Page:From Kulja, across the Tian Shan to Lob-Nor (1879).djvu/120

 area 1270 square feet, channel troughs-shaped as before.

Below Abdallah the Tarim rapidly diminishes in size. Thus twenty versts lower its width is no more than fifty to fifty-six feet, and twenty versts lower still twenty to thirty feet, although its depth is from seven to ten feet, and the velocity of its stream considerable. For twenty versts farther the Tarim continues to flow as a brook of this kind, making several sharp bends, and at length entirely disappearing in the reeds. Farther to the north-east, and even before going so far, extend reedy and for the most part impassable marshes. It is impossible to cleave a passage even for the smallest canoe through this dense growth of canes, growing to a height of twenty feet and upwards in some places, and measuring one inch in the diameter of the stems. These monster canes fringe in one continuous alley the banks of the Tarim itself, whilst in shallower and more stagnant places grows water asparagus (Hippuris). Besides the canebrake we found all over Lob-nor cat's tail (Typha) and water-gladiole (Butomus); but of other water-plants, at least in early spring, there are none.

There is an abundance of fish in the lake of the same two kinds as in the Tarim, viz. marena (Coregonus marœna), and another of the carp family unknown to me. The first mentioned is by far the most plentiful in Lob-nor. The inhabitants call it balik, i. e. fish in general, and the