22 



formly, but appears in oases, between which stretch large 

 tracts of quite bare soil. Even in the north-western part 

 which has a more favourable situation and climate, and 

 where the flora is more steppe -like in character, we look 

 in vain for the luxuriant growth of the herbaceous plant 

 forms which are a characteristic of the steppes of southern 

 Russia and southern Siberia. It is not found here. The 

 immediate neighbourhood of the vast burning deserts which 

 occupy almost three - fourths of the whole area, and the 

 insufficiency of the precipitation (!) have too great an in- 

 fluence on the climate, moreover the soil itself possesses too 

 few of the conditions which are necessary to produce a lux- 

 uriant vegetation. The herb-covered steppe, the only refuge for 

 the nomad and his numberless cattle, is here only a dry 

 Stipa Steppe whose vegetation forms hardly anywhere a 

 thick carpet; only in the river- valleys (and frequently not 

 even there) do we find a somewhat richer development. 



Here, as throughout the whole of Aralo-Caspia, it is a 

 few specially characteristic forms which prevail, they re- 

 peat themselves continually so that the country has a very 

 monotonous appearance. Other species are only subordinate 

 to these. Where the character of the soil changes, these 

 predominant species sometimes change very quickly and 

 give place to others which in turn prevail until the soil 

 changes again. This monotony and this repetition of cer- 

 tain species over vast areas is the third characteristic of 

 the vegetation of the Aralo-Caspian countries. It is no 

 doubt a direct consequence of the uniformity of the cli- 

 mate, which again is mainly dependent on the slight ver- 

 tical relief of the surface. 



A fourth characteristic of the flora is the unfamiliar 

 appearance of many of the plant-forms 1 ). As soon as the 

 Ural is crossed, a different zone of vegetation is entered 

 upon, where the plants differ greatly from those living in 

 the same latitude, but in areas with a different geogra- 

 phical location, a different relief and different soil. Even 



Great poverty in Cryptogams is also a characteristic. 



(B.'s remark.) 



