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0035 Scientific Results of a Journey in Central Asia, 1899-1902 : vol.4
Scientific Results of a Journey in Central Asia, 1899-1902 : vol.4 / Page 35 (Color Image)

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doi: 10.20676/00000216
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THE SELLING-TSO AND THE JAGJU-RAPGA.   23

are different at other seasons of the year, when the river drops, though even then the lake will no doubt preserve the same level.

From the point where we landed the shore-line stretched towards the S. 53° E. and N. 86° W. To the S. 51° E. we saw a rounded elevation, which may possibly have been an island; and to the S. 19° W. there was a relatively lofty mountain. Camp LXXIV, only a couple of kilometers from the shore, lay towards the N. 53° W. In its neighbourhood was a nomad camp consisting of two tents with 12 inhabitants. These people called the locality Schanig-nagbo, while the nearest mountain to the west was Tsong-gong. As the grazing here was good, we were tempted to give ourselves a day's rest. 'The weather however was anything but pleasant: the sky was heavy with clouds, a couple of rain-showers fell, it lightened and it thundered, and the wind blew hard from the west. This was a sort of forerunner of the transition between too different types of weather which are both very characteristic of the autumn, namely from the rainy season to the inconceivably violent, constant westerly wind, which prevails the whole of the autumn and winter.

Fig. 15.

September 7th. We now proceeded west-south-west along the northern shore of the lake. The belt of barren sediment in which the delta is situated grew increasingly narrower, while at the same time it thinned away to a point, and came to an end just beyond the camp, where the vegetation reached down to the water's edge. The boundary between these two belts is very sharply drawn; it marks the outside of the area which becomes inundated when the river rises especially high, and on which it drops its new alluvium. Farther along, the edge of the lake is bordered by only a very narrow strip of barren ground. Here we had, fairly close to our right hand, a minor stretch of cliffs, extending from east-north-east to west-south-west. Their southeastern face is precipitous, while the opposite or north-western slopes down relatively slowly. On the left we passed a blunt-ended peninsula, containing a number of lagoons, marshes, and bays. The water in the lagoons was fresh, so that it must be derived from springs. Close beside these the grazing was especially thick and good, the grass being half a meter high. Here there was a large herd of orongo antelopes.

Next we approached a rather capriciously outlined part of the northern shore, a broad peninsula of an unusual shape, projecting south. Its southern face is fairly straight, and is crowned by a line of steep and rugged cliffs, which terminate towards the east in a point or pier-like continuation, studded with detached pinnacles of rock. Those on the outside of the line even appeared to rise above the water like islands, unless it was a mirage caused by the refraction of the air. This eastward projection gives rise to a bay of especially regular formation, its shore sweeping round in almost a complete circle. Above the existing shore-line we noted åt different elevations four older strand-ramparts, all exceptionally beautiful and very distinct; they run parallel with each other and with the shore. They are best deve-