93 ° 
THROUGH ASIA 
and stand, the medicine - chest, my ulster, cigars, the 
petroleum cooking - stove, and the two photographic 
cameras. Unfortunately these last were of very little 
service afterwards ; for the inhabitants of Tavek-kel had 
appropriated the plates and used them for glazing the 
grated window-openings of their houses. I was therefore 
still restricted, as regards the future, to my pen and pencil ; 
hence it is only the earlier portion of this book which is 
illustrated from photographs. 
The hunters fell in with Togda Beg’s proposal, and had 
already disposed of articles to the value of lo. Ahmed 
Merghen and Kasim Akhun, who had accompanied me 
down the Keriya - daria, had kept their own counsel 
throughout the whole of the journey. But I suspect 
their consciences pricked them ; for, whenever our 
unfortunate desert journey was talked about, they always 
used to say, that the things I had abandoned were certain 
to be found again, and that they would look for them as 
they went home from Chimen, as though they were 
seeking to cover their retreat. I also understood now, 
why Togda Beg lodged me in an ordinary house when I 
visited Tavek-kel, and did not offer me the hospitality of 
his own. The stolen articles wmre concealed there in 
carpets and felts, and possibly something might have been 
discovered. 
The amban, Liu Darin, also held an inquiry, in the 
course of w'hich he elicited, that the locks of my boxes 
had been forcibly broken open. (1 left them locked and 
put the key under one of the boxes that unlucky ist May, 
1895.) He asked how the men had dared to do such a 
thing, and whether they did not know that both the 
Chinese law and the Mohammedan sheriet (theological 
law) forbade them to lay hands upon another person’s 
property. They replied, the boxes w'ere so heavy, that 
they were obliged to break them open, in order to carry 
the contents piecemeal. 
All this had taken place two or three months before 
1 got back to Khotan. The hunters had been put to 
torture to make them confess ; after that they were 
