EXPLORATIONS IX MONGOLIA AXD TIBET. 



By W. Woodville Rockhill. 



On the l.st of December, 1891, I left Peking for a journey in Mon- 

 golia and Tibet, proposing, if possible, to traverse the latter country 

 from north to south and reach British India — Sikkim or Xepah 



I was well provided with scientific apparatus, and very scantily with 

 money, and so I started out with the anticipation of having to endure 

 many discomforts, and possibly see my chance of ultimate success lost 

 for want of a few hundred dollars and my collections poor for lack of 

 funds and means of transportation. This is the one insurmountable 

 difliculty a traveller can have to contend with; nearly every obstacle 

 can be overcome or turned, but how to travel on an empty money bag 

 (and an empty stomach, as it turned out in my case), in a strange land, 

 is a more difficult problem for most men than the quadrature of the 

 circle. 



I will pass over the first few stages of my journey, whicli led me 

 through Chang-chia k'ou to the great emporium of eastern Mongo- 

 lia, Kuei-hua Ch'eng, where I arrived on the ISth of December. 



This town was known in the T'ang period (a. d. 618-007), and how 

 long before that I can Jiot now say. 



Col. Yule* thinks it was Tenduc, the capital of Prester John; but in 

 this 1 can not quite agree, as I believe the latter town is to be identified 

 wltli the i)resent Tou Ch'eng (in Mongol Togto), at the mouth of the 

 I lei -ho, which flows by Kuei-hua and empties into the Yellow River 

 (Huang-ho) at the former place. 



Father Gerbillon visited Kuei-hua Ch'eng in 1688, in the suite of the 

 great Emperor K'ang-hsi. He describes the place as follows: "C'est 

 uue petite Ville qu'on dit avoir ete autrefois fort marchande, et d'un 

 grand abord, pendant que les Tartares d'Oiiestetoient lesmaitres de la 

 Chine: a present c'est fort pen de chose: les muraillcs baties debriques 

 sont assez entieres par dehors ; mais il n'y a i)lus de remparts au dedans : 

 il n'y a meme rien deremarquable dans la Ville, que les Pagodes et les 

 Lamas J^ t 



* Se<- his Book of 8er Marco Polo, 2(1 edit., i, 277. 



tDuIIalde, '' Description de IKinpircdo la Chine," IV, 103. The Monj^ol name of 

 this town is Koko hiitnn, or "Blue town." Chinese histories of th(! sevcutli cen- 

 tury mention it under the name of Tuug-shou Chiang. 



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