countries!" said they. "How fortunate were we, could we spend our days
amidst those rich pasturages."

Before they returned to their dwelling, which lay behind a high mountain,
these Tartars told us that we ought to depart next morning before
daybreak, for that we should not find any water until we came to the
Hundred Wells, which was distant a hundred and fifty lis (fifteen
leagues).

Dawn had not yet appeared when we left. The country was, as before,
sandy, barren, and dismal. About noon we halted, in order to take a
little food, and to make tea with the water we had brought with us on one
of the camels. Night was setting in before we reached the Hundred Wells;
our poor animals could hardly move for hunger and fatigue; yet, at all
cost, we were obliged to reach the encampment. To remain where we were
would have caused infinite wretchedness. At last we came to the wells,
and without troubling ourselves to ascertain whether or no there were a
hundred of them, as the Tartar name of the place imported, we hastened to
pitch our tent. Happily the well was not so deep as that we had seen the
night before. Our first care was to draw some water for the horse and
the mule; but when we went to lead them to the trough, we did not find
them near the tent, where they usually stood to be unsaddled. This
misfortune occasioned us an alarm that made us forget the fatigues of the
day. We had, it is true, no fear of robbers, for in this respect no
country is more safe than the Ortous; but we thought that our animals,
thirsty as they were, had run away in search of water. They will go,
meditated we, till they have found water; perhaps they will go without
stopping to the frontier of the Ortous to the fiery banks of the Yellow
River.

The night was quite dark; nevertheless, we thought it proper to go
instantly in search of our horses, while Samdadchiemba was preparing
supper. We wandered about for a long time in all directions without
seeing anything; ever and anon we stopped to listen whether we could
distinguish the sound of the bells suspended from the horse's neck; but
our efforts were vain; nothing interrupted the dead silence of the
desert. We went on, without losing courage, still hoping to find animals
so very necessary to us, and the loss of which would have placed us in
such difficulties. Sometimes we fancied we heard in the distance the
tinkling of the bells. Then we laid flat down, applying our ears to the
ea