GEOGRAPHICAL PROGRESS. 



Lite existence of an ancient Lob-Xor lake not 

 u utical with the Lob-Nor of the present day. 

 -oiith of this old lake bed, and one day's march 

 jiurth of Kara-Koshun, he discovered a large new 

 Jake formed by a hitherto unknown arm of the 

 Tarim flowing eastward through the old bed of 

 the Shirga. The return journey was made by a 

 new and very interesting road to Yangi-kul, which 

 was reached* early in May. He sent the bulk of 

 his caravan to Abdal, near the entrance of the 

 Tarim river into the Kara-Koshun, which he iden- 

 tifies with Prjevalsky's Lob-Nor, and himself 

 traveled down the river to Abdal in his ferry-boat. 

 En route he explored the lakes to the west fed 

 by Tarim river. After some Aveeks at Abdal he 

 followed the main part of his caravan to the 

 Chunin-Tag, and fixed his permanent camp a 

 little to the south of Lake Gas, in a splendid 

 mountain region called Mandarlik. With a small 

 caravan he left the camp on July 20, to make a 

 round journey through northern Tibet. Oct. 20 

 he again reached his main camp, having traversed 

 965 miles along a new route, although at various 

 points he crossed the routes followed by Carey, 

 Rockhill, Wellby, and Boiivalot. One of his men, 

 an Afghan hunter, died on the journey, and many 

 of the animals perished. The farthest point reached 

 to the southeast was near the upper Yang-tse, 

 and for eighty-four days the caravan did not 

 meet a human being. Intense cold was experi- 

 enced, on one occasion the thermometer falling to 

 4 F., while storms from the west, always ac- 

 companied by snow and hail, caused extreme suf- 

 fering. The heights of several mountain peaks 

 were obtained, and an immense number of photo- 

 graphs and sketches were taken. Geological and 

 botanical collections were made, and notes taken 

 of the wild animals antelopes, bears, wild sheep, 

 and goats being most numerous which were en- 

 countered. The map work of this journey alone 

 fills 194 large sheets. 



From a paper by Sir Thomas Holdich on The 

 Geography of the Northwest Frontier of India 

 is taken the following extract on the physical fea- 

 tures of the region: 



" The great level range of Sufed Koh, the domi- 

 nating feature both of the Kabul and the Kurarn 

 valleys, for all its giant independence, had a dis- 

 tinct geographical connection with the Hindu- 

 Kush. The Kabul basin was embraced by a long, 

 sinuous arm of the Hindu-Kush, and the Kabul 

 river formed no exception to the almost universal 

 frontier rule, that the rivers of the plateau shduld 

 pass through a gate of the hills hewn right across 

 the axis of them ere reaching the Indus flats. The 

 Kuram valley and the Tochi, too, were tied in at 

 their exit to the plains, and their drainage passed 

 out through mountain gates, which so restricted 

 the outflow that past centuries of detritus had 

 accumulated behind them ; the grade of the stream 

 had shaped itself to meet the alluvial formation, 

 and we thus got wide spaces of cultivable land, 

 terraced and reveted into level fields, and form- 

 ing landscapes of fertile beauty with scattered 

 orchards and half-concealed villages. But the 

 lateral feeders of the main streams afforded quite 

 a different class of scenery, the rough-hewn edges 

 of the broken strata formed cliffs which looked 

 straight into narrow, confined troughs at their 

 feet, with the course of the mountain stream 

 (when there was any stream at all) broken by 

 boulders and waterfalls, amid a space so narrow 

 that it was frequently impossible to find passable 

 footway. The point to be noted about all this 

 Pathan borderland, which was the country that 

 mainly constituted the new-formed province or 

 agency, was that it belonged to a northern moun- 



tain area in its chief physical aspects. South of 

 the Gomul river began a new mountain system, 

 Avhich, while it exhibited many of the essential 

 features of the northern orography, claimed a dis- 

 tinct constructive anatomy of its own. Line upon 

 line of ridge and furrow, long dominant sharp- 

 backed ridges with jagged saw-like outlines; 

 short, thin ridges packed in between as tightly as 

 they can fit; here and there a huge massif of lime- 

 stone upheaved in grand outlines, upsetting the 

 regularity of minor construction all running 

 with a parallel trend from north to south facing 

 India presented about as formidable a barrier to 

 farther advance as might well be conceived." 



Explorations have also been made in Asia by 

 Lieut. Kozloff, Dr. Richard Leonhard, Dr. Karl 

 Lehmann, Lieut. Olufsen, Count de Barthelemy, 

 M. G. Saint Yves, Messrs. Harrison and White- 

 house, Douglas Freshfield, M. Bogdanovich, W. 

 W. Skeat, J. P. Needham, and Rev. Putnam Cady. 



Africa. The Royal Society this year awarded 

 one of its medals to Dr. A. Donaldson Smith, on 

 account of his journeys in Africa. On the first 

 he traveled to the northern side of Lake Rudolf, 

 and explored the lower course of the Omo,. then 

 returned over a previously unknown route by the 

 eastern side of the lake. The second journey was 

 from the Somali coast to the upper Nile through 

 an unknown country. Following is an abstract 

 of the account of this journey given to the society 

 by Dr. Smith: 



"He set out from Berbera on Aug. 1, 1899. 

 Owing to the desertion of some of his Sikh fol- 

 lowers, he began to cross the Haud with only 17 

 Somalis and as many Gurkhas and Sikhs, besides 

 his assistant, Mr. Frazer, and a Goarnese cook. 

 The expedition marched by way of Milmil, Sesa- 

 bane, and Sheneli to Shebeli river, the followers 

 being increased to 48 on the way. The Shebeli 

 was reached on Sept. 8 at a spot called Godi, 

 over 400 miles from Berbera by road ; and on Sept. 

 11 the expedition went west again, and between 

 Gohulle and El Dere followed the line of march 

 traversed by Dr. Smith in 1895. In the first jour- 

 ney he saw the worst side of the Abyssinian 

 method of annexation, but his more recent ob- 

 servations showed him that the Abyssinians' 

 treatment of tribes once brought thoroughly to 

 submission was commendable. In the first at- 

 tacks the Abyssinians were certainly very cruel, 

 but later they restored to the natives a large pro- 

 portion of their belongings and very nearly their 

 original self-government, only a moderate tax 

 being imposed. From the Somalis to the Boran he 

 was surprised to find the natives quite as rich, ap- 

 parently, as they were before they came under 

 Abyssinian rule. Leaving El Dere, which is about 

 equidistant (750 miles) from Berbera and the 

 Nile, the expedition marched through broken and 

 very wooded country, abounding in elephants, and 

 here the Somali followers gave much trouble. 

 They were never satisfied unless they had over ten 

 pounds of camel meat or mutton a day each, and* 

 when food was scarce Dr. Smith had to be on the 

 alert constantly to prevent them from poisoning 

 transport animals or stealing sheep. But the So- 

 malis were not such miserable thieves as most of 

 the Indians ; and their superb physical condition, 

 swift-footedness, endurance, and intelligence were 

 remarkable. After leaving Goff the expedition 

 reached an altitude of over 5,000 feet, in the Boran 

 highlands, when suddenly the caravan was 

 brought to an abrupt halt by a precipice that 

 sheered off almost perpendicularly to a broad 

 plain 1,700 feet below. Five marches were occu- 

 pied in crossing this plain, where Dr. Smith ob- 

 tained a specimen of a tiny gazelle new to sci- 



