28o MIRAGE. LAND OF DEATH. 



to disgust anyone ; but we, like the Mongols, were 

 obliofed to use it, taking: care to boil it first and to add 

 brick-tea. 



The mirage, that evil genius of the desert, 

 mocked us almost daily, and conjured up such tanta- 

 lisinof visions of tremulous water that even the rocks 

 of the neighbouring hills appeared as though reflected 

 in it. Severe heat and frequent storms of wind pre- 

 vented our sleeping quietly at night, much as we 

 needed rest after the arduous day's march. 



But not to us alone was the desert of Mongolia 

 an enemy. Birds which began to make their appear- 

 ance in the latter half of August suffered equally 

 from thirst and hunger. We saw flocks of geese and 

 ducks resting at the smallest pools, and small birds 

 flew to our tent so exhausted with starvation as to 

 allow us to catch them in the hand. We found 

 several of these feathered wanderers quite dead, and 

 in all probability numbers of them perish in their 

 flight across the desert. 



The chief migration of birds was in September,^ 

 and by the 13th of that month we had counted 

 twenty-four varieties. From our observations the 

 geese directed their flight not due south but south- 

 east towards the northern bend of the Hoang-ho. 



Eighty-seven miles north of the Hurku hills we 

 crossed another trade route from Kuku-khoto to 

 Uliassutai ;^ practicable for carts although the trafiic 



* Especially in the latter part of the month, but we had already 

 arrived at Urga, and were therefore beyond the confines of the desert. 



- In all probability our camels were driven off by this road in 

 1 87 1, when they were stolen from us near the temple of Shireti-tsu. 



