t unknown to Europeans.

* * * * *

Kalgan, the frontier town of Mongolia, is not so well built as the
imperial cities; it is a commercial centre, where bazaars abound, and
open stalls; the foot passengers touch the walls of the houses as they
file by, one after the other, and the roadway, narrow, squalid, and
muddy, is thronged with chariots, camels, mules, and horses. "I have
been much struck," writes Madame de Bourboulon, "with the extreme
variety of costumes and types resulting from the presence of numerous
foreign merchants. Here, as in all Chinese towns, the traders at every
door tout for custom. Here, porters trudge by loaded with bales of tea;
there, under an awning of felt, are encamped itinerant restaurateurs
with their cooking-stoves; yonder, the mendicant bonzes beat the
tam-tam, and second-hand dealers display their wares.

"Ragged Tartars, with their legs bare, drive onward herds of cattle,
without thought of passers-by; while Tibetans display their sumptuous
garb, their blue caps with red top-knots, and their loose-lowing hair.
Farther off, the camel-drivers of Turkistan, turbaned, with aquiline
nose and long black beard, lead along, with strange airs, their camels
loaded with salt; finally, the Mongolian Lamas, in red and yellow
garments, and shaven crowns, gallop past on their untrained steeds, in
striking contrast to the calm bearing of a Siberian merchant, who
stalks along in his thick fur-lined pelisse, great boots, and large felt
hat.

"Behold me now in the street of the clothes-merchants; there are more
second-hand dealers than tailors in China; one has no repugnance for
another's cast-off raiment, and frequently one does not deign even to
clean it. I enter a fashionable shop: the master is a natty little old
man, his nose armed with formidable spectacles which do but partly
conceal his dull, malignant eyes. Three young people in turn exhibit to
the passer-by his different wares, extolling their quality, and making
known their prices. This is the custom; and to me it seems more
ingenious and better adapted to attract purchasers, than the
artistically arranged shop-windows which one sees in Europe. I allowed
myself to be tempted, and purchased a blue silk pelisse, lined with
white wool; this wool, as soft and fine as silk, comes from the
celebrated race of the Ong-ti sheep. I paid for it double its value, but
the master of the establishment was so persuasive, so ir