546 ACROSS DZUNGARIA 



long daj^'s trek, the line of vegetation for which we had 

 aimed was found to be dried up and we were in danger 

 of a waterless camp. On that occasion the dogs drew 

 our attention to a pool of rain-water lying some way off 

 the track, and we camped close by. Water did not 

 necessarily mean grazing, for the following morning 

 we found that all the horses had strayed far and wide 

 in search of grass ; we thus found ourselves in the 

 predicament of being seven men and eight horse-loads 

 of baggage dumped in mid-desert, with a small and 

 rapidly drying pool of rain-water to depend upon ! All 

 that day and the following night the men scouted the 

 country for the missing animals — no easy matter in a 

 flat plain covered with lo-ft.-high saxaul and tamarisk 

 scrub. Eventually eleven were secured out of sixteen, 

 and, giving up the others as lost, we moved on, just 

 as our now very muddy and much diminished rain-pool 

 was drying up. 



After some eight days in the desert, although endea- 

 vouring to keep a line towards the north-west, one obstacle 

 after another turned us unwillingly towards the west 

 and south-west, until we actually reached the outer 

 fringe of the cultivation along the Kutun River which 

 waters Shi-Kho. Even then we should have struck 

 northwards along a track which led in that direction 

 had not our guide decamped, tempted by our proximity 

 to the Shi-Kho bazaars ; we had therefore to follow suit. 



These two weeks spent in wandering over the plain, 

 although trying and disappointing in that we had been 

 thwarted in carrying out our plan, were not wasted. 

 We had learnt much of the complex character of Central 

 Dzungaria, which otherwise would have remained a 

 blank to us. 



