Tse Wang Rabdan, continued to be a thorn in his side; and his best chance appeared to be an alliance with the Russians, although they had nominally settled all their misunderstandings with the Chinese by the Treaty of Nipchu. The Russians, whatever their inclination may have been, did not possess the available power to help the Eleuths; but, with the object of keeping themselves as well informed as they could about the affairs of their neighbours, they sent an officer on a visit to Galdan's camp. The mere rumour of a possible alliance between Galdan and the Russians roused Kanghi to acts of unprecedented energy and activity. The whole of the Northern army, composed of the picked troops of the Eight Manchu Banners, the Forty-nine Mongol Banners, and the Chinese auxiliaries, was ordered to proceed across the Mongolian steppe, and an expedition of formidable proportions was thus fitted out for the destruction of Galdan.

Meantime Galdan, although his main hope centred in the Russian alliance, and notwithstanding that his necessities had obliged him to kill most of his horses to satisfy the requirements of his followers, had not remained inactive. Collecting all his forces, he made a rapid advance into the territory under Chinese authority, attacked the advanced Chinese army under President Horni on the river Hourhoei, and after a stubborn engagement compelled it to quit the field, of which he remained the undisputed master. This reverse proved that the military power which Galdan had collected during these years was far from insignificant. Considerable as it already was for defence, but a few more years of inaction on the part of Kanghi were required to make it formidable for offence. The defeat of Horni on the banks of the Hourhoei proved this much, if it did not also show that Galdan was resolved to give the reins to his ambition in the direction of China.

Galdan's victory did not render him so elate that he failed to recognize that the chances in the war with China were overwhelmingly against him; and the extensive preparations made by Kanghi warned him that it would be wise to avert the coming storm by timely concessions. He, therefore, sent another envoy to Pekin, where the Emperor

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accorded him an honourable reception, despite the fact that his own officers remained in confinement. Although Kanghi still protested his desire for a peaceful solution of the question, the only terms on which he would treat were the laying down of his arms by Galdan. At the same time that the Eleuth envoy left Pekin, Kanghi set out from his capital to place himself in nearer communication with his army.

Kanghi's brother, Yu Tsing Wang, was appointed to the chief command, and his instructions were to bring Galdan to an engagement as promptly as he could, and to wipe out the stain of the defeat on the Hourhoei by either the overthrow or the capture of the Eleuth prince. Although the Emperor was compelled by the state of his health to return to Pekin, active operations were continued with unabated vigour, and Kanghi had very soon the satisfaction of receiving the news of a decisive victory won by his generals. The battle was fought at Oulan Poutong, where Yu Tsing Wang fell upon the Eleuth camp, which had been formed at the foot of a mountain, with a wood on one side and a small stream on the other. The Chinese attacked Galdan in this advantageous position, and, although the Eleuths fought with much of the valour to be expected from men engaged in defending a popular cause, the former were completely victorious. The victors suffered considerable loss in this encounter, and among the slain was Prince Kiukiu, an uncle of the Emperor Kanghi. This defeat made Galdan again anxious to come to terms with Kanghi, and negotiations were begun between him and Yu Tsing Wang. At first Galdan endeavoured to circumvent the intentions of the Chinese by negotiating on a basis from which his personal enemies, the Khalka princes, were excluded; but he was dealing with a race fully his equal in the art of diplomatic fence, and, as the material argument of superior force was against him, he had really in the end no prudent choice save to give in his unqualified surrender. Galdan sent the Emperor a formal expression of fealty and obedience, and Kanghi in return wrote him a letter of forgiveness. This was in the year 1690.

A few months later, Kanghi sent Galdan the sum of one thousand taels for the purpose of alleviating the sufferings of

four armies, of which Feyanku commanded the Western and Kanghi in person the Eastern. Of the march across the desert from Kukukoto towards Kobdo, where Galdan had established his head-quarters, we fortunately possess details from the narrative of the priest Gerbillon, who was among the personal attendants of the Emperor on this occasion. Despite the difficulties encountered, and the vastness of the distances to be traversed in this portion of the campaign, the Chinese armies succeeded in making good their way to the upper course of the Kerulon, where they were in the immediate vicinity of Galdan's territory. Several thousands of lives had been lost, and more than one detachment had been compelled to call a halt or even to beat a retreat; but notwithstanding these disadvantages, an overwhelming force of Chinese had made good their way across the desert. Galdan's main defence had been shown to be of little avail, and, unless he could establish some more solid claim to success on the field of battle, it was clear that his ruin was a matter that could not be long averted. Feyanku, after a march through the desert of more than three months' duration, had pitched his camp near the source of the Tula. Only 10,000 soldiers remained available for active service, and this body was reinforced by 2000 more troops, who represented all that remained of another corps. These 12,000 men were placed by their able and gallant commander in a fortified position within the Mongol camping-district of Chowmodo.

Galdan has been represented in the character of a formidable antagonist, and the question naturally suggests itself, what had he been doing while this storm was developing portentous proportions upon his eastern borders? We have seen that he had retired to a certain distance from the limits of his possessions. The Chinese found on the banks of the affluents of the Amour the traces of the camps which he had destroyed in order to concentrate his resources for the defence of the permanent camp or town of Kobdo. Either before or about this time Galdan had endeavoured to incite the powerful chief of the Kortsin Mongols to join him in a general Mongol league against Kanghi. The scheme was rejected by either the good sense or the fidelity of that prince, who, it

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will be remembered, had been put up to simulate a sympathy with the plans of the Eleuth. But in consequence of the open state of war, Kanghi had abandoned that intrigue, and now Galdan's schemes only served to increase his indignation and to whet his ardour. But it was towards Russia that Galdan mainly looked for the support which would enable him to make head against the superior power of China. He even went so far as to draw up a scheme for the invasion and conquest of the latter country, but the essential part of the arrangement was that Russia should send a contingent of 60,000 men. In this century we have known something of the slight control possessed at St. Petersburg over the authorities in Central Asia. In the days of Kanghi there was not so much as the pretence of that control exercised; yet it is not to be supposed that the mere handful of Russian colonists in the Siberian solitudes ever seriously entertained the idea of entering upon hostilities on a large scale with the Chinese. To humour Galdan supplied an easy means of occupying the attention of their neighbours, and Galdan's own wants and apprehensions led him to augur from the observations made by the few Russians with whom he came into contact that the amount of support he might expect from them was much greater than could by any possibility have been afforded to him. The hopes of Russian support were soon shown to be delusive, and Galdan could find no better hope than in the difficulties of the desert barrier which protected his territories, and in such resistance as his band of followers, weakened by the indifference of Tse Wang Rabdan, could oppose. The progress of the Chinese armies across the desert, made though it was at the cost of a great expenditure of life, showed him that the former hope was no longer tenable, and that it only remained for him to make the most of the forces at his disposal, and to resist with all his strength the invader.

The situation was indeed desperate; but there still remained a possibility that the Chinese might be so far exhausted by the labour of having traversed the barren region of Gobi that it would be possible for Galdan to overwhelm one of their detachments before the whole of the army had been able to combine on the banks of the Kerulon. In a prompt

attack lay Galdan's sole chance of safety, and, while Kanghi was employed in recruiting his troops in the country of the Northern Khalkas, the Eleuth chieftain advanced as fast as he could from Kobdo, and threw himself upon the Chinese entrenchments at Chowmodo.

At the very moment when Galdan formed this desperate resolve the Chinese commanders were so much embarrassed by the difficulty of obtaining supplies that it seemed impossible for them to maintain their positions. The advisability of retreat was under discussion when Galdan's movement rescued Feyanku from a dilemma in which it seemed next to impossible to save both his military honour and the lives of his soldiers. Few of the incidents of this battle have been preserved. Little more is known of its details than that Galdan assumed the offensive, while Feyanku, having dismounted his cavalry, long contented himself with standing on the defensive. The battle had lasted for nearly three hours when Feyanku gave the signal for attack. The Eleuths made but a brief stand against the onset of their more disciplined opponents, and Galdan, seeing that the day was lost, fled with a mere handful of his followers, leaving his camp and baggage in the hands of the victor. Two thousand Eleuths were slain, and the character of the struggle may be inferred from the fact that the Chinese took only one hundred prisoners, of whom most were women and children. The principal wife of Galdan was among the killed, his army was scattered and reduced in numbers, while that chief himself, after aspiring to be the undisputed ruler on the steppe, became a fugitive glad to hide himself in its remote recesses.

The victory of Chowmodo came like an unexpected Godsend to the Celestials, for, on the very eve of its attainment, it seemed as if all the expense and trouble to which Kanghi had been put were to result in nothing decisive. Feyanku's success removed further cause of disquietude, and enabled Kanghi to return to Pekin, leaving behind him the order to pursue Galdan with the utmost vigour, as the results of the war could only be considered partial so long as he remained at large.

The overthrow at Chowmodo marked the destruction of