110 



Though the Amu Darya from Kelif to the Sea of Aral, 

 a distance of about 1000 kilometres, has not a single affluent, 

 it is in its lower course an imposing river. Where it is wide 

 (3 kilometres or more) its brownish waters glide calmly along 

 laying down banks, on which the boat is continually stranding, 

 or removing them again. But where the river has forced its 

 way through firmer rocks, for instance the limestones occur- 

 ring in its lower course, there it becomes narrower, runs with 

 greater speed and forms no strand. 



From the river one sees the desert on both sides. Though 

 it extends down to the river in a few places only, yet the de- 

 sert gives the character to the landscape. Beyond the green 

 fringe along the banks lie brown drifts of sand, bare slopes 

 of loess, limestone or sandstone, or low, dry, terraced moun- 

 tains on whose flat tops old ruined castles are often visible. 

 Where the river-bed is much wider than the river, one enjoys 

 the characteristic sight of green oases on the background of 

 the brown desert. Thus the oasis Eldjik appears like a green 

 plot with verdant fields, light slender poplars and dark dome- 

 like Ulmus campestris, surrounded by the naked sand. In other 

 places thickets of shrubs, sometimes of considerable width, 

 clothe the banks from the river to the desert; here one may 

 see the cupola-shaped tents of the Kirghiz, and their cattle 

 roaming about. In less fertile places one may scare the wild 

 pheasants or see the ground torn up by the wild boar. The 

 royal tiger is also said to visit these places occasionally. 



On the eastern side of the river the desert sand in some 

 places extends right down to the water, and the bank is then 

 a high glissade, the lee side of an advancing barchan. (Comp. 

 above p. 78). In such a case there is of course no vegetation 

 on the bank. 



In other places, where the river has eaten into the margin 

 and then retreated a little, a narrow green streak will be seen 

 mainly formed by Tamarisks, Phragmites and perhaps Erian- 

 thus Ravennae or Glycijrrhiza glabra. A firm moist soil will 

 carry also Equisetum ramosissimum, Pohjgonum Bellardi, Mul- 

 gedium tataricum, Plantago major, Aeluropus littoralis, Junciis 

 compressus, Scirpus hamulosus all small, herbaceous, meso- 

 phytic or somewhat hydrophytic species. 



