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Ghashiun-Gobi and Kuruk-tagh.—The Yulduz valley or valley ofthe Khaïdyk-gol (83°-86° E., 43° N.) is enclosed by two prominentmembers of the Tian-shan system, namely the Chol-tagh and theKuruk-tagh, running parallel and close to one another. As they proceedeastward they diverge, sweeping back on N. and S. respectivelyso as to leave room for the Baghrash-kol. These two ranges markthe northern and the southern edges respectively of a great swelling,which extends eastward for nearly twenty degrees of longitude. Onits northern side the Chol-tagh descends steeply, and its foot is fringedby a string of deep depressions, ranging from Lukchun (425 ft.belowthe level of the sea) to Hami (2800 ft. above sea-level). To the southof the Kuruk-tagh lie the desert of Lop, the desert of Kum-tagh, andthe valley of the Bulunzir-gol. To this great swelling, which archesup between the two border-ranges of the Chol-tagh and Kuruk-tagh,the Mongols give the name of Ghashiun-Gobi or Salt Desert. It issome 80 to 100 m. across from N. to S., and is traversed by a numberof minor parallel ranges, ridges and chains of hills, and down itsmiddle runs a broad stony valley, 25 to 50 m. wide, at an elevation of3000 to 4500 ft. The Chol-tagh, which reaches an average altitudeof 6000 ft., is absolutely sterile, and its northern foot rests upon anarrow belt of barren sand, which leads down to the depressionsmentioned above.

The Kuruk-tagh is the greatly disintegrated, denuded and wastedrelic of a mountain range which formerly was of incomparablygreater magnitude. In the west, between Baghrash-kol and theTarim, it consists of two, possibly of three, principal ranges, which,although broken in continuity, run generally parallel to one another,and embrace between them numerous minor chains of heights.These minor ranges, together with the principal ranges, divide theregion into a series of long, narrow valleys, mostly parallel to oneanother and to the enclosing mountain chains, which descend liketerraced steps, on the one side towards the depression of Lukchunand on the other towards the desert of Lop. In many cases theselatitudinal valleys are barred transversely by ridges or spurs,generally elevationsen masse of the bottom of the valley. Wheresuch elevations exist, there is generally found, on the E. side of thetransverse ridge, a cauldron-shaped depression, which some timeor other has been the bottom of a former lake, but is now nearly adry salt-basin. The surface configuration is in fact markedlysimilar to that which occurs in the inter-mont latitudinal valleys ofthe Kuen-lun. The hydrography of the Ghashiun-Gobi and theKuruk-tagh is determined by these chequered arrangements of thelatitudinal valleys. Most of the principal streams, instead of flowingstraight down these valleys, cross them diagonally and only turnwest after they have cut their way through one or more of the transversebarrier ranges.^[1] To the highest range on the great swellingGrum-Grzhimailo gives the name of Tuge-tau, its altitude being9000 ft. above the level of the sea and some 4000 ft. above the crownof the swelling itself. This range he considers to belong to the Chol-taghsystem, whereas Sven Hedin would assign it to the Kuruk-tagh.This last, which is pretty certainly identical with the range of Khara-teken-ula(also known as the Kyzyl-sanghir, Sinir, and SingherMountains), that overlooks the southern shore of the Baghrash-kol,though parted from it by the drift-sand desert of Ak-bel-kum (WhitePass Sands), has at first a W.N.W. to E.S.E. strike, but it graduallycurves round like a scimitar towards the E.N.E. and at the sametime gradually decreases in elevation. In 91° E., while the principalrange of the Kuruk-tagh system wheels to the E.N.E., four of itssubsidiary ranges terminate, or rather die away somewhat suddenly,on the brink of a long narrow depression (in which Sven Hedin seesa N.E. bay of the former great Central Asian lake of Lop-nor), havingover against them the écheloned terminals of similar subordinateranges of the Pe-shan (Bey-san) system (see below). The Kuruk-taghis throughout a relatively low, but almost completely barren range,being entirely destitute of animal life, save for hares, antelopes andwild camels, which frequent its few small, widely scattered oases.The vegetation, which is confined to these same relatively favouredspots, is of the scantiest and is mainly confined to bushes of saxaul(Anabasis Ammodendron), reeds (kamish), tamarisks, poplars,Kalidium andEphedra.

Desert of Lop.—This section of the Gobi extends south-eastwardfrom the foot of the Kuruk-tagh as far as the present terminal basinof the Tarim, namely Kara-koshun (Przhevalsky’s Lop-nor), and is analmost perfectly horizontal expanse, for, while the Baghrash-kolin the N. lies at an altitude of 2940 ft., the Kara-koshun, over 200 m.to the S., is only 300 ft. lower. The characteristic features of thisalmost dead level or but slightly undulating region are: (i.) broad,unbroken expanses of clay intermingled with sand, the clay (shor)being indurated and saliferous and often arranged in terraces; (ii.)hard, level, clay expanses, more or less thickly sprinkled with finegravel (say), the clay being mostly of a yellow or yellow-grey colour;(iii.) benches, flattened ridges and tabular masses of consolidatedclay (jardangs), arranged in distinctly definedlaminae, three storiesbeing sometimes superimposed one upon the other, and their verticalfaces being abraded, and often undercut, by the wind, while theformations themselves are separated by parallel gullies or wind-furrows,6 to 20 ft. deep, all sculptured in the direction of the prevailingwind, that is, from N.E. to S.W.; and (iv.) the absence ofdrift-sand and sand-dunes, except in the south, towards the outlyingfoothills of the Astin-tagh. Perhaps the most striking characteristic,after the jardangs or clay terraces, is the fact that the wholeof this region is not only swept bare of sand by the terrific sandstorms(burans) of the spring months, the particles of sand withwhich the wind is laden acting like a sand-blast, but the actualsubstantive materials of the desert itself are abraded, filed, erodedand carried bodily away into the network of lakes in which the Tarimloses itself, or are even blown across the lower, constantly shiftingwatercourses of that river and deposited on or among the giganticdunes which choke the eastern end of the desert of Takla-makan.Numerous indications, such as salt-stained depressions of a lacustrineappearance, traces of former lacustrine shore-lines, more or lessparallel and concentric, the presence in places of vast quantities offresh-water mollusc shells (species ofLimnaea andPlanorbis), theexistence of belts of dead poplars, patches of dead tamarisks andextensive beds of withered reeds, all these always on top of thejardangs, never in the wind-etched furrows, together with a fewscrubby poplars andElaeagnus, still struggling hard not to die, thepresence of ripple marks of aqueous origin on the leeward sides of theclay terraces and in other wind-sheltered situations, all testify tothe former existence in this region of more or less extensive freshwaterlakes, now of course completely desiccated. During theprevalence of the spring storms the atmosphere that overhangsthe immediate surface of the desert is so heavily charged with dustas to be a veritable pall of desolation. Except for the wild camelwhich frequents the reed oases on the N. edge of the desert, animallife is even less abundant than in the Ghashiun-Gobi, and the sameis true as regards the vegetation.

Desert of Kum-tagh.—This section lies E.S.E. of the desert of Lop,on the other side of the Kara-koshun and its more or less temporarycontinuations, and reaches north-eastwards as far as the vicinity ofthe town of Sa-chow and the lake of Kara-nor or Kala-chi. Itssouthern rim is marked by a labyrinth of hills, dotted in groups andirregular clusters, but evidently survivals of two parallel rangeswhich are now worn down as it were to mere fragments of theirformer skeletal structure. Between these and the Astin-tagh intervenesa broad latitudinal valley, seamed with watercourses whichcome down from the foothills of the Astin-tagh and beside whichscrubby desert plants of the usual character maintain a precariousexistence, water reaching them in some instances at intervals of yearsonly. This part of the desert has a general slope N.W. towards therelative depression of the Kara-koshun. A noticeable feature of theKum-tagh is the presence of large accumulations of drift-sand,especially along the foot of the crumbling desert ranges, where itrises into dunes sometimes as much as 250 ft. in height and climbshalf-way up the flanks of ranges themselves. The prevailing windsin this region would appear to blow from the W. and N.W. duringthe summer, winter and autumn, though in spring, when they certainlyare more violent, they no doubt come from the N.E., as in the desertof Lop. Anyway, the arrangement of the sand here “agrees perfectlywith the law laid down by Potanin, that in the basins of CentralAsia the sand is heaped up in greater mass on the south, all alongthe bordering mountain ranges where the floor of the depressionslies at the highest level.”^[2] The country to the north of the desertranges is thus summarily described by Sven Hedin:^[3] “The first zoneof drift-sand is succeeded by a region which exhibits proofs of wind-modellingon an extraordinarily energetic and well developed scale,the results corresponding to the jardangs and the wind-erodedgullies of the desert of Lop. Both sets of phenomena lie parallelto one another; from this we may infer that the winds which prevailin the two deserts are the same. Next comes, sharply demarcatedfrom the zone just described, a more or less thin kamish steppegrowing on level ground; and this in turn is followed by another verynarrow belt of sand, immediately south of Achik-kuduk. … Finally in the extreme north we have the characteristic and sharplydefined belt of kamish steppe, stretching from E.N.E. to W.S.W.and bounded on N. and S. by high, sharp-cut clay terraces. … At the points where we measured them the northern terrace was113 ft. high and the southern 85¼ ft. … Both terraces belong tothe same level, and would appear to correspond to the shore lines of abig bay of the last surviving remnant of the Central Asian Mediterranean.At the point where I crossed it the depression was 6 to 7 m.wide, and thus resembled a flat valley or immense river-bed.”

​Desert of Hami and the Pe-shan Mountains.—This section occupiesthe space between the Tian-shan system on the N. and the Nan-shanMountains on the S., and is connected on the W. with the desert ofLop. The classic account is that of Przhevalsky, who crossed thedesert from Hami (or Khami) to Su-chow (not Sa-chow) in the summerof 1879. In the middle this desert rises into a vast swelling, 80 m.across, which reaches an average elevation of 5000 ft. and a maximumelevation of 5500 ft. On its northern and southern borders it isovertopped by two divisions of the Bey-san (= Pe-shan) Mountains,neither of which attains any great relative altitude. Between thenorthern division and the Karlyk-tagh range or E. Tian-shanintervenes a somewhat undulating barren plain, 3900 ft. in altitudeand 40 m. from N. to S., sloping downwards from both N. and S.towards the middle, where lies the oasis of Hami (2800 ft.). Similarlyfrom the southern division of the Bey-san a second plain slopes downfor 1000 ft. to the valley of the river Bulunzir or Su-lai-ho, whichcomes out of China, from the south side of the Great Wall, and finallyempties itself into the lake of Kala-chi or Kara-nor. From theBulunzir the same plain continues southwards at a level of 3700 ft.to the foot of the Nan-shan Mountains. The total breadth of thedesert from N. to S. is here 200 m. Its general character is that of anundulating plain, dotted over with occasional elevations of clay,which present the appearance of walls, table-topped mounds andbroken towers (jardangs), the surface of the plain being strewn withgravel and absolutely destitute of vegetation. Generally speaking,the Bey-san ranges consist of isolated hills or groups of hills, of lowrelative elevation (100 to 300 ft.), scattered without any regard toorder over the arch of the swelling. They nowhere rise into well-definedpeaks. Their axis runs from W.S.W. to E.N.E. But whereasPrzhevalsky and Sven Hedin consider them to be a continuation ofthe Kuruk-tagh, though the latter regards them as separated fromthe Kuruk-tagh by a well-marked bay of the former Central AsianMediterranean (Lop-nor), Futterer declares they are a continuationof the Chol-tagh. The swelling or undulating plain between thesetwo ranges of the Bey-san measures about 70 m. across and istraversed by several stretches of high ground having generally aneast-west direction.^[4] Futterer, who crossed the same desert twentyyears after Przhevalsky, agrees generally in his description of it,but supplements the account of the latter explorer with severalparticulars. He observes that the ranges in this part of the Gobiare much worn down and wasted, like the Kuruk-tagh farther westand the tablelands of S.E. Mongolia farther east, through the effectsof century-long insolation, wind erosion, great and sudden changesof temperature, chemical action and occasional water erosion.Vast areas towards the N. consist of expanses of gently sloping (ata mean slope of 3°) clay, intermingled with gravel. He points outalso that the greatest accumulations of sand and other products ofaerial denudation do not occur in the deepest parts of the depressionsbut at the outlets of the valleys and glens, and along the foot of theranges which flank the depressions on the S. Wherever water hasbeen, desert scrub is found, such as tamarisks,Dodartia orientalis,Agriophyllum gobicum,Calligonium sinnex, andLycium ruthenicum,but all with their roots elevated on little mounds in the same wayas the tamarisks grow in the Takla-makan and desert of Lop.

Farther east, towards central Mongolia, the relations, says Futterer,are the same as along the Hami-Su-chow route, except that the rangeshave lower and broader crests, and the detached hills are moredenuded and more disintegrated. Between the ranges occur broad,flat, cauldron-shaped valleys and basins, almost destitute of lifeexcept for a few hares and a few birds, such as the crow and thepheasant, and with scanty vegetation, but no great accumulationsof drift-sand. The rocks are severely weathered on the surface, athick layer of the coarser products of denudation covers the flat partsand climbs a good way up the flanks of the mountain ranges, but allthe finer material, sand and clay has been blown away partly S.E. intoOrdos, partly into the Chinese provinces of Shen-si and Shan-si, whereit is deposited as loess, and partly W., where it chokes all the southernparts of the basin of the Tarim. In these central parts of the Gobi,as indeed in all other parts except the desert of Lop and Ordos, theprevailing winds blow from the W. and N.W. These winds are warmin summer, and it is they which in the desert of Hami bring the fiercesandstorms or burans. The wind does blow also from the N.E., butit is then cold and often brings snow, though it speedily clears theair of the everlasting dust haze. In summer great heat is encounteredhere on the relatively low (3000-4600 ft.), gravelly expanses (say)on the N. and on those of the S. (4000-5000 ft.); but on the higherswelling between, which in the Pe-shan ranges ascends to 7550 ft.,there is great cold even in summer, and a wide daily range of temperature.Above the broad and deep accumulations of the products ofdenudation which have been brought down by the rivers from theTian-shan ranges (e.g. the Karlyk-tagh) on the N. and from the Nan-shanon the S., and have filled up the cauldron-shaped valleys, thererises a broad swelling, built up of granitic rocks, crystalline schistsand metamorphosed sedimentary rocks of both Archaic and Palaeozoicage, all greatly folded and tilted up, and shot through withnumerous irruptions of volcanic rocks, predominantly porphyriticand dioritic. On this swelling rise four more or less parallel mountainranges of the Pe-shan system, together with a fifth chain of hillsfarther S., all having a strike from W.N.W. to E.N.E. The rangefarthest N. rises to 1000 ft. above the desert and 7550 ft. abovesea-level, the next two ranges reach 1300 ft. above the general levelof the desert, and the range farthest south 1475 ft. or an absolutealtitude of 7200 ft., while the fifth chain of hills does not exceed650 ft. in relative elevation. All these ranges decrease in altitudefrom W. to E. In the depressions which border the Pe-shan swellingon N. and S. are found the sedimentary deposits of the Tertiarysea of the Han-hai; but no traces of those deposits have been foundon the swelling itself at altitudes of 5600 to 5700 ft. Hence, Futtererinfers, in recent geological times no large sea has occupied the centralpart of the Gobi. Beyond an occasional visit from a band of nomadMongols, this region of the Pe-shan swelling is entirely uninhabited.^[5]And yet it was from this very region, avers G. E. Grum-Grzhimailo,that the Yue-chi, a nomad race akin to the Tibetans, proceededwhen, towards the middle of the 2nd centuryB.C., they movedwestwards and settled near Lake Issyk-kul; and from here proceededalso the Shanshani, or people who some two thousand years agofounded the state of Shanshan or Loû-lan, ruins of the chief town ofwhich Sven Hedin discovered in the desert of Lop in 1901. Here,says the Russian explorer, the Huns gathered strength, as also didthe Tukiu (Turks) in the 6th century, and the Uighur tribes and therulers of the Tangut kingdom. But after Jenghiz Khan in the 12thcentury drew away the peoples of this region, and no others cameto take their place, the country went out of cultivation and eventuallybecame the barren desert it now is.^[6]

Ala-shan.—This division of the great desert, known also as theHsi-tau and the Little Gobi, fills the space between the great N.loop of the Hwang-ho or Yellow river on the E., the Edzin-gol onthe W., and the Nan-shan Mountains on the S.W., where it is separatedfrom the Chinese province of Kan-suh by the narrow rocky chainof Lung-shan (Ala-shan), 10,500 to 11,600 ft. in altitude. It belongsto the middle basin of the three great depressions into which Potanindivides the Gobi as a whole. “Topographically,” says Przhevalsky,“it is a perfectly level plain, which in all probability once formed thebed of a huge lake or inland sea.” The data upon which he bases thisconclusion are the level area of the region as a whole, the hard salineclay and the sand-strewn surface, and lastly the salt lakes whichoccupy its lowest parts. For hundreds of miles there is nothing to beseen but bare sands; in some places they continue so far withouta break that the Mongols call them Tyngheri (i.e. sky). These vastexpanses are absolutely waterless, nor do any oases relieve the unbrokenstretches of yellow sand which alternate with equally vastareas of saline clay or, nearer the foot of the mountains, with barrenshingle. Although on the whole a level country with a generalaltitude of 3300 to 5000 ft., this section, like most other parts of theGobi, is crowned by a chequered network of hills and broken rangesgoing up 1000 ft. higher. The vegetation is confined to a fewvarieties of bushes and a dozen kinds of grasses, the most conspicuousbeing saxaul andAgriophyllum gobicum^[7] (a grass). The othersinclude prickly convolvulus, field wormwood, acacia,Inula ammophila,Sophora flavescens,Convolvulus Ammani,Peganum andAstragalus, but all dwarfed, deformed and starved. The faunaconsists of little else except antelopes, the wolf, fox, hare, hedgehog,marten, numerous lizards and a few birds,e.g. the sand-grouse,lark, stonechat, sparrow, crane,Podoces Hendersoni,Otocorysalbigula andGalerita cristata.^[8] The only human inhabitants ofAla-shan are the Torgod Mongols.

Ordos.—East of the desert of Ala-shan, and only separated fromit by the Hwang-ho, is the desert of Ordos or Ho-tau, “a levelsteppe, partly bordered by low hills. The soil is altogether sandyor a mixture of clay and sand, ill adapted for agriculture. Theabsolute height of this country is between 3000 and 3500 ft., so thatOrdos forms an intermediate step in the descent to China from theGobi, separated from the latter by the mountain ranges lying onthe N. and E. of the Hwang-ho or Yellow river.”^[9] Towards thesouth Ordos rises to an altitude of over 5000 ft., and in the W., alongthe right bank of the Hwang-ho, the Arbus or Arbiso Mountains,which overtop the steppe by some 3000 ft., serve to link the Ala-shanMountains with the In-shan. The northern part of the great loopof the river is filled with the sands of Kuzupchi, a succession of dunes,40 to 50 ft. high. Amongst them in scattered patches grow the shrubHedysarum and the treesCalligonium Tragopyrum andPugioniumcornutum. In some places these sand-dunes approach close to thegreat river, in others they are parted from it by a belt of sand,intermingled with clay, which terminates in a steep escarpment,50 ft. and in some localities 100 ft. above the river. This belt isstudded with little mounds (7 to 10 ft. high), mostly overgrown withwormwood (Artemisia campestris) and the Siberian pea-tree (Caragana);and here too grows one of the most characteristic plantsof Ordos, the liquorice root (Glycyrrhiza uralensis). Eventually ​the sand-dunes cross over to the left bank of the Hwang-ho, andare threaded by the beds of dry watercourses, while the level spacesamongst them are studded with little mounds (3 to 6 ft. high),on which grow stuntedNitraria Scoberi andZygophyllum. Ordos,which was anciently known as Ho-nan (“the country south of theriver”) and still farther back in time as Ho-tau, was occupied by theHiong-nu in the 1st and 2nd centuriesA.D., but was almost depopulatedduring and after the Dungan revolt of 1869. North of thebig loop of the Hwang-ho Ordos is separated from the central Gobiby a succession of mountain chains, the Kara-naryn-ula, the Sheiten-ula,and the In-shan Mountains, which link on to the south end of theGreat Khingan Mountains. The In-shan Mountains, which stretchfrom 108° to 112° E., have a wild Alpine character and are distinguishedfrom other mountains in the S.E. of Mongolia by anabundance of both water and vegetation. In one of their constituentranges, the bold Munni-ula, 70 m. long and nearly 20 m. wide, theyattain elevations of 7500 to 8500 ft., and have steep flanks, slashedwith rugged gorges and narrow glens. Forests begin on them at5300 ft. and wild flowers grow in great profusion and variety insummer, though with a striking lack of brilliancy in colouring.In this same border range there is also a much greater abundanceand variety of animal life, especially amongst the avifauna.

Eastern Gobi.—Here the surface is extremely diversified, althoughthere are no great differences in vertical elevation. Between Urga(48° N. and 107° E.) and the little lake of Iren-dubasu-nor (111° 50′ E.and 43° 45′ N.) the surface is greatly eroded, and consists of broadflat depressions and basins separated by groups of flat-toppedmountains of relatively low elevation (500 to 600 ft.), throughwhich archaic rocks crop out as crags and isolated rugged masses.The floors of the depressions lie mostly between 2900 and 3200 ft.above sea-level. Farther south, between Iren-dubasu-nor and theHwang-ho comes a region of broad tablelands alternating withflat plains, the latter ranging at altitudes of 3300 to 3600 ft. andthe former at 3500 to 4000 ft. The slopes of the plateaus are moreor less steep, and are sometimes penetrated by “bays” of the lowlands.As the border-range of the Khingan is approached thecountry steadily rises up to 4500 ft. and then to 5350 ft. Heresmall lakes frequently fill the depressions, though the water in themis generally salt or brackish. And both here, and for 200 m. southof Urga, streams are frequent, and grass grows more or less abundantly.There is, however, through all the central parts, until the borderingmountains are reached, an utter absence of trees and shrubs. Clayand sand are the predominant formations, the watercourses, especiallyin the north, being frequently excavated 6 to 8 ft. deep, and inmany places in the flat, dry valleys or depressions farther southbeds of loess, 15 to 20 ft. thick, are exposed. West of the routefrom Urga to Kalgan the country presents approximately the samegeneral features, except that the mountains are not so irregularlyscattered in groups but have more strongly defined strikes, mostlyE. to W., W.N.W. to E.S.E., and W.S.W. to E.N.E. The altitudestoo are higher, those of the lowlands ranging from 3300 to 5600 ft.,and those of the ranges from 650 to 1650 ft. higher, though in a fewcases they reach altitudes of 8000 ft. above sea-level. The elevationsdo not, however, as a rule form continuous chains, but make up acongeries of short ridges and groups rising from a common base andintersected by a labyrinth of ravines, gullies, glens and basins.But the tablelands, built up of the horizontal red deposits of theHan-hai (Obruchev’s Gobi formation) which are characteristic ofthe southern parts of eastern Mongolia, are absent here or occuronly in one locality, near the Shara-muren river, and are then greatlyintersected by gullies or dry watercourses.^[10] Here there is, however,a great dearth of water, no streams, no lakes, no wells, and precipitationfalls but seldom. The prevailing winds blow from the W. andN.W. and the pall of dust overhangs the country as in the Takla-makanand the desert of Lop. Characteristic of the flora are wildgarlic,Kalidium gracile, wormwood, saxaul,Nitraria Scoberi,Caragana,Ephedra, saltwort anddirisun (Lasiagrostis splendens).

This great desert country of Gobi is crossed by several trade routes,some of which have been in use for thousands of years. Among themost important are those from Kalgan on the frontier of China toUrga (600 m.), from Su-chow (in Kan-suh) to Hami (420 m.) fromHami to Peking (1300 m.), from Kwei-hwa-cheng (or Kuku-khoto)to Hami and Barkul, and from Lanchow (in Kan-suh) to Hami.

Climate.—The climate of the Gobi is one of great extremes, combinedwith rapid changes of temperature, not only at all seasons ofthe year but even within 24 hours (as much as 58° F.). For instance,at Urga (3770 ft.) the annual mean is 27.5° F., the January mean−15.7°, and the July mean 63.5°, the extremes being 100.5° and−44.5°; while at Sivantse (3905 ft.) the annual mean is 37°, theJanuary mean 2.3°, and the July mean 66.3°, the range being froma recorded maximum of 93° to a recorded minimum of −53°. Evenin southern Mongolia the thermometer goes down as low as −27°,and in Ala-shan it rises day after day in July as high as 99°. Althoughthe south-east monsoons reach the S.E. parts of the Gobi, the airgenerally throughout this region is characterized by extreme dryness,especially during the winter. Hence the icy sandstorms and snowstormsof spring and early summer. The rainfall at Urga for the yearamounts to only 9.7 in.

Sands of the Gobi Deserts.—With regard to the origin of the massesof sand out of which the dunes and chains of dunes (barkhans) arebuilt up in the several deserts of the Gobi, opinions differ. Whilesome explorers consider them to be the product of marine, or at anyrate lacustrine, denudation (the Central Asian Mediterranean),others—and this is not only the more reasonable view, but it is theview which is gaining most ground—consider that they are the productsof the aerial denudation of the border ranges (e.g. Nan-shan,Karlyk-tagh, &c.), and more especially of the terribly wasted rangesand chains of hills, which, like the gaunt fragments of montaneskeletal remains, lie littered all over the swelling uplands andtablelands of the Gobi, and that they have been transported by theprevailing winds to the localities in which they are now accumulated,the winds obeying similar transportation laws to the rivers andstreams which carry down sediment in moister parts of the world.Potanin points out^[11] that “there is a certain amount of regularityobservable in the distribution of the sandy deserts over the vastuplands of central Asia. Two agencies are represented in the distributionof the sands, though what they really are is not quite clear;and of these two agencies one prevails in the north-west, the otherin the south-east, so that the whole of Central Asia may be dividedinto two regions, the dividing line between them being drawn fromnorth-east to south-west, from Urga via the eastern end of theTian-shan to the city of Kashgar. North-west of this line the sandymasses are broken up into detached and disconnected areas, and arealmost without exception heaped up around the lakes, and consequentlyin the lowest parts of the several districts in which theyexist. Moreover, we find also that these sandy tracts always occuron the western or south-western shores of the lakes; this is the casewith the lakes of Balkash, Ala-kul, Ebi-nor, Ayar-nor (or Telli-nor),Orku-nor, Zaisan-nor, Ulungur-nor, Ubsa-nor, Durga-nor andKara-nor lying E. of Kirghiz-nor. South-east of the line the arrangementof the sand is quite different. In that part of Asia we havethree gigantic but disconnected basins. The first, lying farthest east,is embraced on the one side by the ramifications of the Kentei andKhangai Mountains and on the other by the In-shan Mountains.The second or middle division is contained between the Altai of theGobi and the Ala-shan. The third basin, in the west, lies betweenthe Tian-shan and the border ranges of western Tibet. . . . Thedeepest parts of each of these three depressions occur near theirnorthern borders; towards their southern boundaries they are allalike very much higher. . . . However, the sandy deserts are notfound in the low-lying tracts but occur on the higher uplands whichfoot the southern mountain ranges, the In-shan and the Nan-shan.Our maps show an immense expanse of sand south of the Tarimin the western basin; beginning in the neighbourhood of the cityof Yarkent (Yarkand), it extends eastwards past the towns of Khotan,Keriya and Cherchen to Sa-chow. Along this stretch there is onlyone locality which forms an exception to the rule we have indicated,namely, the region round the lake of Lop-nor. In the middle basin thewidest expanse of sand occurs between the Edzin-gol and the rangeof Ala-shan. On the south it extends nearly as far as a line drawnthrough the towns of Lian-chow, Kan-chow and Kao-tai at the footof the Nan-shan; but on the south it does not approach anythinglike so far as the latitude (42° N.) of the lake of Ghashiun-nor. Stillfarther east come the sandy deserts of Ordos, extending south-eastwardas far as the mountain range which separates Ordosfrom the (Chinese) provinces of Shan-si and Shen-si. In the easternbasin drift-sand is encountered between the district of Ude in thenorth (44° 30′ N.) and the foot of the In-shan in the south.” Intwo regions, if not in three, the sands have overwhelmed largetracts of once cultivated country, and even buried the cities inwhich men formerly dwelt. These regions are the southern partsof the desert of Takla-makan (where Sven Hedin and M. A. Stein^[12]have discovered the ruins under the desert sands), along the N.foot of the Nan-shan, and probably in part (other agencies havinghelped) in the north of the desert of Lop, where Sven Hedindiscovered the ruins of Loū–lan and of other towns or villages.For these vast accumulations of sand are constantly in movement;though the movement is slow, it has nevertheless been calculatedthat in the south of the Takla-makan the sand-dunes travelbodily at the rate of roughly something like 160 ft. in the course of ayear. The shape and arrangement of the individual sand-dunes,and of the barkhans, generally indicate from which direction thepredominant winds blow. On the windward side of the dune theslope is long and gentle, while the leeward side is steep and in outlineconcave like a horse-shoe. The dunes vary in height from 30 up to300 ft., and in some places mount as it were upon one another’sshoulders, and in some localities it is even said that a third tier issometimes superimposed.

Authorities.—See N. M. Przhevalsky,Mongolia,the TangutCountry,&c. (Eng. trans., ed. by Sir H. Yule, London, 1876), andFrom Kulja across the Tian Shan to Lob Nor (Eng. trans, by DelmarMorgan, London, 1879); G. N. Potanin,Tangutsko-TibetskayaOkraina Kitaya i Centralnaya Mongoliya, 1884–1886 (1893, &c.);M. V. Pjevtsov,Sketch of a Journey to Mongolia (in Russian, Omsk, ​1883); G. E. Grum-Grzhimailo,Opisanie Puteshestviya v SapadniyKitai (1898–1899); V. A. Obruchev,Centralnaya Asiya, SeverniyKitai i Nan-schan, 1892–1894 (1900–1901); V. I. Roborovsky andP. K. Kozlov,Trudy Ekspeditsiy Imp. Russ. Geog. Obshchestva PoCentralnoy Asiy, 1893–1895 (1900, &c.); Roborovsky,TrudyTibetskoi Ekspeditsiy, 1889–1890; Sven Hedin,Scientific Resultsof a Journey in Central Asia, 1899–1902 (6 vols., 1905–1907);Futterer,Durch Asien (1901, &c.); K. Bogdanovich,GeologicheskiyaIsledovaniya v Vostochnom Turkestane andTrudiy Tibetskoy Ekspeditsiy,1889–1890; L. von Loczy,Die wissenschaftlichen Ergebnisseder Reise des Grafen Széchenyi in Ostasien, 1877–1880 (1883); NeyElias, inJourn. Roy. Geog. Soc. (1873); C. W. Campbell’s “Journeysin Mongolia,” inGeographical Journal (Nov. 1903); Pozdnievym,Mongolia and the Mongols (in Russian, St Petersburg, 1897 &c.);Deniker’s summary of Kozlov’s latest journeys inLa Géographie(1901, &c.); F. von Richthofen,China (1877). (J. T. Be.) 

1. ↑Cf. G. E. Grum-Grzhimailo,Opisaniye Puteshestviya, i. 381-417.
2. ↑Quoted in Sven Hedin,Scientific Results, ii. 499.
3. ↑Op. cit. ii. 499-500.
4. ↑Przhevalsky,Iz Zayana cherez Hami v Tibet na Vershovya Shaltoy Reki, pp. 84-91.
5. ↑Futterer,Durch Asien, i. pp. 206-211.
6. ↑G. E. Grum-Grzhimailo,Opisanie Puteshestviya v SapadniyKitai, ii. p. 127.
7. ↑Its seeds are pounded by the Mongols to flour and mixed with their tea.
8. ↑Przhevalsky,Mongolia (Eng. trans. ed. by Sir H. Yule).
9. ↑Przhevalsky,op. cit. p. 183.
10. ↑Obruchev. inIzvestia of Russ. Geogr. Soc. (1895).
11. ↑InTangutsko-Tibetskaya Okraina Kitaya i Centralnaya Mongoliya, i. pp. 96, &c.
12. ↑SeeSand-buried Cities of Khotan (London, 1902).