296 The Realm of Nature CHAP. 



rivers Indus and Brahmaputra rise in the most northerly 

 longitudinal valley of the Himalaya, and break a way round 

 the northern and southern extremities of the range to the 

 southern plain. Other rivers, amongst them the Irawadi 

 and the Mekong, flow south in the longitudinal valleys of 

 the Indo-China Peninsula. Rising on the eastern margin 

 of the plateau, the Yellow River (Hoang Ho> 324) sweeps 

 north-eastward until it breaks a passage through the Khingan 

 Range and turns south again over the eastern plain. The 

 Yang-tse-Kiang rises close to the Yellow River ; at first it 

 rushes southward through one of the longitudinal valleys, 

 but making a gap through the bordering mountain, and 

 piercing in turn several parallel chains, it swerves north- 

 ward and emerges from its gorges on the plain, to once 

 more approach the Yellow River near its mouth. 



381. Tarim and Gobi Basins. Standing with one foot, as 

 it were, on the northern edge of the Tibet High Plateau, the 

 Kuen Lun and Altyn Tagh reach down with the other to the 

 much lower High Plain of the Tarim River and the Gobi 

 Desert, which averages a little more than 3000 feet above 

 the sea. The vast range of the Tian Shan (" The Moun- 

 tains of Heaven "), with some summits 24,000 feet above the 

 sea, stretches north-eastward from the Pamir, and walls in the 

 northern side of the Tarim basin. Many rivers from the 

 slopes of the amphitheatre, formed by the converging 

 mountains, unite in the Tarim, which flows east for 1300 

 miles to dry up in the swampy salt lake of Lob Nor. The 

 Tian Shan is continued north-eastward by a number of 

 ranges, including the Altai, the Sajan, and the plateaux of 

 Vitim and Aldan, all of which rise much higher than the 

 Gobi, and are separated from each other by mighty valleys 

 sloping into the northern low plain. They are united by 

 the Yablonoi and Stanovoi Ranges to the great Khingan 

 Chain at the Okhotsk knotting point, and continue in the 

 diminishing Stanovoi Range to East Cape. There is 

 abundant evidence that the Gobi High Plain, now covered 

 in most parts with drifting sand, was once a vast inland 

 sea, discharging its surplus waters by the great valleys 

 between the northern heights into the Arctic Sea. Now 



