Maiden Voyages

by Mary Morris

  Had I been without an experienced guide I should certainly have been deceived when I first heard that strange illusory voice calling for help, of which so many travellers have spoken.

  “Halt,” I said, “there is someone calling!”

  “There is no one calling,” said the bash, “and there is no reason to halt.”

  “Cannot you hear?” I persisted. “Someone is calling from among the dunes.”

  “Never listen to those voices,” he replied. “It is not a man’s cry, and those who follow it may never come back to the caravan. We must push on.” He urged the beasts forward and refused to listen. As he trudged ahead he spoke again: “Those voices are heard all over Gobi, but are worse in the Desert of Lob. One night when I was travelling there I got separated from my caravan. I heard a shout and the sound of camel-bells which I tried to overtake for hours. Then the moon rose and I saw there were no recent tracks of camels, so I halted, and turned back, but something held me and the voice still called. At last, with a great effort I retraced my steps to where I could see the tracks of our camels leading off in another direction. It was a strange experience, but as soon as I was on the right road those devilish voices ceased, and by midday I caught up with the caravan once more. They nearly had me that time, as they have had many others.”

  “What then,” I asked, “are those strange voices which I heard?”

  “The people of Lob call them Azghun,” he replied, “and say that it is a kwei which lives among the sand-hillocks and sometimes takes the form of a black eagle. If travellers listen, it leads them away to waterless places where they perish.”

  Dust-demons, phantom voices with their insistence, always trying to turn travellers out of the way—it sounded so fantastic that at first I was inclined to dismiss it all with an incredulous smile, but something in the subconscious arrested me, and I repeated aloud those words: “When an evil spirit has left a man it roams about in the desert, seeking rest.” I had to acknowledge that they were spoken by the only One Who really knows, so I thought on those words and kept silence.

  It seemed as though the pastime of those demons was to make sport of the few lonely human beings who ventured into the desert, by encircling them with every manner of deception.

  By night, lights which were like flames from a camp-fire played on the horizon, but no one has ever located them or come any nearer by following them. Watching my two companions walking ahead of the caravan one day, I was amazed to see four people where I had believed there were only two. My eyes saw something which my reason refused to accept. I overtook them and there were but two: I dropped back, and again there were four. Thus do the refractions of desert light shake confidence in the powers of discernment and call for a new standard of discrimination in which things seen with mortal eye are not to be relied upon, whereas the things which are relied on may be contrary to the evidence of the senses.

  Mirage is the desert traveller’s constant companion and his perpetual torment. As soon as the sun is high above the horizon, the sand begins to glitter like water and appears to move like wavelets, while the clumps of camel-thorn look like tall bushes or stunted trees, and seem to be set by the edge of a lake. All through the day this illusion persists, and not until near sunset does the mirage vanish, the sand cease to glitter, and the landscape show itself for what it really is, a dull grey surface. Even the old traveller must never reckon himself free from the snare of illusion. On one occasion we were to spend a night in a Qazaq tent, but it was autumn, and the coarse desert-grass grew rank and hid the encampment. In the late afternoon the carter gave the cry: “Dao-liao!” (We have arrived), and, sure enough, there were the tents, the herds and the pasturing flocks. A man hurried on to prospect, and we urged our tired beasts to further effort. In an hour’s time the tents, herds and pastures, though still there, were no nearer, and when darkness fell the voice of our man was heard shouting: “We are lost! I cannot find any yurts. We must stay here till morning.” In the straight clear light of dawn we saw the plain in its true aspect; there were no tents, no cattle and no water in sight. Not till the following sunset did we reach the encampment.

  How terrible if in this realm of illusion where that which seemed real was not true, and where true things appeared false, I were left to find my way without a guide. Never could I hope to disentangle the web of deception, and free both mind and sense from its impalpable net. In the desert I learnt to detect some of the illusions which constantly surround me on the greater journey of life, and to depend for direction on the wisdom of Him Who is my unerring guide.

  Without water the desert is nothing but a grave, and is useless either as a dwelling-place or even as a high-road for the living. If the traveller’s food is poor he will go hungry, if his road is long he will be weary, if his lot is hard he will be lonely, but to all these things he can become inured. No one, however, can be inured to thirst. When the craving for water assails a man he will forget all else in his frantic search for it, knowing that life itself depends on finding it, and that failing it he will soon be the victim of delirium, madness and death.

  When a traveller first starts out to cross the desert he is inclined to take water for granted, and though the old innkeepers warn everyone to carry it, he may refuse to listen and prefer taking a risk to being burdened with a water-bottle, but once that man has experienced the torture of thirst his outlook is changed, and nothing will induce him to start upon any stage without a supply.

  As the long hours pass, the burning sun seems to sap the moisture through every pore of the skin, until thirst is not only felt in the dry throat and cracked lips, but throughout the body, and as the days of rationed water go by, the whole system, tormented by a craving which becomes more and more urgent, calls out for the sight, the smell and the feeling of moisture. Sometimes the sunset hour brings a caravan to a lonely spot where a water-hole should be found but is hard to detect. All members of the caravan dismount and hunt for the small depression, perhaps marked only by a stone. It is so easy to miss, and once darkness has fallen it would be impossible to locate it. Then a shout is heard, “Water, water!” and all run to the spot to quench their desperate thirst.

  The mirage has been a decoy to many thirsty men. I myself, when I first saw a lovely lake with trees standing on its farther bank in mid-Gobi, urged the drivers to push on and reach it quickly, but the bash only smiled and spoke indulgently, as one might speak to an ignorant child: “That’s not water,” he said, “that’s glitter sand—dry water.” That lake was but a mirage, and the farther we went the farther it receded, tantalising our thirst with its falsity.

  I was caught by another deception to which weary wayfarers are subject, and this time it was not “glitter sand” but the brackish water of the salt desert. The sparkle of the limpid spring was irresistible, but when I ran toward it, certain this time of the water’s reality, the same gruff voice cautioned me: “Drink as little of that water as you can,” it said. This time I cared for none of his warnings, for I had found real water and would enjoy it to the full. I soon learnt that the bash knew better than I, for the more I took of this water, the more parched I became. It was brackish—neither salt nor sweet. Not salt as sea water which drives to madness, nor sweet like spring-water which heals and refreshes, but brackish, leaving thirst for ever unquenched. I drank my fill, and came again, but I was thirsty still.

  This experience made me wary of all desert waters, and when I came to the oasis of Ever-Flowing-Stream, though the water looked so tempting and so cool in the little grotto under the shady trees, I was shy of it, for other water had looked cool and tempting too. I tasted it cautiously, but here there was no deception and it was a stream of sweet, satisfying quality. This was karez water and came direct from the eternal snows of the distant mountains. Through a deep underground channel it had crossed the torrid plain, and when it emerged at the place where I stood it was as sweet, as cool and as pure as when it left the foot of the glacier, nor would the stream run dry so long as
the snow-clad hills remained and the channel was kept unchoked.

  Occasionally I heard a desert spring spoken of as “living water,” and when I saw one I understood the expression. Its vitalised energy was so irrepressible that from the depths of the water-hole it pushed upward and broke on the surface in shimmering bubbles. Those who draw from such a living spring always speak of it reverently and as of something akin to the divine. The pilgrim prays there at break of day, the Buddhist erects a shrine in its vicinity, the Moslem goes to it for water of purification, and when I stood and looked into the moving depths I better understood the question asked of Christ, “Where do you get living water?” and the answer He gave: “The water I give becomes a spring, welling up to eternal life.”

  It is water which marks the stage, and only where there is water are there human habitations. The people who live there may be terribly poor, but though poverty-stricken and sordid, their houses are homes and their hamlets are oases because water, which is an essential of life, is accessible to them. These men of the water-holes had another supreme need beyond that of bread and water, for man does not live by these alone, and though I could not bring to them life’s normal amenities yet I was there to offer each one that living water for which his spirit craved.

  I sat for long hours in my sand-chair by the Cresent Lake and reflected on the teaching of those desert experiences, the illusive mirage, the tormenting bitter water, the sweet water of the karez channel and the invigorating water of the living spring. Then slowly the lovely lake at my feet recaptured my attention, seeming to say, “Now consider what lies before your eyes.” So I dismissed all thought of desert rigours and yielded myself to the charm of the moment.

  The whole scene, from the brilliant glazed-tiled roofs, the light loggia, the golden sand, the silver trees, the fringe of green sedge, and the delicate hues of wheeling pigeons, was reflected in the still water as sharply as in a mirror. An acolyte came to the water’s edge, stooped, filled a bucket with lake water and turned back toward the temple. The scene had an unreal quality which held me motionless as though a movement on my part might shatter the spell and disperse its beauty like a dream. Overhead the great dunes towered threateningly. “Why,” I asked, “why was this lake not long since buried by these encroaching sands? Why does its fragile beauty last when the whole configuration of the landscape is changed by obliterating sand-storms? Towns and villages have vanished in a wilderness of death and desiccation, yet this lake remains and no one has ever seen its water margin low. What is the secret of its permanence and of the unseen source from which it draws such plentiful supplies that drought has no effect on it?”

  At that moment I saw one of my comrades walking over the crest of the hill, ploughing a deep furrow in the sands as she went. From the summit she slid down the face of the dune, and as she did so I heard the sands sing, then she walked to the guest-house and passed through the door, leaving the whole line of her path, from the top of the hill to the lip of the lake, profoundly disturbed. The sands which, before, had not shown one wrinkle were now furrowed with deep ridges, but, as I watched, I saw their surface slowly but surely smoothed out again till, gradually, every mark was obliterated. The ceaseless winds of God were at work and, as always, they blew off the lake and upward toward the crest of the hill. By some mystery of orientation the lake was so placed that every breath which stirred the encircling sand-mounds blew upward and lifted the drift away from the water. I picked up a handful of sand and threw it downward, but the breeze caught it and blew it back in my face. This, then, was the secret of this exquisite lake’s permanence—its exposure to the upward-wafting winds of God, and its deep unfailing source of supply.

  “Do you understand this picture of one who has attained what you seek and reached the goal of your desire?” something within me said. “In the midst of threatening danger this lake lifts its face heavenward, reflecting as in a mirror the glory of the sky. It is not withdrawn from the terrible sand which constantly threatens to engulf it, its position is always perilous and it lives dangerously, but every time the sand threatens, the winds of God are there to protect it, and no harm touches it. This is why its peace, its purity and its serenity can never be destroyed. Surely the parable is clear—it is the pure in heart who see God.”

  The sight of a red-robed lama walking in my direction called me back to the immediate, and I rose, greeting him, then sat down and talked with him, first of his long pilgrimage and later of the search for God which urged him to such an arduous undertaking. Walking back together toward the guest-house we met the guardian of the temple, who appeared strangely agitated. “Look,” he said, “did you ever see anything like that?” He pointed to a curious triple halo in the sky. The three rims of light spread a diffused radiance, and we all stood and watched the strange atmospheric effect. “This is a terrible omen,” said the priest, “a sign of awful happenings, and of trouble coming such as the world has never known. Alas, alas for this world!” Too profoundly disturbed to say more, the old man turned off to the temple shrine to burn incense and seek to pacify the anger of the gods.

  Next morning the lama, carrying his little bundle, passed on his way toward Tibet. With my companions I walked once more round the lovely lake, gazing till every detail of its beauty was impressed on my memory. Then we said goodbye to the priest, walked to the foot of the great sand-hills, stood there for a moment and gave one last backward look, then waved a long farewell to the lovely lake, and rode away.

  An aerial view of the Desert of Gobi on a midsummer day would show a burning arid waste of dunes interspersed with monotonous rolling expanses of gravel and crossed by occasional ridges of high mountains whose foothills dwindle to low rocky mounds. The whole plain is shade-less and exposed to scorching heat under a pitiless sun. All living creatures seek shelter from its fierce rays and the roads are deserted, for the reverberation of heat makes travel almost impossible.

  By night it is quite otherwise, and as darkness falls the desert quickens into life. Scorching heat gives way to a sudden chill which rises from the ground and strikes the traveller with a cold impact which makes him lift his head to catch the warmer upper stratum of the air as a relief from that too palpable cold. Soon that layer too will be permeated by the chill, and he will wrap a sheepskin coat around him in an endeavour to keep warm.

  At this hour the observer would see caravans emerge from all the oasis inns and move slowly in various directions. Long trains of two hundred camels, roped together in strings of twelve, stretch out in thin lines over the narrow tracks; caravans of large carts, each laden with a thousand pounds of merchandise, follow one another across the plain; these join up for safety and keep within hailing distance of each other. Pedestrians carrying their own baggage balanced over the shoulder from the two ends of a pole come from many places and look like swinging dots as they move briskly at first, but later settle down to the inevitable pace of Gobi travel.

  Half-way through the night all these travellers are seen to halt. This is the moment when caravans moving in opposite directions meet and greet each other. Carters recognise friends from other towns, but there is no more talk between them than is necessary for the passing of needed warnings. Camel-drivers on their immensely long journeys are alert for all unusual sights or sounds, and often carry letters to be handed to those whom they may meet at some halting-place. Pedestrians lay down their loads, rest aching shoulders and drink from their water-bottles, squatting lightly on their heels for a while before they make the second half of the stage. All these men speak but little and there is no easy chat on a desert night journey, nor is loud conversation ever heard; desert talk is always spare, subdued and unhurried, for the spaces teach men to be sharers of their dignity, and to scorn noise and tattle as only suited to the vulgarity of towns. Moreover, in the still air voices carry dangerously well, and silence becomes a cautionary instinct.

  The sand deadens the sound of wheels, and camels’ soft padded feet move quietly between the dunes. The c
amp watch-dogs might give a sharp sound by day, but at night they follow at the camels’ heels or leap on to the back of one beast and lie there until the halt is called, when they jump down to take on duty. The sonorous, monotonous camel-bell has no sharp clang, but only a deep dull boom, and the rhythmic dip of the camels’ neck keeps it in perfect measure. This bell is such a part of desert quiet that it breaks silence without disturbing it. When the great carts draw up for the mid-stage halt, a heavy smell of opium often comes from the pipe of some smoker hidden behind the curtains who lies there listless while the drivers exchange their greeting and then move on again.

  Not only humans but innumerable small animals and insects come from their hiding-places as soon as darkness falls. All through the hours of heat they have slept in the tunnelled world which they have burrowed for themselves a few feet underground, and of which the openings are on the sheltered side of many a tiny sand-mound, blown up round the foot of a tuft of camel-thorn or of a low bush of scrub. All through the night the little live things move ceaselessly, silently and invisibly over the sand, and only by chance does a traveller become aware of their presence; after sunrise, however, he sees the sand patterned with all kinds of beautiful markings left by small rodents, beetles, centipedes and other insects which scuttle back to their sleeping-quarters with the first ray of sunshine.