886 
THROUGH ASIA 
which the native inhabitants of the region bound togeAer 
to make the walls of their cabins. One of the guides 
went on first to examine the nature of the ground ; then 
followed the camels, trampling the reeds down with then- 
feet, and breaking and thrusting them aside with their 
heavy, ungainly bodies. As I followed the guides, I 
seemed to be travelling through a dark tunnel, and was 
very glad to get out again, and have an uninterrupted 
view of the road before me. 
The camels were so exhausted by the unfavourable 
country that we were obliged to give them a day s rest. 
April 6th. As usual we encamped in the open air, 
on a high sand-dune, under the shade of a group of 
ancient poplars, which had just put on their brightest 
mantles of spring greenery. From our camp we com- 
manded a wide view across the Kara-koll, and far away 
in the west saw the thick belts of reeds which encircle 
Chivillik - koll. The heat was already oppressive — at 
one p.m. 9i°6 Fahr. (33°! C.) in the shade— and the 
atmosphere was absolutely still, a rare thing at that time 
of the year. 
During these still, calm days we were greatly tormented 
by gnats. All the way we rode we were accompanied by 
a pfllar of a cloud of those pestilent insects. Their sole 
object in life seemed to be to torment human beings, and 
try their patience to the uttermost. But after the sun set, 
and we encamped for the night, they were worse than 
ever. Millions upon millions of them hummed around us, 
as eager and voracious as though we were come there 
solely to give them a treat for supper! How is it 
possible to write when a thousand gnats are fighting 
for the joy of stinging your hand, and that in defiance 
of the piece of cloth you flap in your other hand? Or 
where is the pleasure, with the thermometer standing 
where I have just stated, in surrounding your camp with 
a ring-wall of fire, and almost suffocating yourself with 
smoke ? 
When we came to the basin of Kara-koll, we hit upon 
a crafty device for retaliating upon the gnats. At sunset 
