ridges over the Tola
and Orkhon; published a newspaper; arranged a veterinary laboratory
and hospitals; re-opened the schools; protected commerce, mercilessly
hanging Russian and Mongolian soldiers for pillaging Chinese firms.

In one of these cases his Commandant arrested two Cossacks and a Mongol
soldier who had stolen brandy from one of the Chinese shops and brought
them before him. He immediately bundled them all into his car, drove off
to the shop, delivered the brandy back to the proprietor and as promptly
ordered the Mongol to hang one of the Russians to the big gate of the
compound. With this one swung he commanded: "Now hang the other!" and
this had only just been accomplished when he turned to the Commandant
and ordered him to hang the Mongol beside the other two. That seemed
expeditious and just enough until the Chinese proprietor came in dire
distress to the Baron and plead with him:

"General Baron! General Baron! Please take those men down from my
gateway, for no one will enter my shop!"

After the commercial quarter was flashed past our eyes, we entered the
Russian settlement across a small river. Several Russian soldiers and
four very spruce-looking Mongolian women stood on the bridge as we
passed. The soldiers snapped to salute like immobile statues and fixed
their eyes on the severe face of their Commander. The women first began
to run and shift about and then, infected by the discipline and order
of events, swung their hands up to salute and stood as immobile as their
northern swains. The Baron looked at me and laughed:

"You see the discipline! Even the Mongolian women salute me."

Soon we were out on the plain with the car going like an arrow, with the
wind whistling and tossing the folds of our coats and caps. But Baron
Ungern, sitting with closed eyes, repeated: "Faster! Faster!" For a long
time we were both silent.

"And yesterday I beat my adjutant for rushing into my yurta and
interrupting my story," he said.

"You can finish it now," I answered.

"And are you not bored by it? Well, there isn't much left and this
happens to be the most interesting. I was telling you that I wanted
to found an order of military Buddhists in Russia. For what? For
the protection of the processes of evolution of humanity and for the
struggle against revolution, because I am certain that evolution leads
to the Divinity and revolution to bestiality. But I worked in Russia!
In Russia, where the peasants are ro