4790 m. or io m. below the level of the lake; the position is only 7 km. east of the lake and between the two there is not the slightest indication of a pass or threshold. It is not probable that a river, which only two days farther clown is so large that it could not be forded, can arise without cause shown out of the level ground within such a short distance of the lake as these seven km. No, it is quite evident that the river forms the direct outflow of the lake, and this inference is confirmed by the statements, that the water of the river is clear and that of the lake is fresh. Dr. B. Hassenstein was also of the same opinion, when he traced out Wellby's itinerary on the map showing my journey of 1896; for in direct contradiction of Wellby's own map, he depicts the river as issuing directly out of the lake. It is however interesting to learn that Wellby's latitudinal valley drains seawards 18o or 190 km. farther west than the latitudinal valley which I followed. The sharp bend which the river makes to the north is also noteworthy. This occasioned Wellby's caravan some difficulty, in that the river there cuts its way through the Koko-schili, and enters the latitudinal valley on the northern side of that range. This is at any rate the impression conveyed by Wellby's map; but the country is still too little known to allow of safe conclusions being drawn.
The adverse remarks which may be made with regard to Wellby's journey, namely that his purely geographical information is too curt; that he miscalculated his equipment, his provisions giving out before the journey was half done; that he was unable to manage his people, for while two of them were without more ado left behind in the most pitiable condition, several others ran away and met with no consideration when they returned, but had, as they themselves told me, to support themselves on wild garlic and grass until, more dead than alive, they chanced to fall in with a Tibetan caravan -- all these things are outweighed by the energy and boldness with which the expedition was led, and by the geographical results obtained, namely a fairly good map of the route followed, determinations of absolute altitudes, a brief description of the most inaccessible and till then quite unknown parts of Tibet, and so forth. From Wellby's description we are able to deduce the following physico-geographical features. Once fairly embarked in the gigantic latitudinal valley, down which he travelled until he struck the Tschumar river, a valley bordered on both sides by parallel mountain-ranges, he had no difficulties worth speaking about to contend against; at all events he encountered no difficulties of the kind that are occasioned by abrupt changes of absolute altitude. To his determinations of altitude we shall return lower down when I come to compare them with my own and those of other travellers. He had only to cross, just as I had in the next latitudinal valley to the north, over the flat transverse thresholds or sills which separate the different self-contained basins one from the other. He remarks with perfect justice, that it is incomparably easier to travel across Tibet from west to east or vice versa than from north to south. In the former case you march between the mountain-ranges; in the latter you have to go over them all. He might also have added, that it is easier to travel from west to east than from east to west, as I did in 1901, for then you do not have constant westerly storms to face. Wellby has also noticed the relatively insignificant upswellings of the Tibetan high plateau; he employs very often the term »hill» instead of the term »mountain».
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