United States or Dominica ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
The head-waters of the Tarim leap merrily down through narrow valleys among the mountains, but the great river is doomed never to reach the sea. It terminates and is lost in a desert lake named Lop-nor.
From Urumtsi we had decided to take the northern route to Hami, via Gutchen and Barkul, in order to avoid as much as possible the sands of the Tarim basin on the southern slope of the Tian Shan mountains. Two guards were commissioned by the viceroy to take us in charge, and hand us over to the next relay station.
The outlines of their ideas are that one of the great waves of emigration which, in a remote age, emerged from the cradle of the human race in central Asia, made its way eastward with a constantly expanding front, and, sweeping up the Tarim basin, emerged in the region of the Yellow River and in Manchuria.
Though they have little to do with the religion of the people, their presence explains the predominance of Indian rather than Chinese influence in these countries. Tradition says that Indian colonists settled in Khotan during the reign of Asoka, but no precise date can at present be fixed for the introduction of Buddhism into the Tarim basin and other regions commonly called Central Asia.
At last there was not a drop of water left, and the whole country dried up. The poplar woods perished, and the reeds withered and were blown away by the wind. The men left their huts and moved down the new water channel to settle at the new lake, where they erected new huts. The Tarim and Lop-nor had swung like a pendulum to the south, and men, animals, and plants were obliged to follow.
The waterway I intended to use was the river which in its upper course is called the Yarkand, and in its lower the Tarim. At the village a great caravan route crosses the river, and flat ferry-boats convey travellers with their animals and goods from one bank to the other. It was 36 feet long by 8-1/2 broad, and was like a huge trough built of rough planks.
It is sufficient for us to know that the capital city was not far from Lob or Lop Nor, into which in lon. 38d E. the Tarim flows. Fa-Hsien estimated its distance to be 1500 le from T'un-hwang. He and his companions must have gone more than twenty-five miles a day to accomplish the journey in seventeen days.
The country through which the Tarim slowly flows had already been visited by Fathers Hue and Gabet, the explorers Prjevalski and Carey up to the Davana pass, situated a hundred and fifty kilometres to the south.
And, far to the west, nearest to the wrist, you find two rivers with which you are already acquainted: the Indus, which flows southwards into the Arabian Sea, and the Tarim, which runs north and east and falls into Lop-nor. The Himalayas are the loftiest range on earth, and among their crests rise the highest peaks in the world.
The Yarkand-darya would never reach the lake, Lop-nor, where it discharges its water, if it did not receive a considerable tributary on the way. This tributary is called the Ak-su, or "White Water," and it comes foaming down from the Tien-shan, the high mountains to the north. After the rivers have mingled their waters, the united main stream is called the Tarim.
Word Of The Day