in the evening of the same day we arrived at the sacred lake ofteri noor, a sheet of water eight kilometres across, muddy andyellow, with low unattractive shores studded with large holes. inthe middle of the lake lay what was left of a disappearing island.
on this were a few trees and some old ruins. our guide explainedto us that two centuries ago the lake did not exist and that a verystrong chinese fortress stood here on the plain. a chinese chiefin command of the fortress gave offence to an old lama who cursedthe place and prophesied that it would all be destroyed. the verynext day the water began rushing up from the ground, destroyed thefortress and engulfed all the chinese soldiers. even to this daywhen storms rage over the lake the waters cast up on the shores thebones of men and horses who perished in it. this teri noorincreases its size every year, approaching nearer and nearer to themountains. skirting the eastern shore of the lake, we began toclimb a snow-capped ridge. the road was easy at first but theguide warned us that the most difficult bit was there ahead. wereached this point two days later and found there a steep mountainside thickly set with forest and covered with snow. beyond it laythe lines of eternal snow--ridges studded with dark rocks set ingreat banks of the white mantle that gleamed bright under the clearsunshine. these were the eastern and highest branches of the tannuola system. we spent the night beneath this wood and began thepassage of it in the morning. at noon the guide began leading usby zigzags in and out but everywhere our trail was blocked by deepravines, great jams of fallen trees and walls of rock caught intheir mad tobogganings from the mountain top. we struggled forseveral hours, wore out our horses and, all of a sudden, turned upat the place where we had made our last halt. it was very evidentour soyot had lost his way; and on his face i noticed marked fear.
"the old devils of the cursed forest will not allow us to pass," hewhispered with trembling lips. "it is a very ominous sign. wemust return to kharga to the noyon."but i threatened him and he took the lead again evidently withouthope or effort to find the way. fortunately, one of our party, anurianhai hunter, noticed the blazes on the trees, the signs of theroad which our guide had lost. following these, we made our waythrough the wood, came into and crossed a belt of burned larchtimber and beyond this dipped again into a small live forestbordering the bottom of the mountains crowned with the eternalsnows. it grew dark so that we had to camp for the night. thewind rose high and carried in its grasp a great white sheet of snowthat shut us off from the horizon on every side and buried our campdeep in its folds. our horses stood round like white ghosts,refusing to eat or to leave the circle round our fire. the windcombed their manes and tails. through the niches in the mountainsit roared and whistled. from somewhere in the distance came thelow rumble of a pack of wolves, punctuated at intervals by thesharp individual barking that a favorable gust of wind threw upinto high staccato.
as we lay by the fire, the soyot came over to me and said: "noyon,come with me to the obo. i want to show you something."we went there and began to ascend the mountain. at the bottom of avery steep slope was laid up a large pile of stones and treetrunks, making a cone of some three metres in height. these oboare the lamaite sacred signs set up at dangerous places, the altarsto the bad demons, rulers of these places. passing soyots andmongols pay tribute to the spirits by hanging on the branches ofthe trees in the obo hatyk, long streamers of blue silk, shredstorn from the lining of their coats or simply tufts of hair cutfrom their horses' manes; or by placing on the stones lumps of meator cups of tea and salt.
"look at it," said the soyot. "the hatyks are torn off. thedemons are angry, they will not allow us to pass, noyon. . . ."he caught my hand and with supplicating voice whispered: "let usgo back, noyon; let us! the demons do not wish us to pass theirmountains. for twenty years no one has dared to pass thesemountains and all bold men who have tried have perished here. thedemons fell upon them with snowstorm and cold. look! it isbeginning already. . . . go back to our noyon, wait for the warmerdays and then. . . ."i did not listen further to the soyot but turned back to the fire,which i could hardly see through the blinding snow. fearing ourguide might run away, i ordered a sentry to be stationed for thenight to watch him. later in the night i was awakened by thesentry, who said to me: "maybe i am mistaken, but i think i hearda rifle."what could i say to it? maybe some stragglers like ourselves weregiving a sign of their whereabouts to their lost companions, orperhaps the sentry had mistaken for a rifle shot the sound of somefalling rock or frozen ice and snow. soon i fell asleep again andsuddenly saw in a dream a very clear vision. out on the plain,blanketed deep with snow, was moving a line of riders. they wereour pack horses, our kalmuck and the funny pied horse with theroman nose. i saw us descending from this snowy plateau into afold in the mountains. here some larch trees were growing, closeto which gurgled a small, open brook. afterwards i noticed a fireburning among the trees and then woke up.
it grew light. i shook up the others and asked them to preparequickly so as not to lose time in getting under way. the storm wasraging. the snow blinded us and blotted out all traces of theroad. the cold also became more intense. at last we were in thesaddles. the soyot went ahead trying to make out the trail. as weworked higher the guide less seldom lost the way. frequently wefell into deep holes covered with snow; we scrambled up overslippery rocks. at last the soyot swung his horse round and,coming up to me, announced very positively: "i do not want to diewith you and i will not go further."my first motion was the swing of my whip back over my head. i wasso close to the "promised land" of mongolia that this soyot,standing in the way of fulfilment of my wishes, seemed to me myworst enemy. but i lowered my flourishing hand. into my headflashed a quite wild thought.
"listen," i said. "if you move your horses, you will receive abullet in the back and you will perish not at the top of themountain but at the bottom. and now i will tell you what willhappen to us. when we shall have reached these rocks above, thewind will have ceased and the snowstorm will have subsided. thesun will shine as we cross the snowy plain above and afterwards weshall descend into a small valley where there are larches growingand a stream of open running water. there we shall light our firesand spend the night."the soyot began to tremble with fright.
"noyon has already passed these mountains of darkhat ola?" he askedin amazement.
"no," i answered, "but last night i had a vision and i know that weshall fortunately win over this ridge.""i will guide you!" exclaimed the soyot, and, whipping his horse,led the way up the steep slope to the top of the ridge of eternalsnows.
as we were passing along the narrow edge of a precipice, the soyotstopped and attentively examined the trail.
"today many shod horses have passed here!" he cried through theroar of the storm. "yonder on the snow the lash of a whip has beendragged. these are not soyots."the solution of this enigma appeared instantly. a volley rang out.
one of my companions cried out, as he caught hold of his rightshoulder; one pack horse fell dead with a bullet behind his ear.
we quickly tumbled out of our saddles, lay down behind the rocksand began to study the situation. we were separated from aparallel spur of the mountain by a small valley about one thousandpaces across. there we made out about thirty riders alreadydismounted and firing at us. i had never allowed any fighting tobe done until the initiative had been taken by the other side. ourenemy fell upon us unawares and i ordered my company to answer.
"aim at the horses!" cried colonel ostrovsky. then he ordered thetartar and soyot to throw our own animals. we killed six of theirsand probably wounded others, as they got out of control. also ourrifles took toll of any bold man who showed his head from behindhis rock. we heard the angry shouting and maledictions of redsoldiers who shot up our position more and more animatedly.
suddenly i saw our soyot kick up three of the horses and springinto the saddle of one with the others in leash behind. behind himsprang up the tartar and the kalmuck. i had already drawn my rifleon the soyot but, as soon as i saw the tartar and kalmuck on theirlovely horses behind him, i dropped my gun and knew all was well.
the reds let off a volley at the trio but they made good theirescape behind the rocks and disappeared. the firing continued moreand more lively and i did not know what to do. from our side weshot rarely, saving our cartridges. watching carefully the enemy,i noticed two black points on the snow high above the reds. theyslowly approached our antagonists and finally were hidden from viewbehind some sharp hillocks. when they emerged from these, theywere right on the edge of some overhanging rocks at the foot ofwhich the reds lay concealed from us. by this time i had no doubtthat these were the heads of two men. suddenly these men rose upand i watched them flourish and throw something that was followedby two deafening roars which re-echoed across the mountain valley.
immediately a third explosion was followed by wild shouts anddisorderly firing among the reds. some of the horses rolled downthe slope into the snow below and the soldiers, chased by ourshots, made off as fast as they could down into the valley out ofwhich we had come.
afterward the tartar told me the soyot had proposed to guide themaround behind the reds to fall upon their rear with the bombs.
when i had bound up the wounded shoulder of the officer and we hadtaken the pack off the killed animal, we continued our journey.
our position was complicated. we had no doubt that the reddetachment came up from mongolia. therefore, were there red troopsin mongolia? what was their strength? where might we meet them?
consequently, mongolia was no more the promised land? very sadthoughts took possession of us.
but nature pleased us. the wind gradually fell. the storm ceased.
the sun more and more frequently broke through the scudding clouds.
we were traveling upon a high, snow-covered plateau, where in oneplace the wind blew it clean and in another piled it high withdrifts which caught our horses and held them so that they couldhardly extricate themselves at times. we had to dismount and wadethrough the white piles up to our waists and often a man or horsewas down and had to be helped to his feet. at last the descentbegan and at sunset we stopped in the small larch grove, spent thenight at the fire among the trees and drank the tea boiled in thewater carried from the open mountain brook. in various places wecame across the tracks of our recent antagonists.
everything, even nature herself and the angry demons of darkhatola, had helped us: but we were not gay, because again before uslay the dread uncertainty that threatened us with new and possiblydestructive dangers.
