of the wheels may chance to roll produces a violent jolting of the whole vehicle and consequently of its unfortunate occupant. It may easily be imagined how his sufferings may be aggravated when travelling with post horses at a trot.
In a conveyance of this kind, hired from a Kiakhta merchant, we determined to proceed with camels through Mongolia to Kalgan. Our contractor was a Mongol whо had brought a quantity of tea to Kiakhta and was returning for a fresh load. After some negotiations, we finally agreed with him for the transport of ourselves, one Cossack, and all our baggage, to Kalgan for 70 lans (140 rubles, 20l.).[1]
The journey was not to take more than forty days, a comparatively long time, as the Mongols usually convey travellers from Kiakhta to Peking in twenty-five days, but the price charged for this accelerated speed is proportionately higher. I wished to acquaint myself as far as I could with the nature of the country through which I was about to travel, and, therefore, a slow rate of progress was rather an advantage to me than otherwise. A Cossack of the Buriat tribe belonging to the Trans-Baikal force was ordered to accompany us as interpreter of the Mongol language. He proved to be an excellent dragoman; but being the son of a rich man, and disliking the hardships of travel, he soon became so
- ↑ Lan appears to be the Russian way of representing the word which French and English sinologues write usually as liang, viz. the taël, or Chinese 'ounce of silver.'—Y.
