74 A CONTRIBUTION TO THE ORNITHOLOGY 
was built by Hazrat Afak, a King of Kashghar, one hundred 
and eighty-six years ago, over his father’s grave. Hazrat Afak 
himself died eleven years after the completion of the building, 
and was buried there. Formerly there were many books in the 
place, histories of the shrine, &c.; but the Hajji said that the 
place had been so often sacked and looted that very few re- 
mained. I suppose this referred to depredations committed by 
the ‘friendly and good natured Kirghiz,’ as the Chinese would 
hardly trouble themselves about such matters. The Hajji him- 
self was a descendant of Hazrat Afak and had been to Cons- 
tantinople, &e. The grounds of the shrine are all rent-free, 
and it contains orchards, vineyards, a college for the training 
of Mullahs, and a short of alms-house for poor Mullahs and 
their families. 
Our ride back to our quarters, through the country and not 
by the way we went to the Mazar, occupied an hour and a half 
very pleasantly. On the way I noticed the method adopted in 
the construction of the tire of a wheel for an arabah: a thickish 
main branch of a poplar or willow is laid on the ground, one end 
bearing against the trunk of a tree, while the other end is gradu- 
ally forced round by means of a stake driven into the cround 
and brought nearer and nearer to the tree at stated intervals. 
Kashghar, 30th November.— During this month the weather has 
become decidedly wintry. We have had seven days of cloudless 
sky ; fourteen days of partial cloud, and haze; and nine days of 
gloomy weather, the sky being quite overcast. On three days a 
cold raw wind was blowing ; “but the rest of the time the air has 
been generally still, so that the cold has not been felt as much as 
might have been expected. During the first half of the month 
the mean of the daily maximum temperature was 53°1; the mean 
of the daily minimum temperature, 27°6; and the mean grass 
minimum, 19°-4, During the latter half of the month, the mean 
maximum has been 41° 7; the mean minimum, 18° 6s 3; and the 
mean grass minimum, 12°-9; but on the 25th the maximum for 
the day did not exceed 26°6 F., while on the 27th the mini- 
mum in the shade fell as low as 10°-8 and the grass minimum 
as low as 4°-9 F. On the 18th, ice, two inches thick, formed on 
the surface of a tank inside the Residency : and to-day (30th) 
numerous fields outside are covered with sheets of ice, due ‘to the 
freezing of the layer of water which had been allowed to flow 
over them. Although vegetation cannot yet be said to be dor- 
mant, it is more or less, going to sleep. 
Her e, at Kashghar,* we are in the north-west corner of 
Kastern Turkestan, at an elevation of 4,124 feet. ‘To the north 
* Captain Trotter has fixed the position of Kashghar Wie: Shahr) at N. Lat. 
39° 24’ 26”, and Longitude 78° 6’ 47” E. of Greenwich. 
