Among the Celestials : vol.1 / Page 162 (Color Image)

0162	Among the Celestials : vol.1

132 AMONG THE CELESTIALS. [CHAP. VI.

and descended a wide valley or plain between

those two ranges on the western side of the

connecting ridge. Between us and the southern

range was a most remarkable range of sandhills,

called by my guide Hun-kua-ling. It was about

forty miles in length, and composed of bare

sand, without a vestige of vegetation of any

sort on it, and I computed it in places to be as

much as nine hundred feet in height, rising

abruptly out of a gravel plain. With the dark

outline of the southern hills as a background,

this white fantastically shaped sand-range pre-

sented a very striking appearance. It must

have been formed by the action of the wind,

for to the westward is an immense sandy tract,

and it is evident that the wind has driven the

sand from this up into the hollow between the

Hurku Hills and the range to the south, thus

forming these remarkable sandhills.

After passing the end of the sand-range, we

entered a country different from any we had

yet been through. In the stage of its evolution

previous to the present it was probably a plain

of sand. But the elements of the air seem to

have fought with and rent the very surface of

the land, torn it up and tossed it about, here

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