"On leaving Tash-kurghan (July 10, 1900), my steps, like those of
Hiuan-tsang, were directed towards Kashgar.... In Chapters V.-VII. of my
Personal Narrative I have given a detailed description of this route, which
took me past Muztagh-Ata to Lake Little Kara-kul, and then round the foot
of the great glacier-crowned range northward into the Gez defile, finally
debouching at Tashmalik into the open plain of Kashgari. Though scarcely
more difficult than the usual route over the Chichiklik Pass and by
Yangi-Hisar, it is certainly longer and leads for a considerably greater
distance over ground which is devoid of cultivation or permanent
habitations.
"It is the latter fact which makes me believe that Professor H. Cordier
was right in tracing by this very route Marco Polo's itinerary from the
Central Pamirs to Kashgar. The Venetian traveller, coming from Wakhan,
reached, after three days, a great lake which may be either Lake Victoria
or Lake Chakmak, at a 'height that is said to be the highest place in the
world.' He then describes faithfully enough the desert plain called
'Pamier,' which he makes extend for the distance of a twelve days' ride,
and next tells us: 'Now, if we go on with our journey towards the
east-north-east, we travel a good forty days, continually passing over
mountains and hills, or through valleys, and crossing many rivers and
tracts of wilderness. And in all this way you find neither habitation of
man, nor any green thing, but must carry with you whatever you require.'
"This reference to continuous 'tracts of wilderness' shows clearly that,
for one reason or another, Marco Polo did not pass through the cultivated
valleys of Tash-kurghan or Tagharma, as he would necessarily have done if
his route to Kashgar, the region he next describes, had lain over the
Chichiklik Pass. We must assume that, after visiting either the Great or
Little Pamir, he travelled down the Ak-su river for some distance, and
then crossing the watershed eastwards by one of the numerous passes struck
the route which leads past Muztagh-Ata and on towards the Gez defile. In
the brief supplementary notes contributed to Professor Cordier's critical
analysis of this portion of Marco Polo's itinerary, I have pointed out how
thoroughly the great Venetian's description of the forty days' journey to
the E.N.E. of the Pamir Lake can be appreciated by any one who has passed
through the Pamir region and followed the valleys stretching round the
Muztagh-Ata range on the west and north (cf. Yule, Marco Polo, II., pp.
593 seq.). After leaving Tash-kurghan and Tagharma there is no local
produce to be obtained until the oasis of Tashmalik is reached. In the
narrow valley of the Yaman-yar river, forming the Gez defile, there is
scarcely any grazing; its appearance down to its opening into the plain
is, in fact, far more desolate than that of the elevated Pamir regions.
"In the absence of any data as to the manner and season in which Marco
Polo's party travelled, it would serve no useful purpose to hazard
explanations as to why he should assign a duration of forty days to a
journey which for a properly equipped traveller need not take more than
fifteen or sixteen days, even when the summer floods close the passage
through the lower Gez defile, and render it necessary to follow the
circuitous track over the Tokuk Dawan or 'Nine Passes.' But it is
certainly worth mention that Benedict Goez, too, speaks of the desert of
'Pamech' (Pamir) as taking forty days to cross if the snow was extensive,
a record already noted by Sir H. Yule (Cathay, II., pp. 563 seq.). It
is also instructive to refer once more to the personal experience of the
missionary traveller on the alternative route by the Chichiklik Pass.
According to the record quoted above, he appears to have spent no less
than twenty-eight days in the journeys from the hamlets of 'Sarcil'
(Sarikol, i.e. Tash-kurghan) to 'Hiarchan' (Yarkand) - a distance of some
188 miles, now reckoned at ten days' march." (Stein, Ancient Khotan, pp.
40-42.)
XXXII., p. 171. "The Plain is called PAMIER, and you ride across it for
twelve days together, finding nothing but a desert without habitations or
any green thing, so that travellers are obliged to carry with them
whatever they have need of."
At Sarhad, Afghan Wakhan, Stein, Ruins of Desert Cathay, I., p. 69,
writes: "There was little about the low grey houses, or rather hovels, of
mud and rubble to indicate the importance which from early times must have
attached to Sarhad as the highest place of permanent occupation on the
direct route leading from the Oxus to the Tarim Basin. Here was the last
point where caravans coming from the Bactrian side with the products of
the Far West and of India could provision themselves for crossing that
high tract of wilderness 'called Pamier' of which old Marco Polo rightly
tells us: 'You ride across it ...' And as I looked south towards the
snow-covered saddle of the Baroghil, the route I had followed myself, it
was equally easy to realize why Kao Hsien-chih's strategy had, after the
successful crossing of the Pamirs, made the three columns of his Chinese
Army concentrate upon the stronghold of Lien-yuen, opposite the present
Sarhad. Here was the base from which Yasin could be invaded and the
Tibetans ousted from their hold upon the straight route to the Indus."
XXXII., p. 174.
"The note connecting Hiuan Tsang's Kieh sha with Kashgar is probably based
upon an error of the old translators, for the Sita River was in the Pamir
region, and K'a sha was one of the names of Kasanna, or Kieh-shwang-na,
in the Oxus region." (E.H. PARKER, Asiatic Quart. Rev., Jan., 1904, p.
143.)
XXXII., I. p. 173; II.
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