Our small group consisting of four mounted and one pack camel movednorthward along the valley of the River Boyagol in the direction ofthe Tarbagatai Mountains. The road was rocky and covered deep withsnow. Our camels walked very carefully, sniffing out the way asour guide shouted the "Ok! Ok!" of the camel drivers to urge themon. We left behind us the fortress and Chinese dugun, swung roundthe shoulder of a ridge and, after fording several times an openstream, began the ascent of the mountain. The scramble was hardand dangerous. Our camels picked their way most cautiously, movingtheir ears constantly, as is their habit in such stress. The trailzigzagged into mountain ravines, passed over the tops of ridges,slipped back down again into shallower valleys but ever made higherand higher altitudes. At one place under the grey clouds thattipped the ridges we saw away up on the wide expanse of snow someblack spots.
"Those are the obo, the sacred signs and altars for the bad demonswatching this pass," explained the guide. "This pass is calledJagisstai. Many very old tales about it have been kept alive,ancient as these mountains themselves."We encouraged him to tell us some of them.
The Mongol, rocking on his camel and looking carefully all aroundhim, began his tale.
"It was long ago, very long ago. . . . The grandson of the greatJenghiz Khan sat on the throne of China and ruled all Asia. TheChinese killed their Khan and wanted to exterminate all his familybut a holy old Lama slipped the wife and little son out of thepalace and carried them off on swift camels beyond the Great Wall,where they sank into our native plains. The Chinese made a longsearch for the trails of our refugees and at last found where theyhad gone. They despatched a strong detachment on fleet horses tocapture them. Sometimes the Chinese nearly came up with thefleeing heir of our Khan but the Lama called down from Heaven adeep snow, through which the camels could pass while the horseswere inextricably held. This Lama was from a distant monastery.
We shall pass this hospice of Jahantsi Kure. In order to reach itone must cross over the Jagisstai. And it was just here the oldLama suddenly became ill, rocked in his saddle and fell dead. TaSin Lo, the widow of the Great Khan, burst into tears; but, seeingthe Chinese riders galloping there below across the valley, pressedon toward the pass. The camels were tired, stopping every moment,nor did the woman know how to stimulate and drive them on. TheChinese riders came nearer and nearer. Already she heard theirshouts of joy, as they felt within their grasp the prize of themandarins for the murder of the heir of the Great Khan. The headsof the mother and the son would be brought to Peking and exposed onthe Ch'ien Men for the mockery and insults of the people. Thefrightened mother lifted her little son toward heaven andexclaimed:
"'Earth and Gods of Mongolia, behold the offspring of the man whohas glorified the name of the Mongols from one end of the world tothe other! Allow not this very flesh of Jenghiz Khan to perish!'
"At this moment she noticed a white mouse sitting on a rock nearby.
It jumped to her knees and said:
"'I am sent to help you. Go on calmly and do not fear. Thepursuers of you and your son, to whom is destined a life of glory,have come to the last bourne of their lives.'
"Ta Sin Lo did not see how one small mouse could hold in checkthree hundred men. The mouse jumped back to the ground and againspoke:
"'I am the demon of Tarbagatai, Jagasstai. I am mighty and belovedof the Gods but, because you doubted the powers of the miracle-speaking mouse, from this day the Jagasstai will be dangerous forthe good and bad alike.'
"The Khan's widow and son were saved but Jagasstai has everremained merciless. During the journey over this pass one mustalways be on one's guard. The demon of the mountain is ever readyto lead the traveler to destruction."All the tops of the ridges of the Tarbagatai are thickly dottedwith the obo of rocks and branches. In one place there was evenerected a tower of stones as an altar to propitiate the Gods forthe doubts of Ta Sin Lo. Evidently the demon expected us. When webegan our ascent of the main ridge, he blew into our faces with asharp, cold wind, whistled and roared and afterwards began castingover us whole blocks of snow torn off the drifts above. We couldnot distinguish anything around us, scarcely seeing the camelimmediately in front. Suddenly I felt a shock and looked about me.
Nothing unusual was visible. I was seated comfortably between twoleather saddle bags filled with meat and bread but . . . I couldnot see the head of my camel. He had disappeared. It seemed thathe had slipped and fallen to the bottom of a shallow ravine, whilethe bags which were slung across his back without straps had caughton a rock and stopped with myself there in the snow. This time thedemon of Jagasstai only played a joke but one that did not satisfyhim. He began to show more and more anger. With furious gusts ofwind he almost dragged us and our bags from the camels and nearlyknocked over our humped steeds, blinded us with frozen snow andprevented us from breathing. Through long hours we dragged slowlyon in the deep snow, often falling over the edge of the rocks. Atlast we entered a small valley where the wind whistled and roaredwith a thousand voices. It had grown dark. The Mongol wanderedaround searching for the trail and finally came back to us,flourishing his arms and saying:
"We have lost the road. We must spend the night here. It is verybad because we shall have no wood for our stove and the cold willgrow worse.
With great difficulties and with frozen hands we managed to set upour tent in the wind, placing in it the now useless stove. Wecovered the tent with snow, dug deep, long ditches in the driftsand forced our camels to lie down in them by shouting the "Dzuk!
Dzuk!" command to kneel. Then we brought our packs into the tent.
My companion rebelled against the thought of spending a cold nightwith a stove hard by.
"I am going out to look for firewood," said he very decisively; andat that took up the ax and started. He returned after an hour witha big section of a telegraph pole.
"You, Jenghiz Khans," said he, rubbing his frozen hands, "take youraxes and go up there to the left on the mountain and you will findthe telegraph poles that have been cut down. I made acquaintancewith the old Jagasstai and he showed me the poles."Just a little way from us the line of the Russian telegraphspassed, that which had connected Irkutsk with Uliassutai before thedays of the Bolsheviki and which the Chinese had commanded theMongols to cut down and take the wire. These poles are now thesalvation of travelers crossing the pass. Thus we spent the nightin a warm tent, supped well from hot meat soup with vermicelli, allin the very center of the dominion of the angered Jagasstai. Earlythe next morning we found the road not more than two or threehundred paces from our tent and continued our hard trip over theridge of Tarbagatai. At the head of the Adair River valley wenoticed a flock of the Mongolian crows with carmine beaks circlingamong the rocks. We approached the place and discovered therecently fallen bodies of a horse and rider. What had happened tothem was difficult to guess. They lay close together; the bridlewas wound around the right wrist of the man; no trace of knife orbullet was found. It was impossible to make out the features ofthe man. His overcoat was Mongolian but his trousers and underjacket were not of the Mongolian pattern. We asked ourselves whathad happened to him.
Our Mongol bowed his head in anxiety and said in hushed but assuredtones: "It is the vengeance of Jagasstai. The rider did not makesacrifice at the southern obo and the demon has strangled him andhis horse."At last Tarbagatai was behind us.............