286 NOTES. 



driven out of China, Urumchi and the adjoining district fell 

 into the power of the Elcuths ; but about the middle of the 

 last century it was conquered by the Manchus and became 

 the military centre of a district extending from Barkul to 

 Hur-kara-ussu. In 1775, Kien-long raised it to the rank 

 of a city of the second order, and gave it the Chinese name 

 of Ti-hwa-chau. But it was best known under its ancient 

 name of Bish-balik, i.e. the five cities, when it flourished 

 under the sway of the powerful Khans of the Mongol 

 dynasty. 



The streets of this town were wide and populous, and it 

 was visited by merchants from the surrounding countries of 

 China, Mongolia, and Turkestan. It contained a gymna- 

 sium, two temples, one school for the town and another for 

 the district, and, according to a Russian traveller (Putimtsefif), 

 ranked, in 181 r, as the richest town in Dzungaria, and was 

 famed for its manufactures and the industry of its inhabit- 

 ants. At that time it carried on an important trade with 

 Chuguchak, on the Chinese-Siberian frontier. The moun- 

 tains on the west are reported to abound in excellent coal, 

 and at their foot lies a great plain, lOO li in circumference, 

 covered with sulphurous ashes. Still further to the west, on 

 the borders of Urumchi and Kuldja, is a great abyss 90 // 

 in circumference, covered with a surface as white as snow, 

 which becomes so hard, after rain, that if struck with a stick 

 it gives forth a hollow sound like the Solfatara of Pozzuoli, 

 near Naples ; but neither man nor animal m.ay venture 

 beyond its edge without being irrecoverably lost. It is 

 called the ' ash-pit.' 



It was Humboldt (see ' Cosmos,' edited by Sabine, 

 i. 232), who first called attention to the volcanic character of 

 the Urumchi district ; and he was followed by Ritter, who 

 adduced the testimony of travellers to prove that severe 

 earthquakes occurred as recently as the year 17 16, and the 

 same year (according to Falk) the town of Aksu was almost 

 entirely destroyed by a similar cause. Severtsoff denies 

 the volcanic character of the Western Thian Shan where 

 seen by him ; but as no travellers have, as far as I am aware. 



