consequently without warm clothes and without food. During the following days these mountains around Kobdo heard many cries of misfortune, woe and death. The severe cold and hunger killed off the women and children out under the open sky of the Mongolian winter. This news was soon known to the Chinese. They laughed in mockery and soon organized a big meeting at the nagan hushun to discuss letting the mob and gamins loose on the town. A young Chinese, the son of a cook of one of the colonists, revealed this news. We immediately decided to make an investigation. A Russian officer and my friend joined me with this young Chinese as a guide for a trip to the outskirts of the town. We feigned simply a stroll but were stopped by the Chinese sentinel on the side of the city toward the nagan hushun with an impertinent command that no one was allowed to leave the town. As we spoke with him, I noticed that between the town and the nagan hushun Chinese guards were stationed all along the way and that streams of Chinese were moving in that direction. We saw at once it was impossible to reach the meeting from this approach, so we chose another route. We left the city from the eastern side and passed along by the camp of the Mongolians who had been reduced to beggary by the Chinese impositions. There also they were evidently anxiously awaiting the turn of events, for, in spite of the lateness of the hour, none had gone to sleep. We slipped out on the ice and worked around by the river to the nagan hushun. As we passed free of the city we began to sneak cautiously along, taking advantage of every bit of cover. We were armed with revolvers and hand grenades and knew that a small detachment had been prepared in the town to come to our aid, if we should be in danger. First the young Chinese stole forward with my friend following him like a shadow, constantly reminding him that he would strangle him like a mouse if he made one move to betray us. I fear the young guide did not greatly enjoy the trip with my gigantic friend puffing all too loudly with the unusual exertions. At last the fences of nagan hushun were in sight and nothing between us and them save the open plain, where our group would have been easily spotted; so that we decided to crawl up one by one, save that the Chinese was retained in the society of my trusted friend. Fortunately there were many heaps of frozen manure on the plain, which we made use of as cover to lead us right up to our objective point, the fence of the enclosures. In the shadow of this we slunk along to the courtyard where the voices of the excited crowd beckoned us. As we took good vantage points in the darkness for listening and making observations, we remarked two extraordinary things in our immediate neighborhood.