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JANUARY, 1910.) ARCHÆOLOGICAL NOTES DURING EXPLORATIONS.
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drinkable water could be found now along the line which the route must have followed towards the westernmost point of the ancient frontier-line subsequently discovered by me in the desert west of Tun-huang, and no possible canal system from the Tarim could now carry water for anything like that distance beyond the Altmish-bulak site, nor even as far probably as the latter. The springs of Altmisb-bulak and some to the west of them where we sent such of our camels as could be spared from transport work, proved so salt that the poor beasts, even with the thirst of a fortnight, would not touch their water. For the same reason no ice had as yet formed on them, in spite of the minimum temperatures during our stay at the rains having fallen as low as 45° below freezing point.
On 29th December, 1906, I set out with a few meu through the unexplored desert southwestward, and afer a seven days' tramp, we safely reached the ice of the Tarim lagoons. Relics of the Stone Age, including a fine jade axe cropped up on the rare patches of eroded bare ground en roule.
11. Miran.
After surveying some localities of archeological interest on the lower Tarim and Charchan Rivers, I hurried vid Charklik to resume my excavation at Miran. This, too, was a very desolate spot situated at the foot of the absolutely barren gravel glacis which stretches down from the mountains towards the westernmost of the Lop-nor marshes. The latter had probably within historical times receded fully 10 miles or go to the north of the position occupied by the rains. But luckily a small stream which had once been used to irrigate the area, still passes within a few miles of the ruins. In the narrow jungle belt on its banks our hard-tried camels found such grazing as dead leaves of wild poplars and dry reeds can offer, and we ourselves were spared the anxieties about water transport. I had got quite used to connect cold and hardships with my archeological work, but none of our party is ever likely to forget the misery we endured during those three weeks of hard work from the icy gales almost always blowing. There were days wiren all my assistants were on the sick-list with the exception of bright, alert, Chiang-ssu-yieh.
But the results achieved offered ample reward to me. The ruined fort quite fulfilled the promise held out by the first experimental digging. The rooms and half-underground hovels which had sheltered its Tibetan garrison during the eighth to ninth century A. D. were rough enough in design and construction, but proved to contain in some respects the most remarkable refase accumulations it has ever fallen to my lot to clear. Rubbish filled them in places to a height of 9 to 10 feet, and right down to the bottom the layers of refuse of all kinds left behind by the occupants yielded in profusion records on paper and wood, mostly in Tibetan, but some in a script which looks like Kok-turki, the earliest Turki writing. The total number rose in the end to close on a thousand. Similarly, the remains of implements, articles of clothing, arms, etc., were abundant. Their condition, I am sorry to say, illustrated only too well the squalor in which these Tibetan braves must have passed their time at this forlorn frontier post. Evidence often of a very unsavoury kind seemed to indicate that the rooms which alone could have given shelter against the inclemencies of the climate, continued to be tenanted to the last, while the refuse accumulations on the floor kept steadily rising. In some places they actually attained the zoofing. I have had occasion to acquire a rather extensive experience in clearing ancient rubbish heaps, and know how to diagnose them. But for intensity of absolute dirt and age-persisting "smelliness" I shall always put the rich “ castings" of Tibetan warriors in the front rank.
There can be no doubt that the stronghold was intended to guard the direct route from the southern oases of the Tarim basin to Tun-huang (or Sha-chou). As a branch of the one previously mentioned as leading north of Lop-nor, this must have been a main line of communication into China from the last centuries B. O. onwards, and still grew in importance when the
