after our return to uliassutai we heard that disquieting news hadbeen received by the mongol sait from muren kure. the letterstated that red troops were pressing colonel kazagrandi very hardin the region of lake kosogol. the sait feared the advance of thered troops southward to uliassutai. both the american firmsliquidated their affairs and all our friends were prepared for aquick exit, though they hesitated at the thought of leaving thetown, as they were afraid of meeting the detachment of chahars sentfrom the east. we decided to await the arrival of this detachment,as their coming could change the whole course of events. in a fewdays they came, two hundred warlike chahar brigands under thecommand of a former chinese hunghutze. he was a tall, skinny manwith hands that reached almost to his knees, a face blackened bywind and sun and mutilated with two long scars down over hisforehead and cheek, the making of one of which had also closed oneof his hawklike eyes, topped off with a shaggy coonskin cap--suchwas the commander of the detachment of chahars. a personage verydark and stern, with whom a night meeting on a lonely street couldnot be considered a pleasure by any bent of the imagination.
the detachment made camp within the destroyed fortress, near to thesingle chinese building that had not been razed and which was nowserving as headquarters for the chinese commissioner. on the veryday of their arrival the chahars pillaged a chinese dugun ortrading house not half a mile from the fortress and also offendedthe wife of the chinese commissioner by calling her a "traitor."the chahars, like the mongols, were quite right in their stand,because the chinese commissioner wang tsao-tsun had on his arrivalin uliassutai followed the chinese custom of demanding a mongolianwife. the servile new sait had given orders that a beautiful andsuitable mongolian girl be found for him. one was so run down andplaced in his yamen, together with her big wrestling mongol brotherwho was to be a guard for the commissioner but who developed intothe nurse for the little white pekingese pug which the officialpresented to his new wife.
burglaries, squabbles and drunken orgies of the chahars followed,so that wang tsoa-tsun exerted all his efforts to hurry thedetachment westward to kobdo and farther into urianhai.
one cold morning the inhabitants of uliassutai rose to witness avery stern picture. along the main street of the town thedetachment was passing. they were riding on small, shaggy ponies,three abreast; were dressed in warm blue coats with sheepskinovercoats outside and crowned with the regulation coonskin caps;armed from head to foot. they rode with wild shouts and cheers,very greedily eyeing the chinese shops and the houses of therussian colonists. at their head rode the one-eyed hunghutze chiefwith three horsemen behind him in white overcoats, who carriedwaving banners and blew what may have been meant for music throughgreat conch shells. one of the chahars could not resist and sojumped out of his saddle and made for a chinese shop along thestreet. immediately the anxious cries of the chinese merchantscame from the shop. the hunghutze swung round, noticed the horseat the door of the shop and realized what was happening.
immediately he reined his horse and made for the spot. with hisraucous voice he called the chahar out. as he came, he struck himfull in the face with his whip and with all his strength. bloodflowed from the slashed cheek. but the chahar was in the saddle ina second without a murmur and galloped to his place in the file.
during this exit of the chahars all the people were hidden in theirhouses, anxiously peeping through cracks and corners of thewindows. but the chahars passed peacefully out and only when theymet a caravan carrying chinese wine about six miles from town didtheir native tendency display itself again in pillaging andemptying several containers. somewhere in the vicinity of harganathey were ambushed by tushegoun lama and so treated that neveragain will the plains of chahar welcome the return of these warriorsons who were sent out to conquer the soyot descendants of theancient tuba.
the day the column left uliassutai a heavy snow fell, so that theroad became impassable. the horses first were up to their knees,tired out and stopped. some mongol horsemen reached uliassutai thefollowing day after great hardship and exertion, having made onlytwenty-five miles in forty-eight hours. caravans were compelled tostop along the routes. the mongols would not consent even toattempt journeys with oxen and yaks which made but ten or twelvemiles a day. only camels could be used but there were too few andtheir drivers did not feel that they could make the first railwaystation of kuku-hoto, which was about fourteen hundred miles away.
we were forced again to wait: for which? death or salvation? onlyour own energy and force could save us. consequently my friend andi started out, supplied with a tent, stove and food, for a newreconnaissance along the shore of lake kosogol, whence the mongolsait expected the new invasion of red troops.
