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Once Barkul and Hami were in the possession of the Chinese, it became necessary to reopen direct communications with Souchow. This task occupied the whole of the next twelve months, and was only successfully accomplished after many difficulties had been overcome, and when halting-stations had been established across Gobi.
The water is very nasty when hot, but much better when it cools. We did not enjoy our tea at all in Hami. We were encamped in a delightful spot under both date and cocoanut-trees, and hot baths were a pleasure to everyone. I had to wait a long time till mine in the tent was cool enough.
We paid a visit to the governor of Hami, who received us on the roof of his house, where many were assembled, and scarcely had he greeted us when they all fell to praying, the mollah standing in front to lead, and all the others standing in a row behind.
Toward Central Asia he was more enterprising, and one of his best generals, Moungtien, crossed what is now the Gobi Desert, and made Hami the frontier fortress of the empire. In his civil administration Hwangti was aided by the minister Lisseh, who seems to have been a man of rare ability, and to have entered heartily into all his master's schemes for uniting the empire.
The expression Tian Shan Pe-lu, or northern Tian Shan route, in opposition to the Tian Shan Nan-lu, or southern Tian Shan route, shows that the Chinese had fully appreciated the importance of this historic highway, which continues the road running from the extreme western gate of the Great Wall obliquely across Mongolian Kan-su, through Hami and Barkul, to Urumtsi.
English letters, too, could be recognized on the second-hand paper and bagging appropriated to the natives’ use, and even the gilded buttons worn by the soldiers bore the stamp of “treble gilt.” From here the road to Hami turns abruptly south, and by a pass of over nine thousand feet crosses the declining spurs of the Tian Shan mountains, which stand like a barrier between the two great historic highways, deflecting the westward waves of migration, some to Kashgaria and others to Zungaria.
Hami is one of those cities which may be regarded as indispensable. At the edge of the Great Gobi and the converging point of the Nan-lu and Pe-lu—that is, the southern and northern routes to the western world—this oasis is a necessary resting-place.
When these stations are completed Kobdo in Mongolia, Hami in Chinese Turkestan and Sian-fu in Shensi will see wireless shafts erected; and old Peking will be in touch with the remotest spots of her far-flung lands at any time by day or night. These things are not idle dreams they are hard business facts already in the first stages of accomplishment. Why, then, should the railroad be long delayed?
Above all, the half million of Wakaf income would no longer be forthcoming, and a Turkish Emir el Haj arriving empty-handed at Mecca would bring his master to a climax of derision. Hejaz then would infallibly look out for a new potentate whom she could dignify with the title of Hami el Harameyn and Emir el Mumenin; and if there were none forthcoming would herself proclaim a Caliphate.
Tso Tsung-k`ang, already distinguished by his successes against the T`ia-p`ings and the Nien-fei, began by operations, in 1869, against the Mahometans in Shensi. Fighting his way through difficulties caused by local outbreaks and mutinies in his rear, he had captured by 1873 the important city of Su-chow in Kansuh, and by 1874 his advance-guard had reached Hami.
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