14. ACROSS MONGOLIAN PLAINS 



regions they are fifty or even sixty miles apart, but usu- 

 ally less than that. 



The camel caravans travel mostly at night. For all 

 his size and apparent strength, a camel is a delicate ani- 

 mal and needs careful handling. He cannot stand the 

 heat of the midday sun and he will not graze at night. 

 So the Gobi caravans start about three or four o'clock 

 in the afternoon and march until one or two the next 

 moiling. Then the men pitch a light tent and the cam- 

 els sleep or wander over the plain. 



At noon on the second day we reached Panj-kiang, 

 the first telegraph station on the line. Its single mud 

 house was visible miles away and we were glad to see it, 

 for our gasoline was getting low. Coltman had sent a 

 plentiful supply by caravan to await us here, and every 

 available inch of space was filled with cans, for we were 

 only one-quarter of the way to Urga. 



Not far beyond Panj-kiang, a lama monastery has 

 been built beside the road. Its white-walled temple 

 bordered with red and the compound enclosing the liv- 

 ing quarters of the lamas show with startling distinctness 

 on the open plain. We stopped for water at a well a 

 few hundred yards away, and in five minutes the cars 

 were surrounded by a picturesque group of lamas who 

 streamed across the plain on foot and on horseback, their 

 yellow and red robes flaming in the sun. They were 

 amiable enough in fact, too friendly and their curi- 

 osity was hardly welcome, for we found one of them test- 

 ing his knife on the tires and another about to punch 



