Jules Verne (14 page)

It will be easily imagined that this conversation on the Russian
enterprise is not very pleasing to Sir Francis Trevellyan. Although he
says not a word and does not lift his eyes from the plate, his long
face flushes a little.

"Well, gentlemen," said I, "what we see is nothing to what our nephews
will see. We are traveling to-day on the Grand Transasiatic. But what
will it be when the Grand Transasiatic is in connection with the Grand
Transafrican."

"And how is Asia to be united by railway with Africa?" asked Major
Noltitz.

"Through Russia, Turkey, Italy, France and Spain. Travelers will go
from Pekin to the Cape of Good Hope without change of carriage."

"And the Straits of Gibraltar?" asked Pan Chao.

At this Sir Francis Trevellyan raised his ears.

"Yes, Gibraltar?" said the major.

"Go under it!" said I. "A tunnel fifteen kilometres long is a mere
nothing! There will be no English Parliament to oppose it as there is
to oppose that between Dover and Calais! It will all be done some day,
all—and that will justify the vein:

"
Omnia jam fieri quae posse negabam
."

My sample of Latin erudition was only understood by Major Noltitz, and
I heard Caterna say to his wife:

"That is volapuk."

"There is no doubt," said Pan Chap, "that the Emperor of China has been
well advised in giving his hand to the Russians instead of the English.
Instead of building strategic railways in Manchouria, which would never
have had the approbation of the czar, the Son of Heaven has preferred
to continue the Transcaspian across China and Chinese Turkestan."

"And he has done wisely," said the major. "With the English it is only
the trade of India that goes to Europe, with the Russians it is that of
the whole Asiatic continent."

I look at Sir Francis Trevellyan. The color heightens on his cheeks,
but he makes no movement. I ask if these attacks in a language he
understands perfectly will not oblige him to speak out. And yet I
should have been very much embarrassed if I had had to bet on or
against it.

Major Noltitz then resumed the conversation by pointing out the
incontestable advantages of the Transasiatic with regard to the trade
between Grand Asia and Europe in the security and rapidity of its
communications. The old hatreds will gradually disappear under European
influence, and in that respect alone Russia deserves the approbation of
every civilized nation. Is there not a justification for those fine
words of Skobeleff after the capture of Gheok Tepe, when the conquered
feared reprisals from the victors: "In Central Asian politics we know
no outcasts?"

"And in that policy," said the major, "lies our superiority over
England."

"No one can be superior to the English."

Such was the phrase I expected from Sir Francis Trevellyan—the phrase
I understand English gentlemen always use when traveling about the
world. But he said nothing. But when I rose to propose a toast to the
Emperor of Russia and the Russians, and the Emperor of China and the
Chinese, Sir Francis Trevellyan abruptly left the table. Assuredly I
was not to have the pleasure of hearing his voice to-day.

I need not say that during all this talk the Baron Weissschnitzerdörfer
was fully occupied in clearing dish after dish, to the extreme
amazement of Doctor Tio-King. Here was a German who had never read the
precepts of Cornaro, or, if he had read them, transgressed them in the
most outrageous fashion.

For the same reason, I suppose, neither Faruskiar nor Ghangir took part
in it, for they only exchanged a few words in Chinese.

But I noted rather a strange circumstance which did not escape the
major.

We were talking about the safety of the Grand Transasiatic across
Central Asia, and Pan Chao had said that the road was not so safe as it
might be beyond the Turkestan frontier, as, in fact, Major Noltitz had
told me. I was then led to ask if he had ever heard of the famous Ki
Tsang before his departure from Europe.

"Often," he said, "for Ki Tsang was then in the Yunnan provinces. I
hope we shall not meet him on our road."

My pronunciation of the name of the famous bandit was evidently
incorrect, for I hardly understood Pan Chao when he repeated it with
the accent of his native tongue.

But one thing I can say, and that is that when he uttered the name of
Ki Tsang, Faruskiar knitted his brows and his eyes flashed. Then, with
a look at his companion, he resumed his habitual indifference to all
that was being said around him.

Assuredly I shall have some difficulty in making the acquaintance of
this man. These Mongols are as close as a safe, and when you have not
the word it is difficult to open them.

The train is running at high speed. In the ordinary service, when it
stops at the eleven stations between Bokhara and Samarkand, it takes a
whole day over the distance. This time it took but three hours to cover
the two hundred kilometres which separate the two towns, and at two
o'clock in the afternoon it entered the illustrious city of Tamerlane.

Samarkand is situated in the rich oasis watered by the Zarafchane in
the valley of Sogd. A small pamphlet I bought at the railway station
informs me that this great city is one of the four sites in which
geographers "agree" to place the terrestrial paradise. I leave this
discussion to the exegetists of the profession.

Burned by the armies of Cyrus in B.C. 329, Samarkand was in part
destroyed by Genghis Khan, about 1219. When it had become the capital
of Tamerlane, its position, which certainly could not be improved upon,
did not prevent its being ravaged by the nomads of the eighteenth
century. Such alternations of grandeur and ruin have been the fate of
all the important towns of Central Asia.

We had five hours to stop at Samarkand during the day, and that
promised something pleasant and several pages of copy. But there was no
time to lose. As usual, the town is double; one half, built by the
Russians, is quite modern, with its verdant parks, its avenues of
birches, its palaces, its cottages; the other is the old town, still
rich in magnificent remains of its splendor, and requiring many weeks
to be conscientiously studied.

This time I shall not be alone. Major Noltitz is free; he will
accompany me. We had already left the station when the Caternas
presented themselves.

"Are you going for a run round the town, Monsieur Claudius?" asked the
actor, with a comprehensive gesture to show the vast surroundings of
Samarkand.

"Such is our intention."

"Will Major Noltitz and you allow me to join you?"

"How so?"

"With Madame Caterna, for I do nothing without her."

"Our explorations will be so much the more agreeable," said the major,
with a bow to the charming actress.

"And," I added, with a view to save fatigue and gain time, "my dear
friends, allow me to offer you an arba."

"An arba!" exclaimed Caterna, with a swing of his hips. "What may that
be, an arba?"

"One of the local vehicles."

"Let us have an arba."

We entered one of the boxes on wheels which were on the rank in front
of the railway station. Under promise of a good "silao," that is to
say, something to drink, the yemtchik or coachman undertook to give
wings to his two doves, otherwise his two little horses, and we went
off at a good pace.

On the left we leave the Russian town, arranged like a fan, the
governor's house, surrounded by beautiful gardens, the public park and
its shady walks, then the house of the chief of the district which is
just on the boundary of the old town.

As we passed, the major showed us the fortress, round which our arba
turned. There are the graves of the Russian soldiers who died in the
attack in 1868, near the ancient palace of the Emir of Bokhara.

From this point, by a straight narrow road, our arba reached the
Righistan square, which, as my pamphlet says, "must not be confounded
with the square of the same name at Bokhara."

It is a fine quadrilateral, perhaps a little spoiled by the fact that
the Russians have paved it and ornamented it with lamps—which would
certainly, please Ephrinell, if he decides upon visiting Samarkand. On
three sides of the square are the well-preserved ruins of three
medresses, where the mollahs give children a good education. These
medresses—there are seventeen of these colleges at Samarkand, besides
eighty-five mosques—are called Tilla-Kari, Chir Dar and Oulong Beg.

In a general way they resemble each other; a portico in the middle
leading to interior courts, built of enameled brick, tinted pale blue
or pale yellow, arabesques designed in gold lines on a ground of
turquoise blue, the dominant color; leaning minarets threatening to
fall and never falling, luckily for their coating of enamel, which the
intrepid traveller Madame De Ujfalvy-Bourdon, declares to be much
superior to the finest of our crackle enamels—and these are not vases
to put on a mantelpiece or on a stand, but minarets of good height.

These marvels are still in the state described by Marco Polo, the
Venetian traveler of the thirteenth century.

"Well, Monsieur Bombarnac," asked the major, "do you not admire the
square?"

"It is superb," I say.

"Yes," says the actor, "what a splendid scene it would make for a
ballet, Caroline! That mosque, with a garden alongside, and that other
one with a court—"

"You are right, Adolphe," said his wife; "but we would have to put
those towers up straight and have a few luminous fountains."

"Excellent notion, Caroline! Write us a drama, Monsieur Claudius, a
spectacle piece, with a third act in this square. As for the title—"

"Tamerlane is at once suggested!" I reply. The actor made a significant
grimace. The conqueror of Asia seemed to him to be wanting in
actuality. And leaning toward his wife, Caterna hastened to say:

"As a scene, I have seen a better at the Porte-Saint Martin, in the
Fils de la Nuit
—"

"And I have at the Châtelet in
Michael Strogoff
."

We cannot do better than leave our comedians alone. They look at
everything from the theatrical point of view. They prefer the air gauze
and the sky-blue foliage, the branches of the stage trees, the agitated
canvas of the ocean waves, the prospectives of the drop scene, to the
sites the curtain represents, a set scene by Cambon or Rubé or Jambon
to no matter what landscape; in short, they would rather have art than
nature. And I am not the man to try and change their opinions on the
subject.

As I have mentioned the name of Tamerlane, I asked Major Noltitz if we
were going to visit the tomb of the famous Tartar. The major replied
that we would see it as we returned; and our itinerary brought us in
front of the Samarkand bazaar.

The arba stopped at one of the entrances to this vast rotunda, after
taking us in and out through the old town, the houses of which consist
of only one story, and seem very comfortless.

Here is the bazaar in which are accumulated enormous quantities of
woollen stuffs, velvet-pile carpets in the brightest of colors, shawls
of graceful patterns, all thrown anyhow on the counters of the shops.
Before these samples the sellers and buyers stand, noisily arriving at
the lowest price. Among the fabrics is a silk tissue known as Kanaous,
which is held in high esteem by the Samarkand ladies, although they are
very far from appreciating the similar product of Lyons manufacture,
which it excels neither in quality nor appearance.

Madame Caterna appeared extraordinarily tempted, as if she were among
the counters of the
Bon Marché
or the
Louvre
.

"That stuff would do well for my costume in the
Grande Duchesse
!" she
said.

"And those slippers would suit me down to the ground as Ali Bajou in
the
Caid
!" said Caterna.

And while the actress was investing in a remnant of Kanaous, the actor
paid for a pair of those green slippers which the Turkomans wear when
they enter a mosque. But this was not without recourse to the kindness
of the major, who acted as interpreter between the Caternas and the
merchant, whose "Yoks! Yoks!" sounded like a lot of crackers in his
large mouth.

The arba started again and went off toward the square of Ribi-Khanym,
where stands the mosque of that name which was that of one of
Tamerlane's wives. If the square is not as regular as that of
Righistan, it is in my opinion rather more picturesque. There are
strangely grouped ruins, the remains of arcades, half-unroofed cupolas,
columns without capitals, the shafts of which have retained all the
brightness of their enamelling; then a long row of elliptical porticoes
closing in one side of the vast quadrilateral. The effect is really
grand, for these old monuments of the splendor of Samarkand stand out
from a background of sky and verdure that you would seek in vain, even
at the Grand Opera, if our actor does not object. But I must confess we
experienced a deeper impression when, toward the northeast of the town,
our arba deposited us in front of the finest of the mosques of Central
Asia, which dates from the year 795 of the Hegira (1392 of our era).

I cannot, writing straight away, give you an idea of this marvel. If I
were to thread the words, mosaics, pediments, spandrels, bas-reliefs,
niches, enamels, corbels, all on a string in a sentence, the picture
would still be incomplete. It is strokes of the brush that are wanted,
not strokes of the pen. Imagination remains abashed at the remains of
the most splendid architecture left us by Asiatic genius.

It is in the farthest depths of this mosque that the faithful go to
worship at the tomb of Kassimben-Abbas, a venerated Mussulman saint,
and we are told that if we open the tomb a living man will come forth
from it in all his glory. But the experiment has not been made as yet,
and we prefer to believe in the legend.