Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 24.djvu/788

Rh 742 YENISEISK Low lands. eastwards towards the upper Lena. A flattened ridge of mountains, hardly attaining more than 3000 to 3500 feet, shoots north-east from the Kuznetskiy Atatau (see TOMSK) and separates the dry steppes of Minusinsk and Abakan from the next terrace of plains, from 1200 to 1700 feet in height, which also stretches in a north-eastern direction from Barnaul in the Altai to Krasnoyarsk, and into the upper basin of the Vilui. Another system of mountains, known under the general name of the Yeniseisk Taiga, rises on the outer border of this terrace, in the space be tween the Upper Tunguska, or Angara, and the Podka- mennaya Tunguska. This system consists of several parallel chains running south-west to north-east, from 2500 to 3500 feet in altitude, though they are much lower on the left bank of the Yenisei, and passing on north-eastwards into the basin of the Olenek. For many years past the Yeniseisk Taiga has been one of the richest auriferous regions of Siberia, not so much on account of the per centage of gold in its alluvial deposits (which are poor in comparison with those of Olekminsk) as on account of the facilities for supplying the gold-fields with articles of food produced in the steppes of Minusinsk. Beyond the Yeniseisk Taiga begin the lowlands, which at no point rise more than a few hundred feet above the sea and which slope gently towards the Arctic Ocean, They are covered with lakes, thin forests, and marshes ; and, as they approach the ocean, they assume more and more the characters of barren tundra, devoid of tree vegetation and covered with lichens. Beyond 70 N. lat. trees occur only along the courses of the rivers. Two ranges, however, break the monotony of the lowlands, the Tungusskiy ridge, which stretches north-east between the Khatanga and Anabara rivers, and the Byrranga Mountains, which run along the north-western shore of the Taimyr peninsula. The shores of the Arctic Ocean are indented by deep estuaries, that of the Taz penetrating 600 miles into the interior of the continent, and that of the Yenisei 300 miles. Gyda Bay, between the estuaries of the Ob and the Yenisei, and Taimyr, Thaddeus, and Khatanga Bays, are wide and deep indentations, ice-bound almost all the year round. Taimyr peninsula, which protrudes as a massive block of land between the Yenisei and the Khatanga, is an utterly barren stony tundra. Geology. In the south are the granites and granitic syenites of the border- ridge of the plateau. In the alpine region all varieties of crystal line slates gneisses, diorite slates, talc and mica-schists, and clay slates are found, the latter being auriferous, and the whole inter sected with dykes and veins of protogene, diorites, porphyry, marble, and quartz. The same crystalline rocks are met with in the Kuznetskiy Atatau, the Yeniseisk Taiga, and the Byrranga Mountains. The plains are built up of Silurian, Devonian, Car boniferous, and Triassic limestones and sandstones, with extensive freshwater deposits of the Jurassic period. Chalk and Eocene de posits are met with farther north. The mountain region bears traces of extensive glaciation, and the lowlands of having been covered during the post -Glacial period with immense lakes and marshy tundras, where thousands of mammoths and rhinoceroses were buried, along with other (now fossil) representatives of extinct Tertiary and post-Tertiary mammals. All the country gives evi dence of having been covered with numberless lakes during the Lacustrine period. Minerals. Yeniseisk is exceedingly rich in all kinds of metals and minerals. Gold dust appears in three different regions, the northern Yeniseisk Taiga, where 100,740 oz. of gold were extracted in 1884 ; the region of the Kuznetskiy Atatau and its spurs, with the basins of the Tuba, Sisim, and Black and White Yus (25,860 oz. in 1884); and the upper parts of the tributaries of the Kan and Agut (12,540 oz.), where the gold-washings merge into those of the Nijne-Udinsk district of Irkutsk. Silver ore is found at several places in the basin of the Abakan, but the mines have been abandoned. Iron ore occurs almost everywhere in south Yeniseisk, but there is only one iron work on the Abakan (25,000 cwts. in 1884). Salt lakes are very common, and about 50,000 cwts. of salt are extracted every year. Rivers. The whole of Yeniseisk is watered by the Yenisei and its affluents. The Yenisei rises in north-western Mongolia in several branches (Bei-khem, Ulu-khem, &c.), the chief of which, the Ulu- Arctic shores. khem, has its source in marshes to the west of Lake Kossogol at a height of more than 5000 feet. As far as the Russian frontier its course crosses the plateau at an altitude of not less than 3000 feet ; on entering Yeniseisk it pierces the great border-ridge and the series of parallel chains of the alpine region. At Sayansk (53 10 N. lat.) it emerges from the highlands and traverses the elevated steppes, receiving the Abakan on the left and the Tuba on the right. In 55 N. lat. it suddenly turns to the north-east, skirting the base of a low range of hills, on the northern slope of which flows the Tchutym, a tributary of the Ob, separated from the Yenisei by an isthmus only 6 miles in width. The possibility of connecting at this point the two great river-systems of Siberia has often been discussed ; the difficulty is that the Tchutym valley is 440 feet higher than the other. A little below Krasnoyarsk the Yenisei is joined by a great tributary, the Kan, and farther north by the Angara or Upper Tunguska, which brings the waters of Lake Baikal 1 and is navigable from Irkutsk, notwithstanding a series of rapids in its middle course. The right-hand tributaries of the Ob, the Ket, the Tym, and the Yakh, approach the Yenisei so closely, and their sources are so thoroughly inosculated with those of the left-hand tributaries of the Yenisei, that the question of con necting the two systems by means of a canal has been more than once raised ; indeed something has been done to connect the Great Kas, a tributary of the Yenisei, with the Ket, a boat Avith some 150 cwts. of cargo having already passed from the one to the other. 2 A railway across the narrow isthmus between the Tchutym and the Yenisei is now regarded as the best solution of the question. In 61 N. lat. the Yenisei, already more than two miles broad, divides into several branches, which wind amidst many islands, and has several dangerous rapids. Then, before piercing a ridge of hills, it expands into a kind of lake, 10 miles across, just above its junc tion with the Podkamennaya Tunguska. Almost exactly at the Arctic Circle, opposite Turukhansk, it receives from the right another large tributary, the Lower Tunguska, which rises within a short distance of the upper Lena. The Yenisei, thus augmented, becomes more than 6 miles wide in lat. 68. Its estuary begins at the village of Dudino, and has a breadth of 40 miles ; it contains numberless islands. The great river narrows once more (12 miles) before entering the Arctic Ocean (Yenisei Bay), after a total course of more than 3000 miles. It is navigable on its middle and lower courses, steamers plying between Krasnoyarsk and Minusinsk, as also on the lower Yenisei. Its mouth has been visited almost every year of late by steamers from Norway or Great Britain ; and it is expected that regular communication will be established between Dudino and European ports. The climate, though very severe throughout, offers, as might be Clima expected, great varieties. The Minusinsk steppes have a dry and relatively mild climate, so that they are sometimes called the Italy of Siberia. At Krasnoyarsk (55 1 1ST. lat.) the climate is more severe, and the winds are exceedingly disagreeable. The yearly fall of snow is so small that the winds blow it away in the neigh bourhood of the town ; hence a circuit has to be made by the con voys of sledges to avoid it, or the sledges changed for wheeled carriages. Yeniseisk (58 27 N, lat.) has an average temperature below freezing-point, and at Turukhansk the coldest month (Febru ary) has an average temperature of - 24 Fahr. On the Taimyr peninsula the average summer temperature hardly reaches 45. For additional particulars, see SIBERIA, vol. xxii. p. 6. The highlands of Sayan and Atatau are thickly clothed with Flora, forests of cedar, pitch-pine, larch, elder, and birch, with a rich undergrowth of rhododendrons, Hcrberis, and Ribcs ; the Scotch fir appears only in the lower and drier parts of the valleys. The summits and slopes of the mountains are strewn with debris and boulders, and thickly sheeted with lichens and mosses ; but there are also patches of meadow land covered with flowers, most of which are known in Europe. Still, the flora is poor as a rule, and Dr Martianoff, after several years collecting, succeeded in gathering only 104 species of phanerogams. 3 On the other hand, the flora of the Minusinsk plains and of the steppes of the Abakan at once strikes the traveller by the variety and brilliancy of its forms. The meadows are covered with bright flowers scattered amid the com mon Graminese,, and in June and July they are adorned and per fumed by the Polygala, Dianthus, Mcdicago, Lathyrus, yellow sweet- scented lily, and scores of other flowers, mostly familiar in Europe, but attaining in Yeniseisk a larger size and greater brilliancy of colour. The rich carpet of grass and flowers is overtopped by the tall white blossoms of Archangdica and Spiraea Ulmaria, and 1 According to recent measurements, the Angara, where it issues from Lake Baikal, has a volume of 121,400 cubic feet per second (fzvestia, East Siberian Geogr. Soc., xvii., 1886). 2 According to Baron Aminoff s measurements, Lake Bolshoye, through which the canal would have to pass, is 66 feet above the Ket at its junction with the Ozernaya, and 181 feet above the Yenisei at its junction with the Kas. 3 N. Martianoff, &quot; Materials for a Flora of the Minusinsk Region,&quot; in Trudy of the Kasau Society of Naturalists, xi. 3, 1882.