THROUGH ASIA 
1 164 
The level of the lake is said to vary greatly in different 
periods. When the lake rises high, it is looked upon 
as premonitory of an unlucky year ; when it sinks, it 
portends nothing but prosperity. This year the lake rose 
exceptionally high. No wonder then the Dungans came 
and inflicted such great losses upon the Tanguts. But 
if the Dungans had not come, the flocks would have been 
visited by the plague, the Tanguts themselves by sickness, 
and there would have been a scanty supply of pasture. 
The lake, I was told, is always higher in summer than 
in winter. Although the actual rise and fall of the water 
is not very considerable, the different levels are very 
plainly discernible on the shore, owing to the fact that 
it shelves down so gradually. The year of my visit 
(1896) the shore-line was said to extend one and a half to 
two miles farther to the north than usual. It was no 
doubt this circumstance which led that noble and incom- 
parable man. Father Hue, to believe that Koko-nor was 
subject to ebb and flow. In this connection he says : 
“This vast sheet of water really deserves to be called 
a sea rather than a lake, for, apart from its great extent, 
its waters are as bitter salt as the waters of the ocean, 
and like them, they ebb and flow.” 
At the west end of the lake we passed at a little 
distance the obo of the Koko-noruin. There was also 
an obo on the east shore, erected in honour of the deities 
of the lake, called Tsagan-yempin or Kusha-chulun. It 
is visited once a year by the chiefs of all the tribes in 
the vicinity. At other spots along the shore there were 
several smaller obos. In one place we passed we observed 
a curious affair, consisting of branches and twigs stuck 
into the ground, and hung all over with pieces of pelts, 
tufts of wool, rope-ends, and such like choice treasures. 
In another place there was a cylindrical stone, in which 
it was customary to make fires. These two obos possessed 
the virtue of curing sickness, provided someone inter- 
ceded for the sick person, by reciting in front of them 
with sufficient industry the all - efficacious “ On maneh 
padmeh hum ! ” 
