ous headland on the southern shore and to the east of it a bay cutting relatively deep inland, and backed by an especially big glen, which apparently would afford access to the heart of the mountains on the south.
The water still continued to be of a dark colour, pointing to a considerable depth, and the bulk of it had not yet cooled sufficiently to admit of the formation of ice, which was also retarded by the heavy insolation and by the wind, as also by the tempests of the preceding night or two. But we were soon to learn that a short spell of quietude in the atmospheric conditions was alone needed for the entire lake to become ice-bound.
For an account of the rocks that compose the mountains on the north side of the lake, I refer the reader to the Geological section of this work. Generally the mountains are rugged and bare, with capricious and irregular outlines. All the finer materials were blown away long ago; even the gravelly screes at the foot of the mountains consist exclusively of coarse material, the interstices of which are not filled up with any finer matter. This alone suggests that it is a windy region, and in fact both mountains and lake-shore were swept as clean as a barn-floor; such fine pulverulent matter as does remain on the latter is retained partly by the corn-pact nature of the schor, partly by vegetation: it was only in one sheltered bay that we hit upon soft dust that whirled up in the wind. Here again older beach-lines often show up distinctly on the rocky walls, while mollusc shells are pretty common on the shore.
Quite close to our camp a very narrow offshoot of the mountains terminates abruptly in the lake itself. This, while offering no insuperable difficulty to yaks and sheep, and even to horses, is nevertheless impassable for camels. But at the base of the cliff there is a shallow abraded shelf, one or two meters wide, and
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