Innermost Asia : vol.1 / 441 ページ（カラー画像）

0441	Innermost Asia : vol.1
極奥アジア : vol.1

at work here could be judged from the fact that the width of the Wadi a little before the caravan
track left it for the plateau adjoining on the south was still about a mile, and that to reach the
edge of this plateau an ascent of over a hundred feet had to be made between the steep cliffs of a
small side gully.

The configuration of the ground here corresponds exactly with that observed along the actual Old bed of
course of the Su-lo-ho both above and below Toghrak-bulak, where the river has cut its way Su-lo-ho
between gravel-covered plateaus of the same description. Our surveys of 1907, as supplemented delta.
by Lāl Singh's work on his return from the present terminal basin of the Su-lo-ho, have shown
that this Wadi debouching into the south-eastern extremity of the old lacustrine basin lies exactly
in the continuation of two old beds, no longer filled by the Su-lo-ho but undoubtedly forming part
of its earlier delta. The distance between the point where Rām Singh crossed the more southerly
of the two beds and the place where the caravan track leaves the Wadi is only five miles, and the
connexion between the two may therefore be considered as certain.¹⁵

SECTION IV.—THE DELTA OF THE SU-LO-HO

Before I proceed to sum up the conclusion which may be drawn from our survey of the dried- Survey of
up basin just described, as regards its relation to the lowermost course of the Su-lo-ho on the one Su-lo-ho
hand and the Bēsh-toghrak valley on the other, it will be convenient to indicate briefly the facts termination.
which the surveys of 1914 have established as to the actual termination of the river. As recorded
in Map No. 35. B, C. 4, they show that the Su-lo-ho bed which passes Toghrak-bulak, and alone
at present carries a regular supply of water during spring and summer, finds its end in a lake
holding, at the time of the Surveyor's visit, a sheet of salty water about six miles in length and two
miles across at its widest.

Considering that the volume of water carried by the Su-lo-ho bed at Toghrak-bulak, as Terminal
measured by me on March 17, 1914, amounted only to about 180 cubic feet per second, as against lake reached
1,800 cubic feet measured on May 2, 1907,¹ it is obvious that the area covered by the lake during by Su-lo-ho.
the time of the spring and summer floods must be much greater. Probably most of the salt-encrusted
ground shown to the east and south of it is then under water. To the west and north the seasonal
expansion of the lake is limited by a great curving ridge of dunes which rises above it. The rela-
tive height of this was estimated by Lāl Singh at about three hundred feet. This ridge resembles
in character the high 'Dawāns' of sands which are found along the terminal courses of the rivers
that lose themselves in the Taklamakān.² It obviously owes its origin mainly to the silt which is
brought down by the Su-lo-ho when in flood and after deposition is heaped up by the prevailing
easterly winds.

Before reaching this terminal lake the actual course of the Su-lo-ho, for a distance of over Terminal
twenty-four miles above and below Toghrak-bulak, occupies a narrow trench-like bed sunk deep course of
between the gravel plateaus to the north of the western extremity of the Limes line. About eight Su-lo-ho.
miles below Toghrak-bulak the plateau on the right bank of the river gives way to a scrub-covered
sandy depression ; that flanking the left bank continues some nine miles farther down. For the

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