to supply
the army with food.

It was the custom of the invaders, after having pillaged a town and
its environs, and taken away all which they could convert to any
useful purpose for themselves, to burn the town itself, and then to
march on, leaving in the place only a smoking heap of ruins, with the
miserable remnant of the population which they had spared wandering
about the scene of desolation in misery and despair.

They made a most cowardly and atrocious use, too, of the prisoners
whom they conveyed away. When they arrived at a fortified town where
there was a garrison or any other armed force prepared to resist them,
they would bring forward these helpless captives, and put them in the
fore-front of the battle in such a manner that the men on the walls
could not shoot their arrows at their savage assailants without
killing their own wives and children. The officers commanded the men
to fire notwithstanding. But they were so moved by the piteous cries
which the women and children made that they could not bear to do it,
and so they refused to obey, and in the excitement and confusion thus
produced the Monguls easily obtained possession of the town.

There are two great rivers in China, both of which flow from west
to east, and they are at such a distance from each other and from
the frontiers that they divide the territory into three nearly equal
parts. The northernmost of these rivers is the Hoang Ho. The Monguls
in the course of two years overran and made themselves masters of
almost the whole country lying north of this river, that is, of
about one third of China proper. There were, however, some
strongly-fortified towns which they found it very difficult to
conquer.

Among other places, there was the imperial city of Yen-king, where the
emperor himself resided, which was so strongly defended that for some
time the Monguls did not venture to attack it. At length, however,
Genghis Khan came himself to the place, and concentrated there a very
large force. The emperor and his court were very much alarmed,
expecting an immediate assault. Still Genghis Khan hesitated. Some of
his generals urged him to scale the walls, and so force his way into
the city. But he thought it more politic to adopt a different plan.

So he sent an officer into the town with proposals of peace to be
communicated to the emperor. In these proposals Genghis Khan said that
he himself was inclined to spare the town, but that to appease his