Journeys On The Silk Road Part 4

Some weeks after he left the caves, Stein sent a message to see if Abbot w.a.n.g would sell more ma.n.u.scripts. Emboldened by the knowledge that his previous transaction had remained a secret, the priest tentatively agreed. To avoid arousing local suspicions, Stein remained in Anxi, instead dispatching Chiang on a secret mission with Ibrahim Beg, Ha.s.san Akhun, and four camels.

The trio duly arrived at the Caves of the Thousand Buddhas in late September, but the inopportune appearance of half a dozen Tibetan monks at the same time reignited w.a.n.g's nervousness. Chiang dodged the red-robed visitors and, once again, w.a.n.g relented. The ma.n.u.scripts were hurriedly packed into sacks throughout the night and loaded onto the camels.

A week after setting out, traveling under cover of darkness and avoiding the high road, they returned to Stein. Chiang "trotted up gaily overflowing with glee at [the] success of his mission." He had secured a further 230 bundles, containing about 3,000 scrolls. Most were Chinese Buddhist sutras, but there were also twenty bundles of Tibetan Buddhist works and they filled twelve more boxes. The size of the second haul had exceeded Stein's hopes.

Just a few weeks after Chiang pa.s.sed through Dunhuang, where he saw the results of the riots, another European, Baron Carl Gustav Mannerheim, also arrived. He was gathering intelligence for the Russians, as well as ma.n.u.scripts and other artifacts for his Finnish homeland. He had traveled part of the way from Tashkent to Kashgar with Paul Pelliot and planned to visit the Mogao Caves. But when the time came, the aristocratic Mannerheim, who later became Finland's president, went off to shoot pheasant instead.

Stein and Chiang had no more time to look closely at the scrolls and other doc.u.ments while camped at Anxi than they had at the Caves of the Thousand Buddhas. The sheer volume of material made detailed doc.u.menting impossible. As a result, the printed Diamond Sutra wasn't properly numbered until it arrived in London, so it is not certain whether it was in the rolls Stein originally purchased from Abbott w.a.n.g or among the later bundles which Chiang secured. What is certain is that the acquisition of the world's oldest printed book was for Stein the happiest of accidents.

Of the material Stein did examine, it was not the Chinese sutras that most excited him but Indian ma.n.u.scripts written on palm leaves. And he was delighted to have obtained so much material for so little money. The entire haul from the Caves of the Thousand Buddhas had cost just 130. "The single ancient Sanskrit MS [ma.n.u.script] on palm leaf might with a few other 'old things' be worth this," he told Allen. It was certainly a pittance compared with other book sales of the era. When the fifth Earl Spencer, Princess Diana's great-grandfather, sold his library at Althorp in 1891 the 40,000 volumes realized almost 250,000. Just a few years later, a Gutenberg Bible sold in London for a record-breaking 4,000.

Stein had little time to reflect on the many pearls he had extracted. More mundane matters needed attention. He had a report to write and his Christmas mail to pen. Even in the desert Stein never forgot to send seasonal greetings or mark the birthdays of friends. He also had to replace his surveyor, Ram Singh, whom Stein had found increasingly problematic. Publicly, Stein acknowledged the work of his surveyor. But to Allen he was more candid: "Ram Singh's rheumatism has disappeared for the time being, but not his bad temper etc & I could not have expected from him effective a.s.sistance next winter. It has cost much firmness & constant care to get all needful work done by him so far & you can imagine that this means much additional strain," he wrote. With the arrival of a replacement surveyor, Lal Singh, Ram Singh was dispatched from Anxi on the long trip home to India, where he arrived safely three months later.

Stein was relieved to put sedentary work behind him and pull out of Anxi. Chiang had even greater reason to see the back of the dreary settlement. Until his gleeful recent arrival with the ma.n.u.scripts, his only connection with the hamlet was a sorrowful one. About a decade earlier, he had set out with a friend on a rare journey home to Hunan when his companion suddenly fell ill and died. Chiang wrapped the corpse in felts and wrote and ceremoniously burned a prayer for his dead companion's soul, "asking him to keep his own body from becoming objectionable & to prevent a breakdown of the cart." For a week, Chiang traveled with the corpse on his cart. At Anxi he bought a coffin and accompanied the body, delivering it to his friend's relatives five months later. In his diary, Stein reflects on Chiang's loyal deed: "Not with a word he alluded to all the trouble arising from this pious performance. How many Europeans would be prepared for such sacrifices?"

Stein and his own cargo had much farther to travel. Anxi was a turning point. The summer excursion in the mountains, where he surveyed 24,000 square miles, took him as far east into China as he intended to go. When he came down from the mountains, he knew his journey back to India and Europe had begun. In early October 1907, he turned his caravan northwest and headed along the northern Silk Road, bound for the oases of Hami and Turfan.

The caravan skirted along the Turfan Depression, a region 500 feet below the level of the far-distant sea. Stein was happy to return to Turkestan, where he felt so at home. Although he had not traveled along the northern route before, with each step he felt he was on familiar terrain. He was again among Muslim people whose customs and culture he understood. Soon, there was milk to drink. He had been without it since arriving in Dunhuang seven months earlier. Despite the fine grazing land he had traversed in that time, the terrain had been devoid of cattle.

He noticed the women shared a fondness for the bright clothes of their Turkestan sisters farther west. Best of all, he no longer had to use silver weighed on scales-Stein considered them "instruments of torture"-to pay for everything. There were familiar sights from farther afield. The Turfan bazaars were so full of Russian goods-kerosene lamps, plate gla.s.s, and chintz-that he dubbed the area "Demi-Europe." And he saw signs of more ancient cultural exchange around the oasis. He realized a Christian minority had once lived peacefully alongside Turfan's Buddhists.

If Stein and his team were happy to return to Turkestan, perhaps only Chiang felt otherwise. For him it was a continuation of the long exile from the land of his birth. He did not expect to return to Hunan-and his wife and son-until his working life was over.

Ancient sites were plentiful along the more populated northern Silk Road. Stein and his caravan pa.s.sed through areas where farmers used temple ruins as manure for crops and ma.n.u.script fragments to paper over windows. It was evidence to Stein that antiquities could not safely remain where history had deposited them. Unlike the southern route, which Stein regarded as his own terrain, the more accessible northern route had attracted other foreign archaeological treasure hunters, from j.a.pan, Russia, and Germany. Stein had little interest in digging where others had already been. With a certain one-upmanship he noted how less arduous it was for his rivals to excavate around Turfan, where laborers could return home each night. There was no need for complicated plans to transport water and food in preparation for weeks in the desert. It was "like excavating in one's own garden," he sniffed.

However, he was curious to see what the Germans had been up to. So in late November 1907, he stopped at the abandoned Buddhist grottoes of Bezeklik where Albert von Le Coq had cut out whole murals and sent them to Berlin's Ethnographic Museum. The German was convinced they would otherwise be destroyed by iconoclasts or by farmers for their fields. Nonetheless, above the door of the room where he'd stayed while removing Bezeklik's murals, von Le Coq had contributed a painting of his own, a message that said: "Robbers' Den."

It was while exploring in nearby Hami in mid-1905 that von Le Coq first heard the rumor of the ma.n.u.scripts discovered at the Caves of the Thousand Buddhas-news that Stein would not learn for another year and a half. A merchant from Tashkent who had traveled through Dunhuang told von Le Coq about a walled-up cave that had been found nearby. The cave was full of ma.n.u.scripts n.o.body could read. The temple guardian would surely be willing to part with them, the merchant told him. Von Le Coq was intrigued but wary. He had already been led on one excursion prompted by a rumor and returned empty-handed. Nonetheless, von Le Coq resolved to make the seventeen-day trip to Dunhuang-until a telegram arrived from Berlin. His boss, Professor Grnwedel, was headed to Turkestan and von Le Coq was to meet him in Kashgar in October. It was now late August. There was no way von Le Coq could get to Dunhuang and back in time to meet Grnwedel. Kashgar was 1,100 miles west and six weeks away, Dunhuang 250 miles southeast. Von Le Coq was in a quandary.

"Somewhat in despair, I left the decision to Fate by tossing a Chinese dollar," he wrote in an account of his travels. Heads he would go to Dunhuang, tails to Kashgar. He flipped the coin. It landed tails. Von Le Coq saddled his horse and left for Kashgar. And so, on the toss of a coin, he lost the chance to claim the Library Cave's treasures for Germany. Little wonder von Le Coq was not in the best of tempers when he reached Chini Bagh on October 17, 1905 and found no sign of Grnwedel, who did not arrive for another seven weeks. Stuck in Kashgar, von Le Coq knew he could easily have reached Dunhuang and investigated the merchant's rumor.

Stein, who long harbored fears about his compet.i.tors, had little idea just how close he came to being beaten to his greatest prize. By the time he learned of the Library Cave, von Le Coq was back in Berlin. As Stein stood in the abandoned Bezeklik caves and stared at the denuded walls, he was aware only that the grottoes there, unlike those at Dunhuang, were no longer places of worship. "How much greater would be the chance for the survival of these art remains in situ if only Turfan still held such a pious image-loving population as Tun-huang?" he wrote.

After his side trip to Bezeklik, Stein pushed west and soon marked his second Christmas of the expedition. A few days into 1908, boxes of chocolate reached him from the Allens in Britain. Stein immediately penned a gracious thank-you-one that ill.u.s.trates his utilitarian approach to food. For Stein, even the rare luxury of chocolate was simply a means to stave off hunger pangs and supplement his diet. "How often I have thanked you at the late hours of the night when dinner was still far off & a headache approaching as a reminder of bodily needs, for your incomparable forethought! I shall need such nourishing & tasteful 'iron reserves' for the next few months too, for quick marches are needed to make up for time."

A couple of spills delayed his pace. Two cases and a camera fell into a ca.n.a.l and were soaked. A few days later, two rutting camels absconded and the rest of the day was spent tracking them. But these were minor hitches compared with the sorrowful tidings the new year brought for Chiang. Since he'd set out with Stein, Chiang had hoped for word of his elderly father. At Kucha he intercepted a letter to his uncle in Kashgar and learned the reason for the long silence. Chiang's father had died twenty months earlier. Grief-stricken, he lamented most that his sixty-four-year-old father had not seen him reach high office. Despite his usual skepticism about such rites, Chiang abandoned his customary bright silk clothes, dressed in dark cotton mourning, and arranged a funeral feast for his father's long-departed soul.

As Chiang grieved, Stein made preparations in Kucha for their return to Khotan on the far side of the Taklamakan Desert. In Khotan, he would pack all of his antiquities for their journey to India and London. To reach Khotan, he planned to cross the desert by a perilous shortcut he had learned about from a guide on his first expedition. The route was known as the old "Thieves' Road" and was once favored by "robbers and others who had reason to avoid the highways." To some it might seem appropriate that the man who removed so many treasures would make his exit via a route so named.

The course was riskier than any he had ever attempted. No European had been known to cross the Taklamakan from north to south. Although Sven Hedin had traveled in the opposite direction in 1896, Stein's plan was far more dangerous. The reason is simple: Hedin followed the Keriya River until it disappeared into the Taklamakan's sands. Hedin knew that if he continued north, the west-to-east flowing Tarim River would cross his path. (Upon finding the Tarim River, Hedin sailed along it while dining on wild duck, pheasant, and rice pudding.) But Stein's plan meant he had to leave the safety of the Tarim River and locate the very spot amid the dunes where the Keriya River trickled out. There were no maps other than Hedin's. Even if Hedin had mapped it perfectly, the river could have changed course by miles in the intervening twelve years, leaving Stein at risk of traveling parallel to-or even away from-the water. Why Stein undertook so dangerous a shortcut is unclear. He was determined, certainly, but never foolhardy. He was no longer racing the Germans or the French. And even if a rival expedition should suddenly emerge from the desert dunes, Stein had already secured his glittering prizes from the hidden library. Although he justified the journey by a desire to save time-and see some ruins-it was the pull of the desert itself that seemed irresistible. "I must confess that, even without this specific reason, I might have found the chance of once more crossing the very heart of the desert too great an attraction to resist."

His antiquities, his "precious but embarra.s.sing impedimenta," could not come with him. Instead, he sent them under the care of Chiang and pony man Tila Bai along a safer and better known route that followed the Khotan River. For more than an hour on a cold winter day, all traffic in the narrow street of Kucha was blocked as the caravan of twenty-four heavily laden camels began their journey south to Khotan. If all went well, Stein would see Chiang and the antiquities again in two and a half months.

He needed a local guide before he could set out across the desert with his smaller party. But none of the potential guides knew anything about the alleged shortcut. They knew only the route his antiquities were taking. Even the most experienced guide in the area, a stooped hunter in his eighties named Khalil, denied any knowledge of such a route. Khalil walked with difficulty but could nonetheless ride, and he agreed to escort Stein to the Tarim River. It was better than nothing. From there, Stein would negotiate his way unaided through 200 miles of waterless towering dunes toward the river's end. Little wonder his conscripted laborers were reluctant, despite the promise of extra wages. First they argued they were unfit for such a journey or lacked ample clothing. Then they fell on their knees and prayed for release from dreaded sufferings and certain disaster. Who could blame them?

Eventually, led by Khalil, Stein's party of twenty men, fifteen camels (including eight to carry ice) and four ponies, carrying enough food for six weeks, headed toward the distant ocean of sand. After nearly two weeks of marching, they encountered a line of poplars tenaciously clinging to life on the edge of a dry river bed. But perhaps not for much longer. Water from the Tarim River that once ensured their survival no longer reached the trees, according to Khalil. It was hardly an auspicious sign as they were poised to enter the desert on January 31. Before turning back, old Khalil delivered a farewell blessing, one that might have unsettled, rather than comforted, the nervous a.s.sembly. "He gave it with more ceremony than I should have expected for the occasion, turning towards Mecca in a long prayer, and the men all joining loudly in the 'Aman'. From Khotan to Lop-nor I had made more than one start into desert quite as forbidding, without ever witnessing such a display of emotion."

The marches through the sand dunes were exhausting. Everyone walked on foot, some days covering fifteen miles. After eight days they reached a dried-up delta somewhere in which the Keriya River died away. But where? "Nowhere in the course of my desert travels had I met ground so confusing and dismal," Stein subsequently confessed. The view in all directions was bewilderingly uniform: endless dunes interspersed with stumps of dead trees and tamarisk cones-strange mounds that form as sand buries the tamarisk tree until only the top boughs are visible.

"My secret apprehension that our real trouble would begin on reaching this dead delta was about to be fully verified. It was as if, after navigating an open sea, we had reached the treacherous marsh-coast of a tropical delta without any lighthouses or landmarks to guide us into the right channel," Stein wrote.

His anxiety increased as each day pa.s.sed without sight of the river. In the first days of the journey, wells dug into the sand had yielded only a little moisture, and Stein noted how the ears of the ponies would p.r.i.c.k up at the sound of hoes striking mud. But as successive efforts to locate the source of the Keriya River proved futile and additional wells dug up to sixteen feet into the ground surrendered nothing, spirits sank. Water was rationed to one pint per man a day. It was a meager amount for hard marching across endless dunes. The camels received little food and no water. "How the camels held out so far is a wonder," Stein wrote in his diary eleven days after Khalil's ominous farewell.

By then the camels and ponies were being fed twigs for the moisture in the sap. Although Dash survived on saucers of Stein's tea, the ponies suffered badly. Stein knew they could not last much longer. On February 12, he counted the cartridges in the holster of his revolver to ensure he could end their suffering if necessary. The mood of the laborers was darkening and Stein feared they might steal what little ice was left. He a.s.signed Lal Singh to guard the remaining supply. Twice in the night when Stein approached to check on its safety, he was challenged by his own surveyor. Stein had little sleep and was awake by 3 a.m.

By daybreak the laborers were on the verge of mutiny and refused to travel further. To turn around would have meant certain death. There was enough water for the men to last just a few days but nowhere near enough to retrace their steps to the Tarim River. They continued with Stein, but he knew time was running out. Lal Singh was ordered to halt the caravan and prepare what Stein termed a "starvation camp." Even the camels, without water for nearly two weeks, were reaching the limits of their endurance. Stein left his caravan behind and marched on until he reached a 300-foot dune. With Dash at his side he trudged to the summit. He scoured the distance through his binoculars. Four miles to the south, he could see four white streaks. Ice? Salt? Or the desert traveler's cruelest tormentor, a mirage?

News of Stein's sighting spurred his exhausted men. So too did the sight of footprints made by a bird that the laborers knew lived near fresh water. As they continued, a camel boy who had surged ahead rushed back toward them. He was too breathless to speak but carried a chunk of ice from the elusive river. When he recovered, he shared his life-saving news: the river was just half a mile ahead. The caravan crested one more dune and looked down on a glittering sheet of clear ice about 500 feet wide. The river had indeed changed course since Hedin's journey. The men rushed to the river bank and fell on their knees to drink the water. The camels and ponies swelled visibly as they slaked their thirst. After sixteen days of marching across the Taklamakan's dunes, they had at last found the end of the Keriya River.

A bodhisattva who still depends on notions to practice generosity is like someone walking in the dark.

VERSE 14, THE DIAMOND SUTRA.

11.

Affliction in the Orchard Six weeks after Stein located the life-saving river, he reached Khotan and was relieved to find his heavy caravan of antiquities had already arrived. They were stored at the house of Akhun Beg. Stein was overjoyed to be reunited with his elderly friend, who had returned from his own perilous journey, a pilgrimage to Mecca. Stein set up his tent in Akhun Beg's garden, beneath blossoming plum and apricot trees. But he had little time to enjoy the brief Turkestan spring. Ever since he'd left the abandoned sanctuary at Miran a year earlier, Stein was eager to return to where he had found the exquisite winged angels-and endured the most putrid ruins of his career. In his race to Dunhuang, he had abandoned his labors in the freezing filth without extracting all he knew lay buried there. Although Miran was 650 miles east of Khotan, this was his last chance to doc.u.ment, photograph, and remove the murals that remained. He could not go himself-he had other work to do-so he dispatched his Indian handyman, Naik Ram Singh. The young man, from a family of carpenters, had proved a reliable, versatile worker. He was strong, stoic, and quick to turn his hand to a range of tasks, including sketching, surveying, and developing photographic negatives. Stein knew the resourceful Naik could work without direction and so had no reservations about sending him, with Ibrahim Beg for a.s.sistance, on the 1,300-mile round trip.

Meanwhile, Stein prepared to head in the opposite direction, west, for further explorations before the summer heat arrived. Just before he left Khotan, a parcel arrived from Fred Andrews. It contained a fountain pen, pince-nez spectacles, and a much-needed new pair of gloves. "I could not help smiling when I read how carefully you had considered the colour of the gloves," Stein wrote to Andrews. "You must think me quite a dandy in the desert, whereas in reality it is hard to look even respectable. You would make eyes if you would see me in my winter clothes, worn etc. almost beyond patching."

Stein traveled as far as the oasis of Yarkand, where he made the first of many partings. He needed to sell his team of hardy Bactrian camels, which would no longer be needed. Yarkand was a crossroads and, with the trading season about to start, he expected to get a better price for them there than in Khotan. As the weather warmed, camel man Ha.s.san Akhun had shorn the double-humped beasts of their magnificent thick winter coats leaving them looking naked and gaunt. Nonetheless, their fame had spread along the desert oases as a result of their remarkable survival down the Thieves' Road. Eager buyers vied for the legendary animals, despite their high desert mileage after nearly two years of travel. The frugal Stein was delighted; he made a 70 percent profit on the deal. As a farewell gesture, he fed each camel a large loaf of bread before relinquishing the reins to their new owner, an Afghan trader.

Buran season arrived while Stein was in Yarkand and a violent two-day sandstorm brought down trees and destroyed ripening mulberries and apricots in the oasis. By the time Stein left, he had to contend with intense heat as well. He traveled by night but several times lost his way in the wind and darkness. "On one occasion when no light could be kept burning in the lantern there was nothing for it in the howling Buran but to lie down [...] & wait for the dawn," he wrote.

He was pleased to return to the shelter of Khotan in June, although he knew an enormous task awaited. He needed to pack everything he had gathered in the previous two years for the journey to India and, from there, to Europe. Akhun Beg's residence was too small to accommodate all of Stein's finds. He needed the s.p.a.ce afforded by his favorite garden palace, Narbagh, with its pavilions, orchard, and beds of lilies. Since the previous year, when he had been guest of honor at a lavish feast, Narbagh's owner had died and the garden was divided between his heirs. The central pavilion, the most suitable place for summer quarters, had gone to the man's formidable dowager. She was reluctant to relocate a silkworm nursery, and it was only with the aid of an old Afghan friend that Stein managed to persuade her to house his large entourage.

Soon the many bags that had already arrived in Khotan under Chiang's care were joined by those Stein had sent for safekeeping to Macartney more than a year earlier, before Stein had crossed to Dunhuang. Macartney also sent sheets of tin-and drained Turkestan's supply of the commodity in the process-so Stein could safely pack his ma.n.u.scripts and other treasures for their journey beyond Turkestan. Narbagh had once echoed to the gentle strains of flutes that serenaded Stein at the feast in his honor; now the garden clanged with hammering and sawing as up to forty local laborers constructed case after st.u.r.dy tin-lined case. Stein watched the work progress, but the careful packing of his fragile antiquities he trusted to no one but himself.

Stein thought hard about how best to get his huge cargo from Turkestan to Europe. He had two options: land or sea. He could take it west via Russia, or south via India and onto a boat from Bombay. The Russian route was shorter and familiar. He had taken his goods that way in 1901, traveling via Kashgar and across the border to Osh in Russian Turkestan and then by train to Europe. He had needed only eight ponies for his antiquities and baggage for his first expedition. This cargo was roughly eight times the size. He needed twenty-four ponies just to carry the ma.n.u.scripts. But it would be impractical to take it all with him on a pa.s.senger train, and even if he could it would be prohibitively expensive. He also feared the loss of material conveyed on an unreliable train system-the same railway that had mislaid the luggage of the German Grnwedel and the Frenchman Pelliot.

India was a slower but safer option. He considered two routes via Kashmir. He ruled out one through Hunza and Gilgit, in present-day Pakistan, as impossible for heavily laden animals. The only solution was to take it all over the Karakoram Mountains via Ladakh and then to Kashmir. The hidden library's scrolls had survived entombed for a millennium because the dry desert atmosphere was devoid of humidity. They had reached Khotan unharmed. But ahead lay huge mountains, glacier-fed rivers, snow, and ice. It was potentially the most risky part of the journey for the Diamond Sutra and the rest of the ma.n.u.scripts. One leaky case could ruin paper forever. The fragile murals from Miran needed extra protection. They were strengthened by gluing strips of cotton to them, then repacked between insulating layers of reeds.

Stein had much to occupy him. As he packed, the future of the finds and his own fate increasingly filled his thoughts. He cared little for London, where he would be hemmed in by arid deserts of bureaucracy and mountains of paperwork. He hoped he might at least find a quiet corner suited to the idiosyncrasies of a man whose preferred habitats were deserts and alpine meadows.

"I shall be more than ever bound to the collection & with it to London, and you can feel what that means for me," he wrote to Allen. "I dread in advance its turmoil, its 'cage' feeling etc, to say nothing of prospective incarceration in [the British Museum's] bas.e.m.e.nts." If only he could have help with the huge task that would await him. Someone such as his friend Fred Andrews. Stein resolved to escape his British Museum "bondage" as quickly as possible.

Packing was tedious, with only a break at dusk to walk or ride through the dusty village roads with Dash for company. Returning to Europe would mean leaving behind his canine companion. The little dog had distinguished himself en route to Khotan when he detected a tiger near the camp. No one realized why Dash had barked constantly one night. The next morning the footprints of a huge beast were found nearby. It would be hard to part with brave Dash. But Stein didn't want to put him through a lengthy sea journey and quarantine in England. He had left behind Dash's predecessor in India in 1901, but the dog died the next year. Perhaps some friends in Punjab would take Dash II, Dash the Great. "It is sad to think that I shall have to leave Dash when I go to England," he told Allen. "How lucky those are who like Dash do not know of impending separation!"

But more immediate concerns demanded his attention. First he had to hose down a problem caused by his "worthless" Kashmiri cook. Ramzan, who had already absconded near Dunhuang, got into a sc.r.a.p with a man in Khotan over a pony. The badly injured local was covered in bruises when he was conveyed to Stein on a litter. Stein paid compensation and hoped that might be the end of the problematic servant's trouble. But apparently a fight over a pony was not all Ramzan engaged in at Khotan. Chiang heard rumors the cook was also procuring young women. Wearied by his cook's bad behavior, Stein explained that he could not concern himself with the morals of his staff. Nonetheless, Ramzan's behavior appalled Stein. "Disgust at having to employ such a scoundrel keeps me awake half the night," he wrote in his diary. But Stein retained his services. A cook, it seemed, was harder to replace than a surveyor.

Chiang spent his days surrounded by bundles of scrolls attempting to make a rough list of the Dunhuang ma.n.u.scripts. The results were thrilling, with Chiang turning up texts much older and more varied than Stein had expected when they began burrowing in the "treasure cave." It was time-consuming work. Chiang had looked at just a third of the ma.n.u.scripts at Khotan. "You can imagine the trouble of unfolding rolls of thin paper, often 30 yards long & more, to search for colophons etc. Chiang is glued to his table from morning till late at night," Stein wrote to Allen.

Chiang's work came to a sudden halt when he suffered a serious case of food poisoning. A photograph taken at Narbagh shows a gaunt Chiang, almost unrecognizable from the round-faced figure photographed in Dunhuang fifteen months earlier. "He suffered awful pains for days & kept me busy as improvised doctor & superintendent of nursing. But at last he got over the attacks & is now slowly regaining strength & spirits. Faith in my medicines was the main cure," Stein told Allen. And he plied poor Chiang with doses of the salty yeast extract sent out from England. "Marmite turned to use at last," he noted with satisfaction in his diary.

Stein too endured ill-health at Khotan. His malarial fevers returned, he suffered from a toothache and he became temporarily deaf in his left ear. Yet both men's ailments paled beside the affliction suffered by Naik Ram Singh. Shortly after setting out for Miran, the Naik's neck and back grew stiff. Soon he was struck by headaches that grew more intense each day. After five days, while sitting in an orchard to escape the noon heat, he began to reel and lost sight in one eye. Nonetheless, the hardy Sikh insisted on continuing, hoping his condition would improve. It worsened. At Miran, while clearing a temple with Ibrahim Beg, the Naik lost the vision in his other eye also. Still he waited-and hoped-for nearly two weeks. Finally he agreed to turn back and let Ibrahim Beg, a Muslim, guide him to Khotan. Although blind, Naik Ram Singh insisted on cooking his own food to avoid breaking caste rules, despite repeated campfire burns.

Stein was devastated to see the once-proud soldier so diminished. No event during the entire expedition affected Stein so deeply. In a heartfelt letter to Allen, his closest confidant, he shared his fears for the Naik.

You can imagine my feelings when I saw him arrive in this state of utter helplessness . . . [The Naik] luckily seems to bear his affliction with remarkable calmness & courage, perhaps a compensation of nature for a certain heaviness of mind & disposition. But whether this did not make him lose precious weeks on his return for the chance of proper treatment only the G.o.ds know. He himself seems confident of an early recovery & this is indeed fortunate. But alas I know only too well how delusive such hope may be & feel the full weight of his care.

Stein searched for some clue and cure for the handyman's blindness. Khotan's only surgeon was called and relieved some of the Naik's pain, but was unable to restore his sight. The best chance of medical help lay 200 miles away in Yarkand, where Stein had sold his camels and where the Swedish medical missionary, Dr. Gsta Raquette, was based. The Naik was transported by cart to Raquette, a friend of Stein.

Raquette diagnosed glaucoma. The headaches were a symptom of its onset. There was no hope of recovery. Only a timely operation could have saved Naik Ram Singh's eyesight. Raquette broke the terrible news to the Naik and reported back to Stein: "You have nothing to reproach yourself with. The disease might quite as well have come on if he had been at home & n.o.body can expect you to recognize a disease that very often in the beginning is overlooked even by medical men."

The letter was scant consolation. Stein knew that at home in India the Naik would have been among his own people and had the chance of prompt medical treatment. The soldier had paid a high price for his wish to better provide for his wife and son. He had been enticed from his regiment by the promise of pay five times his army salary. Although Stein warned him of the trip's hardships, this was a danger no one could have antic.i.p.ated. Chiang was so distressed by the Naik's plight that he again set aside his religious skepticism and made offerings for the handyman's recovery at the shrine of a healing saint. Others, such as Stein's prosperous friend Akhun Beg, urged the use of local treatments. Stein dismissed as "truly mediaeval" remedies that involved the use of breast milk and baby's urine. The Naik, who had been so enchanted when he encountered a frozen lake, would never see such a sight-or any other-again.

Raquette advised that the Naik should head home as soon as possible. Arrangements were made for him to travel with a party of Hindu traders returning to India over the Karakorams to Ladakh. He rested in Leh, the capital of Ladakh, before being conveyed to Dr. Arthur Neve at the Srinagar Mission Hospital in Kashmir. He confirmed Raquette's diagnosis. From there, the Naik's brother escorted him to his family's village in Punjab.

The soldier's future weighed heavily on Stein. When Stein saw him in Punjab five months later, the explorer was shocked by the Naik's mental disintegration, exacerbated perhaps by hashish consumption. Stein argued for a special pension for his loyal handyman. The government of India granted it, but he did not benefit from it for long. Within a year of losing his sight, Naik Ram Singh was dead.

After four months in Khotan, punctuated by a few exploratory diversions, Stein was ready to move. The packing in Akhun Beg's orchard was complete. It had taken six arduous weeks, and the ma.n.u.scripts alone filled thirty of the carefully made cases. Although he made a brief note in Khotan about a well-printed Chinese roll, Stein did not grasp the significance of what is now recognized as the world's oldest printed dated book. It was simply one scroll among many. On August 1, more than fifty camels and a column of donkeys left Khotan under Tila Bai's care for the journey through the Kunlun Mountains via a well-known caravan route. Stein, determined as ever to take the road less traveled, planned a more difficult path. He would then unite with Tila Bai and the antiquities convoy in late September to cross the Karakorams together.

It was time for farewells: to Turkestan, where Stein the lifelong wanderer felt so at home, and to the desert that had yielded such treasures. And it was time to part from some of his loyal followers. t.u.r.di, the courageous dak runner who had risked his life to find Stein in the desert on Christmas Eve in 1906, filled his saddle bags with Stein's mail for the last time. But no parting was harder than from Chiang. A deep friendship had developed during their two years together. The man hired as an interpreter had proved far more: an unlikely desert traveler, a trusted companion, teacher, witty raconteur, a skilled diplomat, and negotiator. Without him, Stein might never have secured Dunhuang's treasure from Abbot w.a.n.g.

While the journey together-and especially their three weeks at the caves-would create an enduring bond between Stein and Chiang, the explorer had been mindful they would eventually part. Before he left Dunhuang he wrote to Andrews to secure a special parting gift. In typical Stein style, he was precise not only about what he wanted but how much he was prepared to pay. He requested a good silver watch-then a rare and prestigious item in Turkestan. The cost was not to exceed 2 10 shillings, and it should be inscribed: "Presented by Dr M.A. Stein to Chiang-ssu-yeh as a token of sincere regard and in grateful remembrance of his devoted scholarly services during explorations in Chinese Turkestan, 190608."

Chiang dreamed of following Stein to London or India, but knew obtaining work in either country would be difficult. Stein, too, imagined spending summers with Chiang on Mohand Marg in Kashmir. But the bucolic idyll remained a dream. The reality was Chiang would remain in Turkestan, in exile from his home and family. Stein wanted to ensure Chiang had a good position and worked behind the scenes to secure one. In Khotan, Stein received welcome news from Kashgar that George Macartney had agreed to employ him as his secretary.

"Often as I look back on all we went through together, I have wondered to what merits (of a previous birth, perhaps?) I was indebted for this ideal Chinese comrade of my travels!" Stein later reflected.

Chiang accompanied Stein and his small party from Khotan for one last day's journey together. Appropriately, their parting would come not among the comforts of an oasis, but amid the solitude of a makeshift camp, an environment dear to them both. Chiang knew he was unlikely to experience such adventure ever again.

They crossed the flooded Yurungkash River by ferryboat before making camp on a gravel flat. Dash seemed to sense the impending separation, nestling up to Chiang for a final cuddle. The next morning, Stein, with his back to Turkestan, headed toward the mountains. "Then, as I rode on, the quivering glare and heat of the desert seemed to descend like a luminous curtain and to hide from me the most cherished aspects of my Turkestan life."

12.

Frozen.

Stein's high-alt.i.tude journey to India soon led him to the Kunlun Mountains, long rumored to be the site of great goldmines. Until he entered the Zailik Gorge on August 18, 1908, no European had ever seen the legendary gold pits, and what he encountered must have appeared like a scene from King Solomon's Mines. The cliffs were dotted with hundreds of diggings. In this deep, gloomy valley, generations of wretched souls-virtual slaves-had lived and died digging for flecks of gold. Their graves extended over every bit of flat ground around the twelve-mile gorge. Others were entombed in abandoned pits.

Most of the gold had long been extracted, but about fifty impoverished men still worked the mines in summer, when the 13,600-foot valley was accessible. The miners were astonished at the arrival of outsiders in their frigid valley. Eight or nine of the miners agreed to abandon their burrowing in the dark pits to work as porters for a couple of weeks through the mountainous terrain. They helped map the glacier-fed rivers that coursed through the mountains to Khotan and emptied far away in the Taklamakan's sands. On the movement of such life-giving rivers the fate of the ancient desert civilizations had depended. Even high in the mountains, Stein sensed a connection with the sand-buried sites. He suspected that long ago gold from these pits had been used to gild the temples of Khotan.

While he mapped the rivers, his murals from Miran and his ma.n.u.scripts from Dunhuang, including the Diamond Sutra, were crossing the mountains via the main trading route between Turkestan and Ladakh. It was safer than his uncharted path. Nonetheless, the terrain that Stein's antiquities had to negotiate posed considerable difficulties, not least repeated river crossings, sometimes up to forty a day. The rivers were full of deep holes, and loose rocks could easily fell a horse. (Von Le Coq, on this route from Turkestan to Ladakh in 1906, watched in dismay as a leather case carried on horseback burst open during one such crossing. A collection of kettles and his supplies of sugar and condensed milk floated away on the swift current.) Not knowing the fate of the treasures he had acquired over two years of hard toil must have added to Stein's worries when, having sent the porters back to their goldmines, he approached the most dangerous part of the mountainous journey. The going grew increasingly tough as he and his men were blasted with icy gales by day and endured temperatures that fell to fifteen degrees Fahrenheit at night. At the foot of a line of glaciers, 17,200 feet above sea level, Stein located the source of the Keriya River, the waterway he had found just in time on his hazardous shortcut across the desert eight months earlier. Once again fodder was running low and no grazing could be found. Several donkeys suffered in the cold and had to be shot.

Then Stein's pony, Badakhshi, became ill. For more than two years of rugged travel, he had conveyed Stein through the most inhospitable of mountainous and desert terrain. With little food or water, the hardy mount had crossed the Taklamakan without any apparent ill-effect. His implacable temperament had wavered only once, when a blast of horns had farewelled Stein's party from an oasis. What caused the animal's sudden illness, none of Stein's men knew, despite their knowledge of horses. Badakhshi was wrapped in extra felts and blankets for the cold night ahead. Stein gave him most of a bottle of port that he kept for emergencies. At daybreak, when Stein rose to check on him, the pony lay on the ground in convulsions.

"He recognized me when I stroked him, and on my holding some oats close to his mouth he struggled to get on his legs," Stein wrote. He had hoped Badakhshi would one day graze on Kashmir's lush gra.s.s. But just when the goal seemed near, the pony died in one of the most desolate places Stein had encountered.

"What he succ.u.mbed to I failed to make out. He was equal to the hardest of fares & would cheerfully chew even ancient dead wood. It was some consolation that he suffered but for a short time & had for his last night every comfort we could provide in that wilderness," he told Allen.

The dispirited party trudged on the next morning until they spotted two small stone mounds, or cairns, half buried under sand and gravel. It was what Stein had been looking for-the cairns that marked a disused route to Ladakh. The party rejoiced at having finally found a path where men had pa.s.sed before. For two days, they followed the stone cairns that led down to a valley. Finally, the welcome remains of an old rock shelter offered refuge from the bitter wind. There were signs in the valley of more recent life-fresh tracks made by wild yaks and donkeys. The valley had just enough vegetation for the hungry animals. And not before time; the fodder had run out. Would those two days have made a difference for Badakhshi? Stein had no way of knowing. But as he watched the hungry ponies graze, he mourned the loss of his own mount, frozen stiff in the forbidding wastes higher up the mountain.

There was relief for men and animals when a team of Kirghiz guides arrived with yaks, camels, and much-needed supplies. With them came word that Tila Bai and the heavy cargo of antiquities were waiting safely eighty miles ahead as arranged. After so much long and hard travel, Stein must have thought his troubles were behind him.

Just one expeditionary challenge remained. Stein still wanted to resolve inaccuracies in a map sketched by surveyor William Johnson, who had crossed the Kunlun Mountains in 1865. Stein's attempt to do this on his first expedition had failed. He had been similarly thwarted two years earlier on his second expedition. This was the determined Stein's third-and final-chance to solve the mystery. The task would also allow him to locate the watershed of the Kunlun Mountains. The side trip had to begin the next day or not at all. There was not enough food for the animals to delay. On the night before his departure, a bout of colic made for a fitful sleep, but the day dawned clear. Just after 5 a.m. he set out with four Kirghiz guides and two of his own men-surveyor Lal Singh and the surveyor's a.s.sistant, Musa-all mounted on yaks. After three hours of climbing, the terrain became too difficult even for the yaks and they were abandoned for the final ascent up a glacier.

As the sun rose higher, the snow softened and the men sank up to their thighs. Roped together for safety, they struggled for breath in the thinning air. Lal Singh especially felt the effects of the alt.i.tude and had to be hauled along, stopping after every ten steps to catch his breath. It took seven hours to climb four miles.

The panorama at 20,000 feet was awe-inspiring. They were surrounded by majestic snow-covered crests that dazzled under the intense light and cobalt sky. Some peaks appeared smooth, almost benign, under a blanket of virgin snow, others harsh and serrated. To the south were ranges whose rivers ended in the mighty Indus. Far away to the north, Stein glimpsed the yellow haze that hovered over the Taklamakan Desert. His mood was as elevated as the landscape.

"The world appeared to shrink strangely from a point where my eyes could, as it were, link the Taklamakan with the Indian Ocean," he wrote. The grandeur before him united his two beloved ancient worlds. To the south was India, where Buddhism had been born. To the north was where it had flourished before the great civilization sank under desert sands.

But Stein could afford little time for reflection that day. There was photographing and surveying to be done, and it was already mid-afternoon. From his vantage point, he corrected the miscalculations of Johnson's sketch. The temperature was down to sixteen degrees Fahrenheit at 4:30 p.m. when the guides insisted on starting the descent. They did not want to risk being stranded overnight on the glacier. Stein grabbed a few mouthfuls of food. In the rush, there was no time to change his boots, which had become wet during the ascent in the soft snow and then frozen as he worked. Nor did he have time to consider how fatigue, high alt.i.tude, and inadequate sleep might cloud his judgment.

It was already dark by the time the men rejoined the yaks and mounted the sure-footed beasts. At times the men dismounted as the yaks negotiated the rocky slopes. When they did, Stein struggled to find his footing, but attributed the difficulty to fatigue and slippery terrain. The six-hour descent seemed endless. When at last the camp came into view, he hobbled into his tent and removed his boots and two pairs of socks. The toes on both feet were frozen. He rubbed them vigorously with snow in an effort to restore circulation. A quick check of his medical manual had advised this as emergency treatment. It may have made matters worse. These days, friction is avoided so that injured tissue is not further damaged; immersing in warm water or wrapping in blankets is the preferred treatment. Nonetheless, the toes on Stein's left foot gradually warmed, though the skin was badly damaged. He had lost feeling in the toes on his right foot.

The pain in his feet immobilized him the next morning. He again consulted his medical manual: "The aid of an experienced surgeon should be sought at once." The advice was sound but hardly rea.s.suring. He knew he was at risk of developing gangrene and must reach Ladakh and medical help quickly. But the town was two weeks' journey away-nearly 300 miles-through some of the most rugged and dangerous terrain on earth.

Walking was impossible. He needed to be carried, but his guides refused to convey him on a makeshift litter. So first he was put onto a yak and later strapped onto a camel. His pain was excruciating as he was bounced and jerked around. Eventually an improvised litter was made with a camp chair suspended from bamboo tent poles fastened between two ponies. Four days later, he was relieved to be reunited en route with his cargo. Despite encountering flooded gorges and the challenge of the 17,598-foot Sanju Pa.s.s, every case was safe. But there was still a long way to travel. The caravan had to negotiate two even higher pa.s.ses: the 18,176-foot Karakoram Pa.s.s and the 17,753-foot Sa.s.ser Pa.s.s. Word of Stein's injury was sent ahead to the medical missionary in Leh as the explorer spent the next two days attending to vital tasks, issuing directives from his camp bed. The most important was to make onward arrangements for the cargo.

The Karakoram Pa.s.s, along the highest trade route in the world, was notoriously difficult. One nineteenth-century British traveler estimated he pa.s.sed the skeletons of 5,000 horses, near which were vultures "so gorged they could hardly move." Men, too, perished on the deadly trail, their remains covered with piles of stones. Von Le Coq noted that if a caravan encountered misadventure, its cargo was left nearby in as sheltered a spot as possible until it could be rescued. A code of honor forbade any interference with these abandoned loads, according to the German, who reported seeing many, each with a tale of misfortune. Von Le Coq also witnessed the vestige of another misfortune along the route: a lonely memorial to the Scottish trader whose murder there in 1888 inadvertently sparked the ma.n.u.script race. It was a small marble pillar atop a cairn with a brief inscription: "Here fell Andrew Dalgleish, murdered by an Afghan." These days there are other attendant dangers. The route lies just east of the world's highest and most improbable battleground, the disputed Siachen Glacier, where nuclear neighbors India and Pakistan have fought intermittently since 1984. So far the greatest battle has been to survive the conditions; more soldiers have died in avalanches than armed conflict.

Stein put Lal Singh in charge of transferring the antiquities onto yaks since parts of the steep, icy terrain ahead were impa.s.sable by camel. Stein watched as the caravan left to continue on its mountainous route before its descent into the safety of Ladakh's fertile Nubra Valley. Meanwhile, the need for medical treatment was growing more urgent. Gangrene had set in to the toes on his right foot and he feared its further spread. The explorer shed most of his remaining party and baggage so he could be carried quickly along the same route as the antiquities. He crossed the Karakoram Pa.s.s on October 3, 1908, and the Sa.s.ser four days later. Like others before him, Stein witnessed how the skeletons of pack animals littered the route. It was a morbid sight at any time, but for a man with a life-threatening injury the sight must have appeared even more distressing. He had once dismissed the Karakoram route as a "tour for ladies"; now it was proving anything but.

To distract himself, Stein attempted to read. He turned to writings by Renaissance philosopher Erasmus-the subject of Percy Allen's years of scholarly study. Erasmus is credited with the adage, "In the country of the blind, the one-eyed man is king," but as Stein contemplated the philosopher's words, anxious questions about a different affliction must have preyed on him. Would his feet survive? Would he walk again? An explorer unable to walk was no explorer at all.

A week later, on the evening of October 8, he approached Panamik, the first village of Ladakh's Nubra Valley, where he was met by the head of the Moravian Mission Hospital. Alerted to Stein's plight, Dr. S. Schmitt had traveled up from Leh to meet him.

The missionary doctor examined Stein's feet. The toes on the left foot would survive, but those on his right foot were doomed. They would have to be removed to prevent the spread of gangrene. Schmitt dressed the wounds but was unwilling to operate on his exhausted patient until they reached Leh. Today trucks, buses, and military vehicles make the journey from Panamik to Leh in about ten hours along the world's highest motorable road. But for Stein, the town was still four days away. Once there, Schmitt amputated toes on Stein's right foot. He removed two middle toes completely and the top joint of the other three. As he recovered at the Mission hospital, Stein wrote Allen a lengthy, if dispa.s.sionate, account in which he glossed over the seriousness of his "unlucky incident."

Dr [Schmitt] a.s.sures me that the three toes left thus for the greater part intact will be ample to a.s.sure my full power of walking & climbing. The operations did not cause much pain [. . .] I am very sorry for the worry this unlucky incident at the very close of my explorations may cause you. But I have told you the details in all truth & hope you will join me in taking a philosophical view of the whole case.

The version is at odds with his later accounts, in which he acknowledges the wounds from the amputation were both painful and slow to heal. No doubt he did not want to alarm his friend. But it was too late. News of Stein's injury reached Allen long before the explorer's nine-page letter. On the day Stein was penning his letter in Leh, The Times published a brief report. The one-paragraph article, published on October 16, 1908, stated simply that Stein was being treated in Leh for frostbitten feet following his return from an expedition to Central Asia. The article added to Stein's distress. "I never thought of such a communication finding its way prematurely to London without any direct report on my part or else I should have sent you telegraphic news direct from Leh. Forgive the omission & all the worrying uncertainty which it must have caused you for weeks," he wrote soon after to Allen.

The inherently private Stein would hardly have been pleased that news of his injury had become public. Having worked so hard to keep confidential the details of his discoveries, this was news he could not control. The image of a crippled explorer-and the speculation such news would prompt-was not what he wanted just ahead of his return to Britain from an otherwise wildly successful expedition.

With a view to the help he would need in London, Stein asked Allen to nudge their mutual friend Fred Andrews to seek a role at either the India Office or the British Museum, where Andrews could use his expertise in Indian and Oriental art. "If you have a chance of talking to the Baron [Andrews] discreetly about the need of urging his own case at both places, kindly use it. He is far too modest & shy about seeing people & writing makes little impression."

Stein convalesced in the autumn sunshine on the mission's veranda, with its view of the majestic Leh Palace high on a barren ridge. The palace, like a smaller version of Lhasa's Potala Palace, dominates the town. Stein regretted not being able to explore this corner of what he called Western Tibet. But he glimpsed a fascinating world. Had he been able to walk the maze of narrow alleys that lead up to the palace, he would have seen a Buddhist culture very much alive. Ladakh's centuries-old monasteries, full of statues, sutras, and painted murals, continue to thrive.

Immobilized, he used the time to write letters and make arrangements for the transport of his antiquities. They had arrived safely in Leh under Lal Singh's care, and the surveyor was once again in charge as the convoy left for Srinagar in mid-October. The cases traveled in carts and then by rail south to Bombay. Stein knew that if he did not follow his antiquities soon, he would be stuck in Leh until spring. Winter was approaching and the first snows would close the pa.s.s between Ladakh and Kashmir. He maintained his optimistic tone in his letters to Allen, expressing a hope that he would be able to ride into Kashmir, walk soon after and be in Budapest for Christmas.

The reality was different. Unable to ride-or even sit up-when he departed on November 1, he had to be carried on his litter for the two-week journey to Srinagar. He was carried over the Zoji Pa.s.s that separates the barren high desert of Ladakh from Kashmir's fertile valleys. It was not how he had imagined his return to the area he so loved. He had to content himself with pa.s.sing a night by the foot of Mohand Marg, his de facto home on whose meadows he had camped for years.

In Srinagar he was treated by Dr. Arthur Neve, head of the Church Mission Hospital and a keen mountaineer, who already knew the toll the expedition had taken on its members. The blind handyman Naik Ram Singh had been taken to Neve just months earlier. Although the surgeon could do little for the Naik, Neve had rea.s.suring news for Stein: the explorer would be able to walk and, most importantly, climb again once the wounds had fully healed. The ball of the foot, so vital for balance, was unharmed. And enough of his toes, including the big toe, remained to ensure he could cope with hilly terrain. "Things might have fared a great deal worse-& you know what walking means for me & my work," he wrote to Andrews.

But the wounds would not heal overnight, and he had to remain in Srinagar until they did. He stayed at the elegant British Residency near tranquil Dal Lake. In the summer, when British officials fled the heat of India's plains and headed for the hill stations, the Residency was one of the Raj era's most enchanting social hubs. At the height of the season its gardens were hung with Chinese lanterns for moonlight gatherings. The Resident's canopied barge glided by on the lake, rowed by liveried oarsmen. By late autumn, when Stein arrived, the glittering social set had long departed, no doubt to his relief. Nonetheless, he enjoyed what seemed to him luxurious trappings. After more than two and a half years of sleeping under canvas and writing his notes by candlelight, he had the novelty of a bed, furniture, and electric light. He took his meals in his old camp chair, and his two Turki servants, Muhammadju and Musa, remained with him. Although the Resident, Sir Francis Younghusband-Macartney's former superior at Kashgar-was absent, Stein was cared for by a young a.s.sistant as though he were a family member.