ngol means, "The Hundred and Eight
Convents." This name is perfectly unknown in the country itself.

Tolon-Noor is not a walled city, but a vast agglomeration of hideous
houses, which seem to have been thrown together with a pitchfork. The
carriage portion of the streets is a marsh of mud and putrid filth, deep
enough to stifle and bury the smaller beasts of burden that not
unfrequently fall within it, and whose carcases remain to aggravate the
general stench; while their loads become the prey of the innumerable
thieves who are ever on the alert. The foot-path is a narrow, rugged,
slippery line on either side, just wide enough to admit the passage of
one person.

Yet, despite the nastiness of the town itself, the sterility of the
environs, the excessive cold of its winter, and the intolerable heat of
its summer, its population is immense, and its commerce enormous.
Russian merchandise is brought hither in large quantities by the way of
Kiakta. The Tartars bring incessant herds of camels, oxen, and horses,
and carry back in exchange tobacco, linen, and tea. This constant
arrival and departure of strangers communicates to the city an animated
and varied aspect. All sorts of hawkers are at every corner offering
their petty wares; the regular traders, from behind their counters,
invite, with honeyed words and tempting offers, the passers-by to come in
and buy. The Lamas, in their red and yellow robes, gallop up and down,
seeking admiration for their equestrianism, and the skilful management of
their fiery steeds.

The trade of Tolon-Noor is mostly in the hands of men from the province
of _Chan-Si_, who seldom establish themselves permanently in the town;
but after a few years, when their money-chest is filled, return to their
own country. In this vast emporium, the Chinese invariably make
fortunes, and the Tartars invariably are ruined. Tolon-Noor, in fact, is
a sort of great pneumatic pump, constantly at work in emptying the
pockets of the unlucky Mongols.

The magnificent statues, in bronze and brass, which issue from the great
foundries of Tolon-Noor, are celebrated not only throughout Tartary, but
in the remotest districts of Thibet. Its immense workshops supply all
the countries subject to the worship of Buddha with idols, bells, and
vases employed in that idolatry. While we were in the town, a monster
statue of Buddha, a present from a friend of Oudchou-Mourdchin to the
Tale-Lama, was packed for Thibet,