Southern Tibet : vol.7 / 379 ページ（カラー画像）

0379	Southern Tibet : vol.7
南チベット : vol.7

a greater extent of level than of hilly ground, and the hills are low and have easy slopes . . . .
The first plain is about 17,300 feet above the sea-level, it bears traces of having been the
bed of a large lake and at present contains two lakes, which, when I saw them, covered
areas of about 16 and 60 square miles resp. . . . . A second plain slopes for a distance of
30 miles in a north-easterly direction from 16,700 feet down to 15,300, when it rises again
towards the watershed of the Kiun Lun.

To the east and S. E. other plains continued far away into Tibet. To the
west were deep valleys belonging to the Kara-kash River. Reckoned from the point
where he crossed this river, its sources were about 25 miles S. E. on the southern
side of the Kwen-lun. From these sources the Kwen-lun was said to continue about
100 miles to the east and terminate in an extensive plain, communicating with the
Chang-tang plain.

Finally he crossed the Kwen-lun in the Yangi Diwan (= davan), 19,092 feet,
and had a difficult road to Ilchi. Of the different roads he tells us:

The usual route from Leh to Ilchi is over the Kárákoram Pass, and through Sanjú,
but there are several others, which, however, have not been much used till very lately,
viz: the Hindoták diwán, the Brinjga diwán, and the Polú route. The last of these is the
best, as it lies over vast plains, where water, grass, and wood are obtainable at every
halting-place.

This may be the same road which later on was used by Forsyth's Pundit
and by Dutreuil de Rhins. It is, no doubt, easier ground, but longer than the
ordinary Kara-korum Pass road. The Hindotak road is reported to branch off to
the E. N. E. from Sukit (Suget) on the ordinary Kara-korum Pass road. It can only
be used by foot passengers »on account of very difficult and extensive glaciers on
the northern side of the pass».

His own road Johnson calls the Brinjgá route, »over immense plains perfectly
uninhabited and void of all vegetation» . . . . The whole country is covered over with
a deposit of saltpetre and soda to the depth of from six inches to a foot; »the
plains have once been the beds of three vast lakes, judging from the water-marks
and banks which are distinctly visible». Masses of snow and ice make the Brinjga
passes difficult; one of them was 18,660 feet. From the sources of the Kara-kash
there is another road to Khotan over Shahidullah, following the river the whole way
and being passable only in winter. The routes chiefly used by traders from Leh
to Yarkand are those via Kugiár, Kalián and Sanjú, the last two being closed in
winter. He recommends the Rudok-Chang-tang-Polu road, which he supposed could
be reached even from Almora, via the Niti Pass and Gartok.

On his way back he travelled through the lower spurs of the Kwen-lun to
Sanju, crossed the Walágót Pass (16,760) which was the first Kwen-lun Pass, then
the Suget-davan (18,227) and finally the Kara-korum Pass, to which he gives an
altitude of 18,317 feet.
31. VII.

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