National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

and of the chase constitutes their entire wealth, as will be described hereafter. The shores
of these marshes produce a rich pasture, and the reed belts around harbour great numbers of
wild pig, wolves, leopards, and tigers. The climate of this tract is described as extremely
insalubrious to strangers though not so to the natives. The heat in summer is said to be very
great, but the winter, as compared with the rest of the valley, is a mild season and frosts last
only for a few days.

Besides this great swamp tract in the eastern part of the valley there is another similar
tract of considerable extent on the shores of the Baghrásb Lake near Karáshahr to the north.
The two are separated by the Kúrúgh Tágh range of sand hills, amongst the ridges of which
the wild camel=túga is said to breed. On the western half of the plain there are numberless
minor swamps and marshes scattered about on the hollows of the surface. Some of these
assume the form of pools or small lakes and are called Kol=Lake by the natives, as Áy Kol
on the Aksú road, &c.

Lake.—Like the swamps the lakes are in the eastern half of the valley, and very little is
known about them. Three principal ones are spoken of, viz., Baghrásb, Lob, and Karya.

Baghrásb is situated to the south and east of Karáshahr, and receives the Káidú River as it
debouches from the Yuldúz valley on to the Káshghar plain, and gives it exit to join the Tárim
River, which it does at a point seven days' journey from Karáshahr by winding round Kúrúgh
Tágh, a wide range of clay and sand hills that separate this lake from the district of Lob. The
Lake Baghrash, also called Káidú Kol, may be considered as a mere expansion of the Káidú River
over a hollow basin in the way of its course. It is described as a shallow sheet of water six
days' journey in length, covered with floating islands of reeds amongst which the river flows, and
bordered on each side by a belt of tall reeds, poplars, and tamarisk trees. Along its southern
shore in all its length runs the Kúrúgh Tágh ridge, and between the two is a road from Kurla
to U'sh Aktél—a journey of seven days.

Lob Lake is described as situated on the edge of the Gobi desert at the extreme east limit
of the Káshghar plain. In the Túrkkhi Rashhdi of Mirzá Hydar it is mentioned as covering an
area four months' journey in circuit, and as giving exit to the great Kará Morán River of China.
In this calculation of its extent the swamp tract to the west would seem to be included. Whilst
at Káshghar I made enquiries regarding this lake from some Kirghiz and Kalmák shepherds
who professed to be familiar with the locality, and also from some of the Amir's officers who had
visited Lob district during the Turfán campaign. The accounts of all, though varying consi-
derably in details, corresponded remarkably as to the facts of the existence of the lake, and its
connection with the swamps to the west, and as to the general characteristics of the place and
people. My most intelligent informant was a native of Karáshahr who had visited the Lob
settlement on the Tárim just below the junction of the Káidú River repeatedly during five suc-
cessive years. His description may be briefly given thus—" Lob is a succession of lakes along
the Tárim River. Each lake gives off five or six streams which spread over the plain and reunite
lower down to form the next lake, and so on for a journey of thirty days by the road. Beyond
this is the Great Desert of which nobody knows anything. All the lakes are fringed by reedy
marshes and forests of tamarisk and poplar, but there are no willows. The people live in huts
of wattle or in boats on the river. They are rich in cattle, sheep, and horses, but do not culti-
vate the soil, which is all sand, and forms undulating ridges between the several lakes and the
forests on their shores. Tigers, wolves, and wild pig abound in the thickets, and fish are plen-
tiful in the river. Venemous insects, and a large species of scorpion swarm all over the place."

Another intelligent informant was a Kirghiz of Kákshál. He had travelled all over Ila and
Kánsuh during nearly thirty years, and was in Bajin or Pekin at the time the city was taken
by the allied French and English armies in 1860. He had resided as a shepherd for three years
at Lob itself and professed to know every settlement in the whole tract. His statements
on this subject correspond in the main with those of the informant above quoted, and
add thereto the following particulars:—" Lake Lob or Lop Kol is situated in a great
salt desert. It is entirely uninhabited, and is five days' journey in circuit. Nobody
can go more than three or four days' journey to the east of the lake owing to the
depth of the soft powdery saline soil on which neither man nor beast can find a footing.