Page:Mongolia, the Tangut country, and the solitudes of northern Tibet vol 1 (1876).djvu/191

 the sun's rays, which shone dimly as if through smoke; sometimes they were entirely obscured, and it was twilight at noon. Hills half a mile off were invisible; and large particles of sand were driven with such force by the wind, that even the camels accustomed to the desert would turn their backs to the storm and wait till its fury had abated. We could not keep our eyes open when facing it; our heads ached, and there was a singing in our ears as though we were in the throes of suffocation. Everything in the tent was thickly covered with dust; and when it had been blowing hard all night we could hardly open our eyes in the morning for the layer of dirt which covered them. Now and then, in the intervals between the squalls, hail and rain would come in buckets-full, driven into the finest sleet by the force of the gale. After a few minutes of this, there would be a lull for a quarter of an hour, succeeded by another hurricane and another downpour of rain. Although our tent was fastened to the ground with twelve iron pegs, each more than a foot long, it seemed about to be torn up every minute, and we were obliged to secure it to the packs with all the ropes we had.

The total quantity of rain and snowfall is, however, small; very little, if any, occurring in March and April.

The constant frosts and winds on these high plains during the spring delay the flight of birds and retard vegetation. Towards the end of April the young grass certainly begins to shoot up under the