CHAPTER XX 



A THIBETAN INTERLUDE 



TAOCHOW, the Old City, 2,000 ft. above sea level, 

 of indefinite age, and inhabited by a mixed popula- 

 tion of Thibetans, Chinese, and Mohammedans, 

 lies on the borders of Thibet and Kansu. It is a 

 quaint little walled town, and wandering through 

 its streets one feels at the other end of the world. 

 The chief object of interest is a fine Mohammedan 

 mosque, surmounted by a double cupola with curved 

 roofs. There is a curiously unbusinesslike, uncon- 

 ventional air about the place. References are not 

 asked for nor required, and the open shops 

 with their miscellaneous contents invite enquiry. 

 Bears' paws, dried, with the claws intact, for they 

 are otherwise valueless, swing mournfully amid 

 bundles of deer's sinews ; eagles' wings, mac/ti 

 feathers, wapiti horns, roe heads, yak bells, swords, 

 daggers, and I know not what other curious 

 objects, attract the foreigner's attention. They 

 hold, too, a wonderful variety of skins. Half a 

 dozen species of cat, from the splendid lynx, 

 valued at seven or eight taels apiece, to the 

 common domestic brute worth a few cash. Fox 

 and wolf hang side by side, whilst in the wholesale 

 houses lie hundreds of sheep and lambskins, of 



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