of tea a distance home of 5,000 miles. When I
reached Vierny, however, I was told that this yellow
tea was of so choice a kind that it is reserved in
China for the Emperor and great personages; that
now and then Chinese generals sold it to Russian
officers, and that its value was about 50^. per lb.,
whereupon I was reconciled to bringing it to England,
but only to give to my friends in small quantities
as a curiosity, for my poor taste is not sufficiently
educated a la Chinoise to appreciate its super-excellence.
W e reached Chinchakhodzi by night, and found
the one room of the post-station occupied by a doctor.
W e were recommended not to proceed in the dark,
as the road was bad, but to wait for the rising of the
moon, which I did, our company being soon increased
by an officer, his wife, wet-nurse and a b ab y ; so that,
rather than attempt going to sleep, I sat up reading and
writing, and soon after midnight we sped forward. Early
in the morning we crossed the two or three streams of
the Khorgos, and breakfasted at Ak-Kent. The next
station was Jar-Kend, that has now become colonized
by Dungans and Taranchis who have left the Kuldja
province to be under the Russians, rather than, remain
thereto be subject to the Chinese. A wealthy Taran-
chi, who joined Mr. P. in the steam navigation project
of the Ili, has removed from Kuldja to this place, and it
is here that corn had to be brought, in 1883, to supply
their immediate wants; but M. Gourdet tells me that
now the emigrants are quite settled on their new lands,
and have so finished their irrigation works that it is
expected wheat will be cheaper in this neighbourhood
than at Vierny.
W e came next to Borokhudzir. We had succeeded,
well about horses thus far, but, to make matters still
better, we found awaiting us here, on the frontier of
the uyezd, the secretary of the Uyezdi nachalnik, who,
through General Kolpakovsky’s kindness, had actually
come all the way from Kopal to accompany us for the
purpose of seeing that we were not delayed through
lack of horses. An instance of greater official kindness
than this I had never met. The secretary took
us over the nursery garden in the place, and we then
started forward, our cicerone preceding us a little so
as to get to the next station first, and have fresh horses
in readiness. The same evening, at Konor-Ulen, we
came again to the station where was the sick telegraphist,
whose kindness to us we returned by leaving
him some fruit. Mr. Sevier attended again to the
Tatar’s tongue, who asked this time what were the
books we had sold him, for he could not understand
them. After this we reached the steep incline of
the pass, up which we had six horses to drag us,
before descending to the station beyond.