66 ASIA 



considered here as one geographical unit. Mongolia forms 

 the largest unbroken portion of it. Towards the west, 

 the great ranges of the Tian Shan and the Altai divide 

 it into the separate basins of the Tarim, Sungaria, and 

 Kobdo. 



Completely enclosed by mountains, the central plateau 

 is practically shut off from outside influences. Rainless 

 for the most part, it undergoes without mitigation the 

 alternations of intense cooling and heating, and is swept, 

 according to the season, by icy or scorching winds, neither 

 of which bring rain. What water may be found within 

 the basin is mostly due to the snows of the surrounding 

 rim of mountains. 



The Han-hai is not an absolute desert over its entire 

 area, but rather develops around certain centres of 

 greatest aridity, the most important of which are to be 

 found in the Gobi or Shamo, in the Takhla Makan, and 

 in Sungaria. 



Such centres take the form of stony wastes or of seas 

 of moving sand-dunes alternating with salt tracts of 

 various extent: they are well nigh plantless. In the 

 desert of Kami, says an explorer : ' Siliceous soil, sand, 

 stones, with scattered blocks of loess, here and there the 

 bones of a dead camel or horse, were all that met the 

 eye. Not a tree, not a shrub, neither bird nor beast, not 

 even a lizard, gave life to this dismal waste. The ground 

 was burning hot ; even night brought no relief. Terrible 

 storms whirled clouds of sand along. . . .' 



Around those forbidding areas, in belts that meet each 

 other to cover the largest portion of the plateaus, extend 

 semi-desert wastes of rubble, gravel, and coarse-grained 

 sands, where scattered tufts of dried-up grass, one foot 

 high, intermingle with Compositae. Predominant among 

 them is the sage-like artemisia or wormwood, which also 



