The steep and rocky slopes are more or less naked, most of the soil being carried away, 

 and the vegetation here mostly consists of mosses and lichens. In places which are not too 

 steep for the heaping up of earth, the declivities exhibit various conifers and foliage 

 trees, especially Reliila vcrmcosa, Popiiliis laiirifolia. Popuhis nigni. Populiis Iremiila. 

 Pniiiiis Pddiis, several species of Salix. ant! Rosa, etc. 



Of conifers occur Abies sibirica. Picea obovata. Pinus siliwstris. more rarely 

 Laiix sibirica and Pinus Cembm vai: sibirica. The eye of the traveller, however, is 

 especially caught by the fine, white-stemmed birches with their fresh, green leaves, and 

 — at this time, in the second half of May — by the flowering bird-cherries, filling the air 

 with delicious, sweet odour. The trees here did not seem to attain any considerable 

 height, being most of them comparatively small and medium-sized, recurved and crooked. 

 Farther southwards the banks become gradually less steep and rocky. It 

 appears from the luxuriant vegetation that the soil here is very fertile, but 

 only here and there, at long intervals, are seen some few and small patches of culti- 

 vated ground, constituting only a minimal portion of the land. The very scattered 

 population seemed, by the way. to live mostly by breeding of cattle, and every now and 

 then the traveller passes herds of cattle, especially of cows, sheep, goats, and horses. 



Further south the river becomes broader and shallower, here and there almost 

 resembling a lake with numerous low islets; the valley widens, and the river-banks 

 successively become lower. The traveller is no>v approaching the extensive south-Siberian 

 steppes about Minusinsk; the climate becomes drier, and the wood gradually disap- 

 pears. The cedar, spruce, and silver-fir, requiring much moisture, disappear first, then 

 the fir, and last the larch, which seems most enabled to stand the drying wind prevalent in 

 these tracts. Thus the character of the scenery is gradually changed from that of wooded 

 country into a dry, open, brownish steppe, here and there with grey, reeking, and barren 

 areas of sand, or with scattered larger and smaller salt lakes, some of which were already 

 quite dried up, glittering in the sun. Along the river-banks and on the low islets are espe- 

 cially to be found several species ol Salix. Populiis nigra and Primus Padus, with a luxuiiant 

 undergrowth. This luxuriant belt, however, is quite narrow, only covering the immediate 

 neighbourhood of the river. 



The environs of Minusinsk are, accordingly, a slightly undulating, open steppe- 

 land, from where the snow-clad peaks of the Sayansk mountains may be seen gleam- 

 ing forth, limiting the steppe to the south. In the northern part of the Minusinsk region, 

 the soil is genei'ally sandy and too dry for farming, while, on the other hand, the southern 

 parts mostly consist of of the well-known Russian black earth — «t s c h o r n a j a 

 s e m 1 j a». Here the climate is moister and the country accordingly very rich. This 

 southern and soutli-eastern district is really considered to be the richest and most 

 luxuriant one in all Asiatic Russia, and is for this reason also named the Italy of 

 Siberia. The towns along the Siberian railway are, for a great part, supplied with corn 

 and other victuals from this region. 



10 



