THE MURGHAB TO BULUN-KUL 207 
corrugated surface. On the other side of the pass we 
ciescended into the broad, open, level valley of Naisa-tash, 
in which were two Kirghiz auls (tent-villages). We took 
up our quarters in the one which stood farthest east. 
It consisted of five yurts (tents), occupied by nineteen 
individuals of the Chighit tribe, ten of them being men. 
They spend the wfinter and summer beside Lake Rang- 
kul ; but cross over into the valley of Naisa-tash for the 
spring grazing. Their wealth in live-stock embraced 400 
sheep, 40 yaks, 7 camels, and 3 horses. 
On the following day, April the i 2th, we were to cross 
the provisional frontier - line between the Russian and 
Chinese Pamirs. Ever since we left Rang-kul we had 
seen glittering immediately ahead of us the snowy crests 
of Sarik-kol. That lofty range we had to climb over. Out 
of the several passes which lead over it I chose the one 
known as Chuggatai, 15,500 feet in altitude. We struck 
off towards the north-east. The inclination increased the 
further we advanced, until at the foot of the pass it became 
very steep and difficult. The track too was not at all 
easy, being strewn with large blocks of gneiss and clay- 
slate, still draped for the most part with snow. On the 
summit of the pass, which had a high, sharp pitch like 
a house-roof, we halted to rest ; and whilst resting were 
surprised by a violent hailstorm, which came out of the 
south-west. The temperature was 5° Fahr. below freezing- 
point (- 2°8 C.). 
The descent towards the north, on the other side of the 
range, was equally as steep as the ascent had been ; and it 
cost us a wearisome march to reach the first aul of 
Chuggatai— a little collection of four yurts with twenty-four 
inhabitants. But we pushed on to another aul of six yurts 
a short distance lower down. There we made our first 
camp on Chinese territory. 
I speedily learned that all sorts of wildly extravagant 
rumours were flying about the neighbourhood concerning 
me. It was said, that I was a Russian, coming at the 
head of three-score Cossacks, armed to the teeth, to make 
a hostile raid into Chinese territory. My arrival had 
