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The church was built at the expense of the Kiachta merchants. Troilskosavsk contains some good houses, but they are not equal in luxury to those at Kiachta. Many dwellings in the former town are of unpainted logs, and each town has its gastinni-dvor, spacious and well arranged.
After visiting the converts, partly for the sake of diverting the curious eyes of the Russians from the great aim of my journey and partly in the traveller's spirit, I turned westward and crossed the Baikal on the ice, and remained a few days in the capital of Siberia, Irkutsk. On returning to Kiachta I found another teacher, and went out for another month into Mongolia and tent life.
During all the time we sat under the pavilion the crowd looked at me far more intently than at the stage. An American was a great curiosity in the city limits of Maimaichin. The performance began about two o'clock and lasted less than an hour. At its close we thanked the sargoochay for his courtesy, and returned to Kiachta.
Gilmour used, whenever possible, to return to Kiachta to spend the Sunday at Grant's house; but by enduring the hardships and suffering all the inconveniences of ordinary Mongol life he rapidly acquired the colloquial, and he also made an indelible impression upon the minds and hearts of the natives, who ever afterwards spoke of him as 'Our Gilmour. He saw Mongol life as it was, free from all the illusion and romance sometimes thrown around it.
'It is nothing to the Lord to save by many or by them that have no power. Help me, O God, for I rest on Thee, and in Thy name I go against this multitude! Kiachta, on the southern frontier of Siberia, was reached September 28, 1870, and there Gilmour was at once plunged into a series of troubles.
He claimed that his Mongol couriers made the journey to Pekin in twelve days, and that he could outstrip the Suez and Ceylon telegraph and steamers. He seemed a permanent fixture of Kiachta, as he had married a Russian lady, the daughter of a former governor. All these foreigners placed me under obligations for various favors, and the two Britons were certainly more kind to me than to each other.
All the freight between Kiachta and Lake Baikal is carried on carts in summer and on one-horse sleds in winter. From Kiachta westward tea is almost the only article of transport, the quantity sometimes amounting to a million chests per annum. The tea chests are covered with raw hide, which protects them, from rain and snow and from the many thumps of their journey.
Taken as a whole it is a mental discomfort but a physical good, and may be considered a necessary nuisance of winter travel in Siberia. At Ust Kiachta, the last station before reaching our journey's end, we were waited upon by a young and tidy woman in a well-kept room.
Unfortunately the treaty was made just after the Russian and Chinese merchants had concluded contracts in the tea districts; these contracts caused great losses when the treaty went into effect, and for a time paralized commerce. Kiachta still retains the tea trade of Siberia and sends large consignments to Nijne Novgorod and Moscow.
It is the custom to close the gates of Kiachta and Maimaichin and shut off all communication between sunset and sunrise. The rule is less rigidly enforced than formerly. After this introduction I visited Maimaichin almost every day until leaving for Irkutsk. Maimaichin means 'place of trade, and the name was given by the officer who selected the site.
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