From Tientsin to Mongolia
I
Mou brought me a calling card — Frans August Larson — and, with the license of a Chinese house steward, observed, ‘A Swede by birth, created a Mongolian duke by the Mongols, who speak of him as “the Mongol who knows most about Mongolia.” Thirty-five years’ residence among the Mongolian people in many capacities. One-time adviser to the Living Buddha. One-time Mongolian representative and adviser to the Government of Yuan Shih-kai. A man in his late fifties. Just returned from eighteen months’ work on the Sino-Chinese Scientific Expedition to the desert of Takalama, in which he has been associated with Sven Hedin.’
I went down to the drawing-room. My guest rose, and without preamble asked me to come to Mongolia and write a book.
I gasped, because I knew real writers who had begged for his story and been refused — writers of reputation, who could assure publication simply by their established names. In a slow, gentle voice he told me that he had read the few poems, stories, and articles printed below my name. I confessed that they represented the sum total of my published work, and protested that they were slender recommendation for the ability to write a book. I suggested that it was only fair that he should study the manuscript of the novel over which I had toiled for fourteen months, and in which I had failed so badly that I dared not submit it to a publisher for consideration.
He brushed my objections aside. ‘I know what should be written — I know that you can do it — I have already made plans for the German and the Swedish publications — I came this way from Takalama — how soon can you be ready to start to Mongolia?'
I had a double errand at the American Consulate. According to regulations, I must notify the office of my intention to leave the Consular District; and on the annual date of registration I had left my old passport, which had reached the end of its life, to be replaced by a new one, and must remind the Consul I had not yet received it.
The Tsinanfu incident had increased the tension in Tientsin. Representative authorities of France, Italy, England, and Japan met in diplomatic counsel. Cable wires whispered carefully coded messages to and from the capitals of the world. Defense lines crawled out beyond the boundaries of the foreign concessions. American soldiers and marines sweated with ‘allied’ soldiers to throw up trenches, curl miles of barbed wire, and build sandbag barricades around agreed ‘special areas.’ Despite the protests of the Chinese, Japan was permitted to cut down trees, level ground, and put into action aeroplane landing stations outside Tientsin and in Peking.
Fear, distrust, and suspicion pressed into every gathering of foreigners. Men and women recounted the terrors of the Boxer days, of Shanghai, of Shameen, of Hankow, Nanking, and the interior. These stories were supplemented by historic tales from the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. Dinner guests and chance acquaintances missed no opportunity to stress the deceit and the cruelty of the Chinese. They became the ‘yellow peril.’ The triple spirits of evil smothered all memories of good.
Chinese farmers, shopkeepers, and gentry, carrying all the material possessions they could transport, swarmed into Tientsin and joined the local native populace, who pressed against the allied barricades and begged for protection from loot, rape, and massacre, which are too often the attributes of Chinese civil war, even when the only battle is change of authority by compromise. Chinese families permanently domiciled within the foreign protected areas, who in reality outnumber the foreigners, filled their courtyards with visiting relatives.
The talk in the courtyards of my Chinese friends ran thus: ‘Chang Tsolin declares he will protect us from these mad Nationalists, but he and his confederates are good business men ■— they will sell out to the highest bidder’; ‘The Nationalists speak with fragrant words, but they are cunning people'; ‘Feng Yu Sheng will bite the nose of his allies as soon as he gets to Peking. He may save himself a battle by letting the much respected governor of Shansi accept the keys of the capital, but he will disarm the Shansi soldiers when they have served his purpose — which is Moscow’s breath.’
Deeper than this distrust of Chinese military leaders ran the same fear which menaced foreign society, except that the name of the terror was now ‘the foreign domination menace.’ The people who accepted protection within the lines of foreign soldiers watched each move of the foreigners with suspicion. All the dregs of foreign intercourse since the very beginning were stirred up. Tales of treachery, deceit, and cruelty by ‘outsiders’ were remembered and retold to children who listened with wide eyes.
Against this background I met my Consul-General, and we parted in baffled misunderstanding at the end of an hour in which he had told me stories of Chinese untrustworthiness with the manner of an indulgent father, and brushed aside my knowledge of the kindly way in which these people respond to trust. He ushered me out without my passport.
So, without it, I left for Mongolia on Sunday morning. Although the lack of a passport often means the delay of long conversations, this may after all be the best way to travel while peoples of different race continue to shift cautious national eyes sideways in mutual distrust.
The morning press, both Chinese and foreign, carried statements that Chang Tso-lin would defend Peking and the Northern territory to the last — one paper even had the picturesque story that Fengtien generals at the front were equipped with steel coffins which they were pledged to use as their only way of return. But the railway yards gave the lie to these statements. They were filled with the rolling stock of all the railways north of the Yellow River — engines, passenger cars, and freight cars ail bearing evidence of preparation for departure to Manchuria.
As an omen of good fortune for my journey, the train made the run to Peking on express time, when rumor had told me that every day for weeks the trip had been one long torture of delay. I had been undaunted by this, because I like railway trains and have no objection to spending a week on the trip to Peking.
The Peking railway yards were also filled with engines, and cars from the Hankow, Pukow, and Kalgan roads. Thus we were almost certain of Chang Tso-lin’s plans, even before we heard that his Fifth Concubine was superintending the melting down of all tribute gold dust and the putting into solid form of all moneys.
II
No passenger trains were running to Kalgan, the gateway to Mongolia, but many minor incidents were proof that the Fengtien forces would be withdrawn to Manchuria. We knew that extensive military preparations for a long siege had been made beyond the Nankow Pass, and that Fengtien officers would have to go up the line with the orders for evacuation.
At six o’clock on the morning of May 30, we went to the West Gate Station in the limousine of a kind friend. In accordance with previous arrangements, we met a young German farmer and a young American missionary, who also desired to go north. We were prepared to camp at the station until the day and the hour a train, which we believed would eventually go, should be ready. The waiting room and the platforms were filled with soldiers — further proof that troop movements were pending. They crowded about us and expressed surprise that we should come to the station. Soldiers are human, and all Chinese have an easily tickled sense of humor. They were soon laughing good-naturedly.
One hardened ruffian pushed a fair young boy, scarcely taller than the bayonet rifle which hung from his frail shoulder, toward me. He will make a good bodyguard for you — he is too slight to fight with the Fengtien, who are fierce soldiers.’
'He is grown straight as a bamboo — give him full rice bowls for two years and he will be a general.’ The crowd nodded agreement.
In such simple ways the morning passed, and at noon an engine steamed into the station with three cars coupled behind it, one closed and two open, one of the latter with tying places for horses. Soldiers crowded into the other open car, making themselves comfortable on rolls of bedding and opening gay oiled-paper umbrellas as protection against the sun.
We went out of the station in the closed car as guests of three officers of the Twelfth Army. By reputation among civilians, the Twelfth Army is the worst gathering of rogues among the Fengtien forces. The Chinese have a saying that when one must travel in dangerous places it is best to travel in the worst company. We found these men charming companions.
One was wiry and weathered to leather wrinkles by rough living. We knew he was first in rank because the others stood until he was seated. One had the clear-cut profile of North Manchuria, which resembles the classical Greek more than the southern Chinese. He was an athlete in iron condition. The third was fair and plump, with dimples that danced in each cheek as he talked.
All were dressed in well-tailored uniforms of excellent cloth, with leather belts, shoulder straps, neat covers for their revolvers, and circular military capes. Two wore riding boots of stout leather. The slim, graceful feet of 'Dimples’ were clad in trim satin slippers.
‘A relative, comfortably berthed as an officer by someone in a high position,’ we murmured to each other.
I had noticed that our engine bore the stamp of the Baldwin Locomotive Works in Philadelphia, and so I felt close to a friend. The senior officer told me that the car in which we rode also came from America, but all the American fittings had been taken out and Chinese comforts added. Chinese beds had been built across each end. These the officers’ servants spread with rich coverlets.
Fox furs, first, to make them soft. Then layer on layer of silk quilts. Quilts in lovely colors, all immaculately clean. Scarlet, orange, leaf-green, sapphire, heliotrope, sunset-yellow. One place of honor was arranged just a trifle better than the others. This the senior officer graciously requested me to accept, and, as Chinese custom demands, I replied that I should be happier in a more modest place. Then he pulled his cloak about him and lay down so that the rest of the company might also make themselves comfortable.
In reclining positions we thus sped through the green country toward the Nankow Pass. Our talk ranged over the face of the earth and through the philosophies of all time. With that ease which the Chinese have cultivated, we dozed and woke to take part in the conversation when we chose, and sipped cups of fragrant tea which the happy serving boys, dressed like regular cavalry soldiers, kept ever before us, or refreshed ourselves with steaming hot towels rung from boiling water.
Grain in the field, despite the barren unwatered plots, was continuous evidence of the fruitful promise of the earth. As we came into the mountains, my mind Hashed remembrance of an old Chinese man to whom I had once talked as he worked in his field. I had pricked him with pointed words about the civil conditions in his country which permitted ever-changing military upstarts to ravage the land. He had worked quietly, digging up the soil about a clump of peanuts, until I ceased. Then he rested back on his heels: ‘Before us is the mountain. My fathers have lived in this plot and observed the mountain for generations beyond count. Rabbits run over the mountain. Through the generations the mountain stands.’
Shortly before sunset we came to Huai Lai — the end of our officers’ detail of duty. We all got out. Horses were taken from the box car and saddled. We discreetly and privately offered twenty dollars to the servants and to the engine driver. They firmly refused, saying, ‘It has been a pleasure to have you — money may not pass between friends.’
But Huai Lai was like a city of the dead. The streets were empty of the teeming colorful life which belongs to a living place of the Chinese people. No compound gates were open even the fraction of an inch. Dogs and children had disappeared. Shops were closeshuttered. Beggars and barbers had fled elsewhere. The only sign that life, other than soldier life, had ever been here was steaming iron pots of rice set out on little tables before many closed homesteads. Food placed as a peace offering against loot.
We knocked long at the doors of the Methodist Mission compound. When the Chinese left in charge discovered we were foreigners, we were welcomed with eager words. We must tell him how we had come. ‘Peace — peace,’ he murmured thankfully as we told. He talked of the strain and stress of the days since the American missionaries had been recalled from the station, and told us that now he had more than two hundred refugees from the country, with their beasts and chattels, housed within the Mission walls. Many of them were sick because of the close, unsanitary housing and his inability to doctor or to secure simple drugs for the illnesses he understood.
His wife came to the outer court and insisted that we must not seek shelter for the night at an inn. They wanted to have us with them — it gave them confidence in the future to have foreigners come again. They led us to the upper of three ascending courtyards (their own living quarters), and insisted that we take the only sleeping room. This had built across one end a stone Chinese bed, with a stove under it for winter, used as table and seat by day.
The men went off to pay their courteous respects to the City Elder. With the help of the Mission workers’ daughter of seven, I laid out things for supper. Luckily I discovered in the lining of my old purse a little ivory elephant, bought long ago in Ceylon and forgotten, which delighted her immensely. Together we chatted and waited while the sinking sun tinted the courtyard bricks ashy rose.
Supper by candle. Then a few hours of sleep in our clothes in a stuffy room on a stone bed — a surface hard to a body too long accustomed to foreign mattresses. At dawn we were up, breakfasted on Chinese tea and eggs, and watched the passing of the Fengtien troops.
III
First came Dodge motor trucks, heaped high with new, unopened boxes of military supplies, driven at full speed by soldiers. A line so long that I lost count of the number. After the trucks came camels — moulting camels, which are camels in ugly undress. Some were in bare skin — nasty, weaklooking skin. Others were worse, with patches of wool hanging half off. They were heavily packed with burdens of ammunition. It took them an hour to shamble by.
Behind the camels came an assortment of mules, donkeys, and ponies, some hitched to farm carts, all heavily loaded and driven by haggard, frightened peasant owners, commandeered from the surrounding territory by soldiers. Next coolies, also under soldier guard, wild-eyed and trembling with fear, stumbled along with rolls of bedding, stretchers on which lay sick men, chests, and what not of luggage that goes with a withdrawing army. Mingled with the coolies came the foot soldiers at a good pace, but marching in no formation. They continuously dropped out of place to eat from the bowls of food, again steaming hot, which stood before close-bolted courtyard doors, and fell in again farther in the rear.
A percentage of the soldiers were boys just entering their teens. A few looked weary and discouraged, as though they would prefer to drop by the roadside rather than make the journey to Manchuria. The majority were tall, strong men, in good condition and clothed in decent uniforms.
Close behind the foot marchers, so close that there was little opportunity for the straggling which leaves thieves and marauders behind to make trouble in the evacuated country, pressed horses driven at quick speed. Great Russian horses, with muscles swelling under glossy coats; well-conditioned horses of spirit, hitched to gigantic guns mounted on wheels; dozens and dozens of teams of horses such as I have not seen before in China, pulling great guns such as I should not have believed the Fengtien possessed had I not observed with my own eyes.
Cavalry brought up the rear. Men well armed and well mounted. They did not ride with the military precision of Western cavalry, but their horses moved with the frisky grace of animals bred in the wild herd and well pastured. The sun was past mid-heaven before they had cleared the road and we could consider preparations for our further journey.
The streets remained empty, but our host of the night sent his servants on discreet errands. The word spread that we would hire two carts if they were available. Eventually the carts were assembled — a wheel brought from this hiding place, an axle from another, for it is the custom of the Chinese, when in fear of soldiers, to take their possessions apart and scatter the sections. In time miserable, rawboned, sway-backed beasts were attached to the carts with ropes. We could not expect animals of value to be supplied in such a time, even though the carters were willing to come under our escort . We promised that we would not walk faster than they at any time. Our bedding, clothes rolls, and foodstuffs were put on the carts. Burden-free, we were off.
We tramped twenty-five miles before nightfall. Through fields and walled villages without sign of civilian life; fields that irrigation made fruitful — velvet rice crops — heavy-headed wheat — row on row of vegetables. Barren earth, powdery dry, so that the hot wind danced the dust in whirling figures. Villages and towns well walled and well built, with silent streets. The only sign of habitation was a great new gun mounted on the wall ofTuMu, the ancient city famous for historic wars, through many centuries, between the Mongols and the Chinese; and the lively twittering birds that fluttered unconcernedly through field and town.
Once we crossed a brook of sparkling water, where the horses drank thirstily and one of our party bathed his tired feet. Twice only we came upon straggling Fengticn soldiers. One group had with them two poor old horses and a baby donkey so tired that it tried to lie down, but was beaten and struggled forward on frail, swollen legs.
The countryside was scarred by trenches, built with the thoroughness of Western method. At frequent intervals we saw ambushes finished less than twenty-four hours earlier, because the branches that had been cut to make them resemble a growth of young trees were still fresh. Trees and shrubs lay where they had been felled. Cartloads of stone and sand had been dropped as though from the active hands of workmen. Everywhere there were evidences of extensive preparations for war — preparations suddenly abandoned.
‘The Fengtien have made good business. They are wise,’ commented one of our carters. ‘Chang Tso-lin is an expert merchant. All Chinese people are good merchants when given the opportunity — the Fengtien have been given the opportunity.’
The other agreed: ‘All soldiers are keen business men. It is an uncertain calling, but it has its merits, especially if one rises to a position where he has some power. Promises have been made in this deal. The incoming army will approach always one day, at least, behind the withdrawing authority. All faces are saved. The retreating forces take with them all they desire. All the railway engines, cars, and handy freight for trade in Manchuria. They keep unused all their stores of guns and ammunition, which are expensive to purchase or manufacture, and conserve their trained soldiers for future need. They carry away all tribute and all taxes, because a retreating army cannot be expected to keep the promises of good roads, new canals, bridges, irrigation plants, or schools for the people, which they made when they were the government. Even the blindest beggar can understand how they cannot do this when they have resigned office. On the other side, the new army come in with all their men and supplies intact, strong and ready for office. The crops are not yet harvested. The exchange has not placed undue stress on the populace. Conditions are more prosperous without war. The chests of the new authorities will be filled with tribute — but the burden will be no heavier than if the Fengtien had remained.’
All day the carters chatted thus. They expressed no bitterness, but continuous admiration for business acumen.
At San Chen we considered refreshment for ourselves and the beasts. We came to the door of an inn. Repeated knocks brought a cautious whisper. We were admitted to a stable courtyard and the bolts slid behind us. The place was bare of all furniture — every possible possession having been hidden away. The horses were unroped and fed. Water boiled and tea was made for the carters and ourselves. Eggs were finally secured. From our packet of food we took dry biscuits and one precious refreshing can of peaches.
Then on again through country the same as that we had passed, with no glimpse of human life, and the same frequent empty trenches, until at evening we came to Shin Pao An. Here in the home of kindly Norwegian missionaries we had baths, tall glasses of goat’s milk, crisp homemade bread, delicious white cheese, and sleep on spring beds between snowy sheets. Their compound, too, was crowded with country refugees, and the stable yards filled with animals brought to them for protection.
We were up at dawn, breakfasted royally, and were escorted beyond the city walls by our hosts. A Chinese postman, who wished to travel in company, was now one of our party.
A little way beyond the city we came to the dry, rocky bed of a river, through which trickled only a tiny stream of water. ‘Just enough to keep the river alive,’ explained the Chinese postman.
Away from the arid river bed on either side stretched vivid green crops fed by tiny irrigation canals in careful husbandry, which regulated the exact drop of moisture necessary with miniature dams and tiny gates. Mile on mile the crops marched with the river, so that we feasted our eyes on the promised harvest as long as our trail led the same way. We saw no more Fengtien soldiers, but the fields continued empty of men and beasts. The people waited in silent obscurity for the advent of the Nationalists.
Near noon we sighted the dust of approaching horsemen. Soon we crossed ways with Shansi cavalry wearing the Nationalist colors. They galloped by on good horses, with only a cheery greeting.
Half an hour later riders pressed upon our back trail. Three of the Shansi cavalry galloped back. One dismounted. He apologized in courteous language for the necessity to ask our names, our business, our destination. He looked at the passports of the others and made no trouble about my lack of one. That business completed, he inquired about conditions in Tientsin and Peking and in all the country through which we had passed.
He expressed astonishment that we had dared to travel into the face of a Fengtien retreat, and asked if we had found the officers or the men rude. We told him how gracious they had been to us from Peking to Huai Lai; how we had stood by the side of the road to watch the withdrawing army pass. He asked if the soldiers had shouted at us, and we could reply, ‘Yes, but all they said was “Good day” in Chinese, and “Comrade” in Russian. This they did repeatedly.'
He smiled, and assured us that the Nationalists would give us no moment of uneasiness. We asked about the road ahead. One of his companions answered that he had ridden all the way from Kalgan and found it passably good. The three saluted in farewell.
We stopped for refreshments at Sang Sui Pu, the next town. People were in the streets. The inn door was ajar. ‘Peace — peace — peace!' was the glad cry with which we were greeted. All that afternoon we journeyed through countryside and town filled with busy, happy people, who had confidently returned to the normal round of life now that the Fengtien had passed in orderly fashion, and the Nationalists had come in with equal orderliness.
At evening we came to the city of Shun Hua Fu. A city gay with fluttering banners of red and of blue, and white-starred flags waving above every shop, inn, and homestead. In the streets civilians jostled soldiers in comradely swarms. Children squatted around a candy maker, exchanging coppers for the spun-sugar horses, fans, birds sitting on the nest, and fierce dragons which he blew from a bamboo pipe and handed out still warm. In the doorway of an open tea shop a minstrel chanted some historic tale. Traveling barbers were busily at work, shaving faces and cutting hair beside the road. A fortune teller w’s encircled by customers. Roadside food kitchens sent forth appetizing odors. A blacksmith’s forge glowed with warm light. He sang as he shaped shoes for waiting horses.
That night we had two comfortable rooms in a charming flower-filled courtyard, and a good Chinese supper. Sleep on a stone bed the second time had none of the misery of the first. In fact, I did not notice the hardness at all, but slept peacefully until dawn. After breakfast we were off on the last fifteen miles to Kalgan.
This was a walk of half the distance and twice the difficulty of the previous day. A gradual ascent with sliding desert underfoot and hot, wind-driven sand stinging our faces. Our carters had wisely exchanged horses with mail carts bound for Huai Lai, so that our animals had their noses turned toward home and took the road at a quickened gait. We kept pace with them.
IV
In the afternoon of June 2 we came into Kalgan, which is the Russianization, by early tea traders, of the Mongolian word Halaga (gateway). The city lies in the dimple of surrounding mountains, from which the sky rises like the canopy of a bright blue tent. The river, Tung-chiao, intersects the city. At this time of year it is a tiny stream, trickling between great rocks. The river bed is spanned by a long bridge.
There is no city wall. Only the Great Wall of China, built about 220 B.C., to divide the borders of China and Mongolia. Two gates break the Wall. Kalgan nestles against it. The way is but twenty long steps. It took us thirteen days to pass.
Nationalist flags fluttered in the streets as we entered. Shansi soldiers were all about. The atmosphere was charged with caution. We soon learned of the incident, some days past, which had struck fear to the heart of the city. In the interval between the departure of the Fengtien authorities and the entry of the Nationalists, Jung San Tieh-er, accompanied by a band of associates, had descended from the surrounding mountains and paid a visit to Kalgan.
Kalgan prospers only as a gateway for trade: skins and hides, furs of all variety, camel and sheep wool, soda and salt, ponies, cattle, and sheep. It has no industry other than that of a centre of trade, and trade has been throttled for many, many moons by exorbitant taxes and impossible regulations. The Mongolian bazaar has long been empty. No caravans file the long streets as in normal days. The railway lies an idle stretch of steel. The offices of foreign firms are closeshuttered. The American and other consuls have been withdrawn. Poverty stalks in the homes of the people whose hands ache for work, while cargo rots in the North.
Silver dollars were hard to find, but the native citizens got together one hundred and forty thousand. Convinced that there were no more, Jung accepted this amount, with a check for sixty thousand and nine motor cars to carry the heavy coins away. The motor cars were provided — all the cars in the city except one owned by a German trader and two in the possession of an Englishman in the Salt Administration. The affair was closed without loss of life. The intruders drove peacefully away.
Still the Nationalists did not come. Filled with apprehension, the local citizens formed a Committee of Safety. When the Shansi soldiers arrived thej' brought word that a Commissioner of Affairs was on the way from Nanking, The Committee give guaranty for the wages of the Shansi soldiers, and regulate Kalgan affairs with anxiety against the day when the Commissioner, vested with the power of life and death, shall arrive. Fear makes them timid, and timidity paralyzes their power to act. They were friendly to us, but hampered and delayed us with petty matters, insisting that we have permits for this and that and withholding the permits because they were afraid to sign.
in the meantime we were welcomed by Mrs. Larson, an American by birth, who, because of her Swedish citizenship by marriage, has been able to remain in Kalgan since the withdrawal of all Americans and protect the large Chinese girls’ school from the soldiers.
News of our arrival spread, and the other foreigners came to talk of the world from which they had been cut off. The Russian Consul; the Russian bank manager; a German trader and his Chinese wife; two Swedish and two Norwegian missionary girls; a young Englishman in the Salt Administration. We played tennis, teaed and dined in different houses. They all combined to celebrate my thirty-second birthday.
The Chinese have an old saying, ‘All good comes to those who wait in patience.’ All good has come to us. Tall, smiling, burnished-copper Mongols began to trek in a few days ago. Many of them have tramped one hundred and forty days. They are self-confident people, who walk with their heads erect and appear not to know fatigue. Mr. Larson is a Mongolian duke. Thirty of them have now gathered within the walls of his Kalgan compound.
‘Permits?’ they grin. ‘Mere slips of paper. Bandits—poor misguided men.’
These quiet, fearless, unarmed Mongols disdain concern about the regulations of a more complex civilization. Chinese carts, unavailable before, are simply arranged. Escorted by Mongols, we shall set foot on Mongol soil. Suddenly the Committee of Safety has let us know that we may have the permit to take our money through the Kalgan Gate, if we will give a percentage to the hard-pressed city. The percentage has been given. It is June 15. The Nationalist Commissioner has not yet arrived, but the local men have signed our permission to go.
We are off at dawn for the tents of Prince Sennit of Silingal, where the Mongols are assembling to celebrate his acceptance of leadership of all Inner Mongolia. When my foot touches Mongolian soil, outside the Great Wall Gate, I shall put this manuscript into the hands of a courier.