428 SOUTHERN DZUNGARIA 



for transport to carry us over 800 miles of the worst 

 section of this road, from Kulja to Kumul on the edge of 

 the Gobi. 



Being winter, this route alone was open to us, and 

 we had no choice but to follow the high-road, which 

 passes out of the Hi Valley over the Boro-Khoro range 

 by the Talki Pass, and, entering Dzungaria, leads by a 

 route of unrelieved monotony along its southern borders. 

 This is the Pei-lu — the " great North Road " of the 

 Chinese ; it runs along the northern side of the Tian 

 Shan Mountains, and is thus called in order to distinguish 

 it from the Nan-lu, or South Road, which runs the entire 

 length of Chinese Turkestan on the south side of the Tian 

 Shan. Had it been summer we might have varied the 

 tediousness of a continuous cart-journey along the high- 

 road by taking a mountain-track for a portion of the 

 way ; but even in the best season these hill-tracks in 

 the Tian Shan are difficult and dangerous, while the 

 time occupied in traversing them would be far greater 

 than that entailed by the journey along the main-road. 



*rhe season of the year, which limited us in our choice 

 of routes, also permitted only one method of transport. 

 The deep snow and the bitter winds rendered exposure 

 dangerous even to the inured and hardened natives ; 

 transport by camel or horse-caravan would have been 

 impossible in the face of such intense cold, with so great 

 a distance to cover ; the only other means of getting to 

 Kumul was by cart. 



The Chinese officials and merchants — all, in fact, who 

 can afford to do so — travel over the roads of the New 

 Dominion by wheel-transport. They come from rail- 

 head at Honan in China Proper to these far western 

 dependencies by cart ; when they have served their 



