354 THE PULSE OF ASIA
sounded the lake, it overflowed throughout the year, and formed one of the most remote sources of the Tigris. Those years, however, were a time of large rainfall, not only in Turkey, but in the continental regions of the world as a whole. In drier years, the lake is said to have no overflow during the long rainless summer. In 1879, which was also a time of comparatively abundant rainfall, Tozer records that the water had recently begun to overflow. Nevertheless, during most of the last century, the lake-level must have been lower, for the natives are unanimous in saying that previous to 1878 the water, sometimes at least, stood many feet below the present strand. The impregnation of the clear blue water with borax also indicates that in recent years the lake has at some period been without an outlet. The borax comes chiefly from large deposits about three miles east of the lake. Its amount is not so great as to render the water undrinkable, or even distasteful if one is thirsty; and animals drink from the lake freely. Apparently, under the present climatic conditions the lake is on the dividing line between a so-called " normal " fresh-water lake with a permanent outlet, and a salt lake with no outlet.
In former times Lake Gyoljuk appears to have fluctuated in size in the same fashion as the Caspian Sea and the distant lakes of Seyistan, Lop, and Turfan. The first historic account of Gyoljuk is that of Ptolemy, in the second century of our era. He calls it Lake Thospitis, apparently equivalent to the name Dzopk, by which the Armenians still know it. He merely says that it lies four degrees -- actually three — west of Lake Arsissa, the modern Van, and that the Tigris River flows from it, which is exactly what a modern geo-
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