Marco’s health being restored, our travellers resumed their journey towards Cathay, and proceeding in a north-easterly direction, arrived at the roots of a vast mountain, reported by the inhabitants to be the loftiest in the world. Having continued for three days ascending the steep approaches to this mountain, they reached an extensive table-land, hemmed in on both sides by still loftier mountains, and having a great lake in its centre. A fine river likewise flowed through it, and maintained so extraordinary a degree of fertility in the pastures upon its banks, that an ox or horse brought lean to these plains would become fat in ten days. Great numbers of wild animals were found here, among the rest a species of wild sheep with horns six spans in length, from which numerous drinking-vessels were made. This immense plain, notwithstanding its fertility, was uninhabited, and the severity of the cold prevented its being frequented by birds. Fire, too, it was asserted, did not here burn so brightly, or produce the same effect upon food, as in other places: an observation which has recently been made on the mountains of Savoy and Switzerland. From this plain they proceeded along the foot of the Allak mountains to the country of Kashgar, which, possessing a fertile soil, and an industrious and ingenious population, was maintained in a high state of cultivation, and beautified with numerous gardens, orchards, and vineyards. From Kashgar they travelled to Yarkand, where the inhabitants, like those of the valleys of the Pyrenees, were subject to the goitres, or large wens upon the throat. To this province succeeded that of Khoten, whence our word _cotton_ has been derived. The inhabitants of this country, an industrious but unwarlike race, were of the Mohammedan religion, and tributaries to the Great Khan. Proceeding in their south-easterly direction, they passed through the city of Peym, where, if a husband or wife were absent from home twenty days, the remaining moiety might marry again; and pursuing their course through sandy barren plains, arrived at the country of Sartem. Here the landscape was enlivened by numerous cities and castles; but when the storm of war burst upon them, the inhabitants, like the Arabs, relied upon famine as their principal weapon against the enemy, retiring with their wives, children, treasures, and provisions, into the desert, whither none could follow them. To secure their subsistence from plunder, they habitually scooped out their granaries in the depths of the desert, where, after harvest, they annually buried their corn in deep pits, over which the wind soon spread the wavy sand as before, obliterating all traces of their labours. They themselves, however, possessed some unerring index to the spot, which enabled them at all times to discover their hoards. Chalcedonies, jaspers, and other precious stones were found in the rivers of this province.