We felt the cold becoming rather cutting at the fall of night, and we observed the thermometer already several degrees below zero. We therefore resolved to alight at a Mongolian encampment, that we might be able to warm ourselves at the family fire. Besides, M. Marine, like a true Russian, was longing for a cup of tea, and all the utensils necessary for this purpose were with the caravan, far beyond our reach. The tents, near which our yemschik pulled up his troïka, were most picturesquely pitched on the slope of a hill just on the skirts of a little pine wood, and these trees were the last I had the pleasure of regarding for a long time. The night was beautifully clear, and little plots of snow, that had stood out against the thaw of the preceding days, were quite luminous in the silvery rays of the moon. We quickly leapt to the ground and then over the barrier of the paling, and M. Marine and I, without calling out, presented ourselves at the opening of the tent which appeared to be the principal habitation.
A STREET IN URGA.
These tents are firmly raised on wooden lattice-work, covered with several layers of sheep’s skins. They are about three yards in diameter, and are entered by a single, narrow, low opening, which is closed by a sheep’s skin hanging before it. Facing this entrance may invariably be seen a little statuette or picture, representing the protecting deity of the family, and, before it, stand seven or eight small vessels or vases, containing bread, salt, bits of wood, camel-dung, tea,—everything in fact necessary to the ignoble, barbaric existence of these poor, rude people.
The tent was occupied by two men and a woman, who were lying around a fire placed in the centre, and which barely lighted with its glowing embers this wretched hovel. We soon discovered that this recumbent attitude was the only one supportable; for the abundance of smoke rendered respiration impossible beyond two or three feet above the ground. This is the reason the Mongols appear nearly black, from having their faces covered with a layer of soot, a coating they are not accustomed to remove. The wife, like all Mongolian women, was covered with jewels. A demi-crown in silver was set on her forehead; two large pins gathered her hair behind her ears, as in Egyptian mummies, and two enormous brooches, also of silver, fastened the ends of it over her chest; the whole being ornamented with variously coloured stones.
These three human beings crouching like tired hounds around a smouldering heap of dried camel-dung, whose feeble and fitful glowing alone lighted up in the gloaming their black eyes and glittering jewels, formed a scene, in which the startled imagination conjured up, from mediæval times, midnight councils of black spirits, looming through “the fog and filthy air.” It was one altogether spectral and diabolic. A few hours had indeed transformed my existence, and carried me beyond the pale of civilized life into a desert, where I was doomed to pass many long days and nights, in which there was no retreat but these unearthly abodes. But then, on the other hand, I was well provided with food and utensils; and, as I looked up through an opening in the top of the tent, and gazed on the pale twinkling stars, they seemed to invite me benignly to spread my repast on the desert sand and trust to their unerring guidance over the trackless way.
Our yemschik was not long in following us into the tent: as he was a Buriat, he entered into conversation with our hosts, who seemed pleased to receive us. I tried to make myself intelligible to M. Marine, but did not venture to do so in Russian: the ease, however, with which I made myself understood, gave me a high opinion of his intelligence. The Mongols quickly perceived that signs and gestures were important elements in our conversation, and I was to them, as to the Chinese of Maimatchin, an object of much curiosity. I took care, however, to keep them at a respectful distance, and not to allow myself to be touched by any member of this filthy, fulsome, fetid race, teeming with vermin and covered with corroding sores. There is not, I am sure, any people in the world more disgusting than the Mongols. Water in this region, unhappily, is too precious to admit of its use for any other purpose than drinking. These wretched creatures are therefore putrefying in their wounds: sometimes, in fact, their limbs drop off and they perish piecemeal, inspiring with horror all those who come near them, who can only stand helpless and aghast at such a spectacle of human suffering.
When we had refreshed ourselves and warmed our benumbed limbs, we hastened to emerge from this loathsome hut and to breathe again, under the star-bespangled firmament, the pure bracing desert air. Then we stretched ourselves in our tarantass for our night’s repose.
It was about three o’clock in the morning, when our horses had sufficiently rested, and we resumed our way.
During this journey we found ourselves, many times, suddenly surrounded by Mongol horsemen clad in yellow jackets and red breeches, who, having spied a Russian conveyance, had galloped up at full speed to gratify their curiosity. They had long poles rather heavy fastened to their horses and trailing behind them, and these left on the sand a trace of their course.