heir way through desert
regions. Now, pressed by want of food, they traversed rich and inhabited
lands, through which they had to win a passage with the sword. Every day
the Bashkirs attacked them, drawing off into the desert when too sharply
resisted. Thus, with endless alternations of hunger and bloodshed, the
borders of China at length were approached.

And now we have another scene in this remarkable drama to describe. Keen
Lung, the emperor of China, had been long apprised of the flight of the
Kalmucks, and had prepared a place of residence for these erring
children of his nation, as he considered them, on their return to their
native land. But he did not expect their arrival until the approach of
winter, having been advised that they proposed to dwell during the
summer heats on the Toorgai's fertile banks.

One fine morning in September, 1771, this fatherly monarch was enjoying
himself in hunting in a wild district north of the Great Wall. Here, for
hundreds of square leagues, the country was overgrown with forest,
filled with game. Centrally in this district rose a gorgeous
hunting-lodge, to which the emperor retired annually for a season of
escape from the cares of government. Leaving his lodge, he had pursued
the game through some two hundred miles of forest, every night pitching
his tent in a different locality. A military escort followed at no great
distance in the rear.

On the morning in question the emperor found himself on the margin of
the vast deserts of Asia, which stretched interminably away. As he stood
in his tent door, gazing across the extended plain, he saw with
surprise, far to the west, a vast dun cloud arise, which mounted and
spread until it covered that whole quarter of the sky. It thickened as
it rose, and began to roll in billowy volumes towards his camp.

This singular phenomenon aroused general attention. The suite of the
emperor hastened to behold it. In the rear the silver trumpets sounded,
and from the forest avenues rode the imperial cavalry escort. All eyes
were fixed upon the rolling cloud, the sentiment of curiosity being
gradually replaced by a dread of possible danger. At first the
dust-cloud was imagined to be due to a vast troop of deer or other wild
animals, driven into the plain by the hunting train or by beasts of
prey. This conception vanished as it came nearer, until, seemingly, it
was but a few miles away.

And now, as the breeze freshened a little, the vapory curta