A narrow valley--Mud villages--The “Eighteen Terraces”--Devout muleteers--A tablet--Pure Mongol type--Incomprehensible dialect--A perforated mountain--Sheu-men-tzu--Not a paradise of comfort--The “kan”--The walled courtyard--Chinese food--A panic--The magic rubber band--A wind storm--A strange phenomenon--A ghost-like dance--Blinding dust.

I proceeded towards Tzie-tzia-pu-zu, on the right-hand side of the stream as one faces the tower of Tung-an-tzu. Then, turning north-west, I entered a narrow valley, the road all along being exceedingly picturesque, winding among huge boulders and rocks on either side, and at times forming beautiful gorges. We came across large and interesting caves, but probably the most curious thing noticeable in that neighbourhood was a hole pierced by Nature right through a mountain, near its summit. Here and there quaint little mud villages added life to the otherwise somewhat wild scenery. At noon the top of the Sheu-pa-pan pass was reached, the name of which, being translated, means “the eighteen terraces.” As usual, a shrine had been erected on this pass, with five gods and a tablet in it. Two of these gods were appropriately the protectors of passes, and the entrance of the building faced the east. A few yards from it, in front, stood the wall--ever to be found in China--to prevent evil spirits from entering the temple. As we have seen, the builders of these temples and the worshippers in them labour under the impression that evil spirits can only travel in a straight line. Travelling in a roundabout manner they believe impossible to them, a circumstance rather convenient for less ethereal people, since all you have to do to keep, not only temples, but even your own house, free from the visits of these objectionable callers, is to erect a small wall in front of the doorway, and you can thereafter live safe and undisturbed within the walls of your dwelling.

[Sidenote: DEVOUT TRAVELLERS]

The muleteers, who are about the only travellers on these lonely roads, are extremely devout, and even the men in my employ never missed an opportunity of paying their chin-chins to the gods inside the temples and shrines we passed on the roadside.

The tablet in this particular temple was of the fifth moon of the fifteenth year of Tzia-tziu; or, in other words, dated from the present dynasty.

South-east of the pass, a long way off, the towers of Tung-an-tzu could still be distinguished on the sky-line.

Descending on the other side of the pass, I was particularly struck by the sudden and strongly-marked contrast in the type of the inhabitants. They were now of an absolutely pure Mongol type; they had larger and more slanting eyes, a flatter nose with wide nostrils, and appeared less intelligent and quick than the natives we had so far encountered. They spoke a dialect quite incomprehensible to us--even to my muleteers. We had noticed variations from one village to another in the pronunciation of the same words, but here, much to the concern of my men, we could not understand a single word.

As we continued to descend, the valley grew wider. Late in the afternoon the village of the Kau family, Kau-tzia-chuan, was reached, and not very distant from it another quaint village, after which the hills closed in again, the road being actually walled in between huge rocks perpendicular to the ground.

A perforated and curiously-shaped mountain in the vicinity gives its name, “Mao-mian-tzu,” to the next village we visited, and when we had toiled through yet another small valley, a ravine and a narrow pass, we left the region of the picturesque and solid granite, and came to one where it is replaced by soft earth of a ghastly yellow colour.

Towards six in the evening we halted at Sheu-men-tzu (the stone door), where we put up at the quaint little inn.

A Chinese inn at its best is not a paradise of comfort, nor, indeed, a model of cleanliness or privacy. There are, of course, in China, inns that are larger than others, but, no matter what their size, all are equally and disgustingly dirty. Those in towns have separate small rooms, no bigger than ship cabins, with paper windows. A portion of the room, called the “kan,” raised a couple of feet above the floor, and covered with a rough mat, is the part on which one sleeps at night and sits in the daytime. This raised portion being of masonry, and vaulted, a fire can be lighted under it in winter to keep one warm. There is possibly, when the “kan” is lighted, the disadvantage of having one’s body broiled on one side and frozen on the other, unless one keeps turning over all the time, but that is only a trifle to travellers in the Celestial Empire.

In villages where smaller inns--generally only one--are to be found, the accommodation is even worse. There is only one barren shed, with a “kan” running the whole length of the longer wall, or sometimes two “kans,” one at each end of the room. On these, packed together like sardines, travellers of all grades of society sleep at night in their clothes, or wrapped up in blankets. The majority of guests at these resting-places are usually muleteers or pedlars, for the better classes in China are not much given to travelling.

[Sidenote: CHINESE INNS]

One of the principal features of a Chinese inn is the walled courtyard, in which the carts, sedan chairs, mules, ponies, and donkeys are kept at night, the animals making such a diabolical noise that it is not easy to get much sleep.

Most of these inns provide you with sleeping accommodation, _pour façon de parler_, and tea. Travellers have to bring their own bedding and their own food. Something to eat can nevertheless always be obtained at these hostelries by making a special arrangement, and to any one not over fastidious there are several Chinese dishes that are quite palatable. For instance, the “laopings” (a cross between an omelette and a tart) are, to my taste, quite delicious.

Not many European travellers had been seen in these parts, and our appearance generally caused a great commotion. The moment the news of our arrival spread about, the room of the inn was invaded by swarms of natives, and our baggage, clothes, and all we possessed, inspected with ever-increasing curiosity. At this particular place, Sheu-men-tzu, I caused a panic in the crowd by showing them an indiarubber band, the expanding qualities of which made them bolt out of the room in terror. How a “ribbon,” to use their expression, only a couple of inches long could suddenly become a yard long and _vice-versa_ was a mystery quite beyond them, and was looked upon as uncanny. They kept discussing it all night--at a respectful distance, be it understood--and none of my things were fingered again as long as we remained. It is superfluous to say that, on my side, I never failed to produce the “magic rubber band” whenever, on after occasions, the natives bothered us too much with their inquisitiveness.

I made a very early start, as a long day’s journey was before me, and by eight o’clock had already passed through To-cheng-pu and reached the plateau-like stretch of yellow earth on the summit of the hill-range. About an hour later, in a wind-storm, I began descending towards an immense plain--a regular desert--which lay for miles and miles stretched below me, losing itself in the sky on the horizon. We were fortunate enough to witness a strange phenomenon. Dozens of gigantic columns of dust, rising several hundred feet above the ground and formed by so many whirlwinds, were revolving at a terrific pace upon themselves, and moving about along the plain in a fantastic, ghost-like dance. Every now and then one vanished in a cloud of dust, and others, as if by magic, rose in a cone-like shape from the ground to join in the weird game of Nature. With incredible rapidity these moving dust cones assumed an immense height.

On crossing the plain, although we naturally took care to avoid these whirlwinds, we were nearly caught in one of them, for they travel so swiftly and in such an erratic fashion that it is not always easy to get out of their way. The whizzing noise, as it swept by us, was fearful, and the dust raised was for some minutes blinding. Even stones of moderate size were lifted up several feet by the force of the rotatory movement of the wind.

[Sidenote: BLINDING DUST]

As we went on across this table-land--at Tao-la-tsuei the altitude was over 4000 feet--the wind increased during the afternoon, and, as it blew in our faces, made travelling uncomfortable. At times such was its fury that it was all we could do to hold on to our saddles. It raised a fearful dust, and in the afternoon further thick masses of sand blew over us. The latter probably came from the southern part of the desert. It was like being in a dense yellow fog, and for some time we were at a loss as to where we were going. We lost the track in the blinding dust, and had considerable difficulty in finding it again.