NIGHT FROSTS, CLEAR ATMOSPHERE. 171 



and all through November, the autumnal weather 

 was fine and clear, and though the night frosts were 

 sharp (— 9° Fahr. in October, and— 13° Fahr. in No- 

 vember) the days were warm^ when the sun shone and 

 there was no wind, and we enjoyed it the more after 

 the constant rain and snow in Kan-su. Towards 

 the end of October Lake Koko-nor remained un- 

 frozen, only some of the smaller bays being covered 

 with ice, but a month later the rivers, including the 

 Baian-gol, were ice-bound. Very little snow fell, and 

 the little that did fall soon disappeared under the 

 combined influence of sun and wind.^ The natives 

 said that even in winter snow was rare in Tsaidam 

 and Koko-nor ; in Kan-su, where the weather is 

 generally clear at that season, it snows but little. 



After taking our leave of the Tsing-hai-wang, 

 we crossed a barren saline plain, in which are the 

 two salt basins of Sir-ho-nor and Dulan-nor, after 

 Avhich we ascended a spur of the southern range, 

 whence we saw the plain of Tsaidam in our front, 

 and the Burkhan Buddha mountains, which rose like 

 a wall, beyond it. The atmosphere in autumn is so 

 clear that with the naked eye we could see the 

 mountains although eighty miles off, and with a 

 field-glass we could make out almost every cliff. 



Before entering the salt marshes we crossed a 

 wide undulating plain which connects them with the 



' The first day that the thermometer descended below the freezing- 

 point at I P.M. was November 9. 



- The snow here and in Kan-su is so dazzling that the inhabitants, 

 as they have no spectacles, bandage their eyes with blinkers made 

 from the black tail of the yak. 



