Government to talk about
the way the Chinese settlers are wronging him, taking away the tillable
lands. He does not want them to till, but to pasture his herds, and that
is just the difficulty. It is not China but civilization that is driving
the Mongol to the wall, just as the Red Indian was driven. Nowadays the
people that will not make the best use of the land must give it up to
those who will.

The next day promised to be a long, hard one, and proved even harder
than I had expected. First the little dog was run over by my own baggage
cart. I thought surely he was dead, and then I feared the first use of
the revolver I had brought from America would be to end his gay little
life. The Russians shook their heads dolefully and gave no help, but
Wang lent a hand with his cheerful "all right," and in twenty-four hours
Jack was able to bark at the horses, even though he was too much bunged
up to stand.

My other trouble was the behaviour of the man Ivan. He was in fact a
thoroughly bad sort, lazy, stupid, sullen, and brutal to his horses. He
was supposed to take orders from the other Russian, but he refused to
obey him or any one. Only when by signs I could make clear what I wanted
could I do anything with him; then I could sometimes put enough
peremptoriness in my voice to bring him to heel. Added to the natural
bad temper of the man he was drinking constantly, and was quite beyond
control.

The country where we now were was a succession of beautiful valleys
watered by many streams and enclosed by barren, treeless hills,--a rich,
uninteresting district. We stopped for tiffin by a broad stream
bordered by willows. The grass was good, but the flies were so maddening
that the poor ponies hardly grazed at all. Hot as it was, I thought they
were better off moving than in this pestilential spot, but it was
impossible to get Ivan started. For hours he slept and drank, while the
horses twitched their skins and switched their tails and stamped their
feet, and between times tried to snatch a bite. Poor-looking women and
boys from some yurts crept over to our camp, and sought eagerly through
the grass for any finds in the way of tins or bottles. They were quite
the most miserable natives that I saw on my trip. As for me, I sat on
the ground, comforting Jack and longing for a Chinese or a Mongol or
anything that had learned to obey.

Finally at half-past five the driver roused from his drunken doze and we
started off again. On