Across Tibet - Paperback

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: CHAPTER III. TO TCHARKALIK. Kourla?In the Bazaar?Provisioning the Caravan?Parpa?Visit from the Akim of Kourla: A " Mandarinade "?Tehinagai?Music in the Camp?A Forest of Poplars?Crossing the Kutche-Darya and the Intchigue-Darya?Aktarma?The River Tarim?The " Silk Plant "?Arkan?Hard Words and Blows Compared?Talkit- chin?The Hat of the Tarim?At Tcharkalik. October 6.?Kourla is a small town situated in a fine oasis. It is traversed by the Kutche-Darya, over which a wooden bridge has been built, connecting the suburbs on the left bank with the bazaars and the fortress on the right. The population is a mixture of Chinese, Dounganes, and Tarantchis; but, as the Mussulmans form the majority, the chief of the town (the Akim) is of that persuasion. It was he who came and laid siege to us upon our arrival, not giving us time to enjoy the satisfactions and pleasures which an oasis always offers to those who have crossed the desert; and Kourla is charming, with its gardens, its green trees, its fine river, and its bazaars, where are to be found melons, apples, figs, grapes, and apricots, which nomads like ourselves find so delicious. We arrived in the night of this day (the 5th October), having done a stage of nearly thirty-five miles. We are lodged in the house of a Mussulman who is a Russian subject and a merchant in the town. KOURLA. WOMIiX. Or'iober 6.?To-day we received a great many inquisitive visitors. We learn that the authorities are summoned to meet at the Yamen in the evening to take counsel together concerning us, and the chief asks permission to pay us a visit the next morning. "We find ourselves in the flrst bazaar we have seen since we left Kuldja, and we shall not encounter another after we make a fresh start. So we buy and buy in preparation for Thibet, an...