Across Asia on a Bicycle by William Lewis Sachtleben (best ebook reader for laptop .TXT) 📖
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Before retiring for the night, the dervish led the prayers, just as he had done at sunset. The praying-mats were spread, and all heads bowed toward Mecca. The only preparation for retiring was the spreading of blankets from the pile in one of the kibitkas. The Kirghiz are not in the habit of removing many garments for this purpose, and under the circumstances we found this custom a rather convenient one. Six of us turned in on the floor together, forming a semicircle, with our feet toward the fire. “Kumiss John,” who was evidently the pet of the household, had a rudely constructed cot at the far end of the kibitka.
Vernoye, the old Almati, with its broad streets, low wood and brick houses, and Russian sign-boards, presented a Siberian aspect. The ruins of its many disastrous earth[pg 139]quakes lying low on every hand told us at once the cause of its deserted thoroughfares. The terrible shocks of the year before our visit killed several hundred people, and a whole mountain in the vicinity sank. The only hope of its persistent residents is a branch from the Transsiberian or Transcaspian railroad, or the reannexation by Russia of the fertile province of Ili, to make it an indispensable depot. Despite these periodical calamities, Vernoye has had, and is now constructing, under the genius of the French architect, Paul L. Gourdet, some of the finest edifices to be found in central Asia. The orphan asylum, a magnificent three-story structure, is now being built on experimental lines, to test its strength against earthquake shocks.
One of the chief incidents of our pleasant sojourn was afforded by Governor Ivanoff. We were invited to head the procession of the Cossacks on their annual departure for their summer encampment in the mountains. After the usual religious ceremony, they filed out from the city parade-ground. Being unavoidably detained for a few moments, we did not come up until some time after the column had started. As we dashed by to the front with the American and Russian flags fluttering side by side from the handle-bars, cheer after cheer arose from the ranks, and even the governor and his party doffed their caps in acknowledgment. At the camp we were favored with a special exhibition of horsemanship. By a single twist of the rein the steeds would fall to the ground, and their riders crouch down behind them as a bulwark in battle. Then dashing forward at full speed, they would spring to the ground, and leap back again into the saddle, or, hanging by their legs, would reach over and pick up a handkerchief, cap, or a soldier supposed to be wounded. All these movements we photographed with our camera. [pg 140]Of the endurance of these Cossacks and their Kirghiz horses we had a practical test. Overtaking a Cossack courier in the early part of a day’s journey, he became so interested in the velocipede, as the Russians call the bicycle, that he determined to see as much of it as possible. He stayed with us the whole day, over a distance of fifty-five miles. His chief compensation was in witnessing the surprise of the natives to whom he would shout across the fields to come and see the tomasha, adding in explanation that we were the American gentlemen who had ridden all the way from America. Our speed was not slow, and frequently the poor fellow would have to resort to the whip, or shout, “Slowly, gentlemen, my horse is tired; the town is not far away, it is not necessary to hurry so.” The fact is that in all our experience we found no horse of even the famed Kirghiz or Turkoman breed that could travel with the same ease and rapidity as ourselves even over the most ordinary road.
At Vernoye we began to glean practical information about China, but all except our genial host, M. Gourdet, counseled us against our proposed journey. He alone, as a traveler of experience, advised a divergence from the Siberian route at Altin Imell, in order to visit the Chinese city of Kuldja, where, as he said, with the assistance of the resident Russian consul we could test the validity of the Chinese passport received, as before mentioned, from the Chinese minister at London.
A few days later we were rolling up the valley of the Ili, having crossed that river by the well-constructed Russian bridge at Fort Iliysk, the head of navigation for the boats from Lake Balkash. New faces here met our curious gaze. As an ethnological transition between the inhabitants of central Asia and the Chinese, we were now among two distinctly agricultural races—the Dungans [pg 142]and Taranchis. As the invited guests of these people on several occasions, we were struck with their extreme cleanliness, economy, and industry; but their deep-set eyes seem to express reckless cruelty.
The Mohammedan mosques of this people are like the Chinese pagodas in outward appearance, while they seem to be Chinese in half-Kirghiz garments. Their women, too, do not veil themselves, although they are much more shy than their rugged sisters of the steppes. Tenacious of their word, these people were also scrupulous about returning favors. Our exhibitions were usually rewarded by a spread of sweets and yellow Dungan tea. Of this we would partake beneath the shade of their well-trained grape-arbors, while listening to the music, or rather discord, of a peculiar stringed instrument played by the boys. Its bow of two parts was so interlaced with the strings of the instrument as to play upon two at every draw. Another musician usually accompanied by beating little sticks on a saucer.
These are the people who were introduced by the Manchus to replace the Kalmucks in the Kuldja district, and who in 1869 so terribly avenged upon their masters the blood they previously caused to flow. The fertile province of Kuldja, with a population of 2,500,000, was reduced by their massacres to one vast necropolis. On all sides are canals that have become swamps, abandoned fields, wasted forests, and towns and villages in ruins, in some of which the ground is still strewn with the bleached bones of the murdered.
As we ascended the Ili valley piles of stones marked in succession the sites of the towns of Turgen, Jarkend, Akkend, and Khorgos, names which the Russians are already reviving in their pioneer settlements. The largest of these, Jarkend, is the coming frontier town, to take the place of [pg 144]evacuated Kuldja. About twenty-two miles east of this point the large white Russian fort of Khorgos stands bristling on the bank of the river of that name, which, by the treaty of 1881, is now the boundary-line of the Celestial empire. On a ledge of rocks overlooking the ford a Russian sentinel was walking his beat in the solitude of a dreary outpost. He stopped to watch us as we plunged into the flood, with our Russian telega for a ferry-boat. “All’s well,” we heard him cry, as, bumping over the rocky bottom, we passed from Russia into China. “Ah, yes,” we thought; “ ‘All’s well that ends well,’ but this is only the beginning.”
A few minutes later we dashed through the arched driveway of the Chinese custom-house, and were several yards away before the lounging officials realized what it was that flitted across their vision. “Stop! Come back!” they shouted in broken Russian. Amid a confusion of chattering voices, rustling gowns, clattering shoes, swinging pigtails, and clouds of opium and tobacco smoke, we were brought into the presence of the head official. Putting on his huge spectacles, he read aloud the visé written upon our American passports by the Chinese minister in London. His wonderment was increased when he further read that such a journey was being made on the “foot-moved carriages,” which were being curiously fingered by the attendants. Our garments were minutely scrutinized, especially the buttons, while our caps and dark-colored spectacles were taken from our heads, and passed round for each to try on in turn, amid much laughter.
Owing to the predominant influence of Russia in these northwestern confines, our Russian papers would have been quite sufficient to cross the border into Kuldja. It was only beyond this point that our Chinese passport would be found necessary, and possibly invalid. After the usual [pg 145]visés had been stamped and written over, we were off on what proved to be our six months’ experience in the “Middle Kingdom or Central Empire,” as the natives call it, for to Chinamen there is a fifth point to the compass—the center, which is China. Not far on the road we heard the clatter of hoofs behind us. A Kalmuck was dashing toward us with a portentous look on his features. We dismounted in apprehension. He stopped short some twenty feet away, leaped to the ground, and, crawling up [pg 146]on hands and knees, began to chin-chin or knock his head on the ground before us. This he continued for some moments, and then without a word gazed at us in wild astonishment. Our perplexity over this performance was increased when, at a neighboring village, a bewildered Chinaman sprang out from the speechless crowd, and threw himself in the road before us. By a dexterous turn we missed his head, and passed over his extended queue.
Kuldja, with its Russian consul and Cossack station, still maintains a Russian telegraph and postal service. The mail is carried from the border in a train of three or four telegas, which rattle along over the primitive
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