Page:Mongolia, the Tangut country, and the solitudes of northern Tibet vol 1 (1876).djvu/82

16 the eyes of the nomads, induced the Chinese to march hither 2,000 of their own soldiers, and to assemble 1,000 Mongol troops. But the notorious cowardice of these fighting men afforded a very insufficient safeguard to Urga, and the Russian Government was obliged to send a considerable force (600 infantry and Cossacks, with two guns) to protect the consulate and the tea trade. This detachment remained at Urga more than a year, and thanks were due entirely to it if the insurgents relinquished their attack on Bogdo-Kuren.

At Urga the Siberian character of Northern Mongolia ceases. On crossing the Tola the traveller leaves behind him the last remaining stream; and here too, on Mount Khan-ola, considered sacred ever since the Emperor Kang-hi hunted there, he must take his last look at forest scenery. Southwards, as far as the borders of China Proper, lies the same desert of Gobi, which extends like an enormous girdle across the plateau of Eastern Asia, from the western spurs of the Kuen-lun to the Khingan mountains, which divide Mongolia from Manchuria.

The western part of this desert, especially between the Thian-shan and Kuen-lun, is entirely unexplored even at the present day. The eastern half is best known along the Kiakhta and Kalgan