Jasper County Democrat, Volume 13, Number 20, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 15 June 1910 — DUG OUT OF RUINS IN ASIA. [ARTICLE]

DUG OUT OF RUINS IN ASIA.

Finds of a Japanese Explorer in a 5,000 Mile Journey. Zuicho Tachibana. a Japanese only 20 years of ; age, has completed a journey across Central Asia of some 5,000 miles. Mr. Tachibana is secretary to Count Otani, the head abbot of the Shinshu sect of Buddhists, wJbo provided the equipment for the journey, which was undertaken specially with a view to visiting the ancient sites of Central Asia and where possible making excavations. Leaving Japap in the spring of 1908. Mr. Tachibana first made some investigations among the islands of Lake Tung Ting, in Hunan. After crossing the Gobi Desert he went to Karakorum and thence to Gutchen, in Chinese Turkestan, 300 miles distant. There he obtained some important finds from an ancient fort. Among other things he unearthed a number of ancient tiles with chrysanthemum decorations, a find particularly interesting to a Japanese. These tiles dated from the seventeenth century. At Turfan, further to the south, he visited a large number of ancient Buddhist caved Wellings. The neighborhood was very sparsely inhabited. In exploring these caves, which belonged to the sixth century, but were all destroyed by the Mohammedans in the fourteenth-century, some very valuable manuscripts were , found. Soon after this Mr. Tachibana sent his assistant with all the baggage to Kashgar, while he proceeded to the southeast to explore the Ldb Desert, parts of which he crossed by a new route. There he had some of his worst experiences owing to the absence of water, the prevalence of a terrific wind and a burning sun. The heat was in places 120 in the shade, and at Keria he had sunstroke. In the Tarim Desert he passed through a desolate region, where the course of a river was lost amid the sand and the landscape was marked by blasted tree trunks and ruined dwellings. The journey, which was chiefly through desert and mountain, was rich in results. The traveller has brought back with him over 4,000 manuscripts and a magnificent col lection of ancient coins.—Sun.