224 FLORA INDICA. 



those of Kishtwar. Padum, the capital, is 12,000 feet above 

 the sea ; and a rich herbaceous vegetation occupies the river- 

 flats and ravines. The Zanskar basin is cut off from that of 

 the Indus by lofty ranges, and the defile through which the 

 Zanskar river flows to the Indus is rocky and impracticable. 



4. Dras. — This province occupies the same position rela- 

 tively to Kashmir that Zanskar does to Kishtwar. The com- 

 munication between Dras and Kashmir is by a remarkable 

 depression — the Zoji Pass, whose elevation being only 11,300 

 feet, gives free access to the moist winds of Kashmir, and 

 Dras is hence the most humid and fertile province of Tibet ; 

 its flora approaching very closely to that of Kashmir. 



The openness of the valleys of Dras, and the occurrence of 

 elevated plains or steppes at its north-west extremity, which 

 have been called the plains of Deotsu, are remarkable excep- 

 tions to the generally rugged nature of Tibet ; and the fact 

 of Dras and Guge having both been visited and described by 

 European travellers before most other parts of Tibet, and their 

 both being so exceptionally level as compared with the rest 

 of that country, has materially tended to spread the erro- 

 neous impression of the whole of Tibet being a series of ele- 

 vated plains. * 



Artemisia and Umbellifera, including Prangos pabular ia, 

 are abundant in the Dras valley, and the prevalent Cfieno- 

 podiacem of Tibet are scarce. Vitis, Impatiens, Black Cur- 

 rant, Silene inflata, Aconitwn, Hypericum, Vernonia, Junipe- 



?*us, 



Millefolia 



very 



Towards 



mmmit 



on the Tibet side, of which all but six or seven were Kash- 



mir lan. 



N 



Nari 



Khorsum) nothing is known botanically; it is enormously 

 lofty, utterly barren, and almost uninhabited, except on the 

 lowest part of the ravine of the Indus, whose sources have 

 not been visited by any traveller ; nor has the province been 



