234 OVER THE KARA-KASH RANGES [CHAP. XIV.
rising thousands of feet above the narrow fissure at the bottom. As it appeared to me in my total want of geological training, only the erosive action of water, aided by extreme disintegration of the rocks under peculiar climatic conditions, could have produced these extraordinary formations. But of water there was no trace, only ankle-deep dust overlying the detritus. For the first four or five
ERODED RANGES TO NORTH-WEST, SEEN FROM ABOVE YAGAN-DAWAN.
miles there was scarcely even scrub growing in these terribly barren gorges ; animal life seemed completely absent. The want of water did not physically distress me, as it did our ponies and yaks, which had tasted no drop for more than twenty-four hours. Yet my attention was ever turned to it in contrast, by the sight of the huge, overhanging cliffs, the cavities, and isolated pinnacles, which all looked as if water had worked them.
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