easily
guarded against inroads from Tibetan nomads in the narrow gorges through which they debouch
towards the foot of the mountains.⁶ On the other flank, to the north-east, stretches the western
Ala-shan hill chain, relatively low but extremely barren, and beyond it a wide desert area, largely
drift-sand. Through this, as I had occasion to convince myself in the course of my explorations in
1914, only small parties could ever penetrate, owing to the great scarcity of water and grazing.⁷
Beyond Su-chou, the cultivable area along the great route becomes restricted to a succession of
small oases.⁷ᵃ This is due to the limited chances of irrigation which the increasing aridity of the
outer chains of the western Nan-shan allows here. But the physical conditions securing protection
on both flanks continue much the same, and suitable stages, habitable and amply provided with
water and grazing, are to be found along the ancient highway right through to the big Tun-
huang oasis.
Border com- This brief survey of geographical features will help us to understand better the direction taken
mands from
Liang- by the Chinese conquests after the Emperor Wu-ti had decided upon his policy of expansion
chou to
Tun-huang. towards the Târim Basin. It fully explains also the line which the extension of the Chinese Limes
wall followed in rapidly advanced stages. After the severe defeat inflicted upon the Hsiung-nu by
the successful campaigns of the general Ho Ch'ü-ping, the regions which correspond to the present
Liang-chou and Kan-chou were, in 121 B.C., brought under Chinese control. First, as M. Chavannes
concludes from a comparison of the several Chinese historical records, the command of Chiu-ch'üan
酒泉 was instituted in 115 B.C. in the locality represented by the present Su-chou.⁸ It appears to
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