ANNOTATIONS AND ADDITIONS. 81 



deyu," marked by the devil's small-pox. (Vigne, Travels 

 in Kashmeer, 1842, vol. i. p. 237-293.) The beauty of 

 its vegetation has from the earliest times been very differently 

 described, according as the visitor came from the rich and 

 luxuriant vegetation of India, or from the northern regions 

 of Turkestan, Samarcand, and Ferghana. 



It is also only very recently that clearer views have been 

 obtained respecting the elevation of Thibet ; the level of the 

 plateau having long been most uncritically confounded with 

 the summits which rise from it. Thibet occupies the 

 interval between the two great chains of the Himalaya and 

 the Kuen-liin, forming the raised ground of the valley 

 between them. It is divided from east to west, both by 

 the natives and by Chinese geographers, into three portions. 

 Upper Thibet, with its capital city H'lassa, probably 1500 

 toises (9590 English feet) above the level of the sea; 

 Middle Thibet, with the town of Leh or Ladak (1563 toises, 

 or 9995 English feet) ; and Little Thibet, or Baltistan, 

 called the Thibet of Apricots, (Sari Boutan), in which are 

 situated Iskardo (985 toises, or 6300 English feet), Gilgit, 

 and south of Iskardo but on the left bank of the Indus, 

 the plateau of Deotsuh, measured by Vigne, and found to 

 be 1873 toises, or 11,977 English feet. On examining all 

 the notices that we possess respecting the three Thibets, (and 

 which will have received in the present year a rich augmen- 

 tation by the boundary expedition under the auspices of 

 the governor-general, Lord Dalhousie) , we soon become con- 

 vinced that the region between the Himalaya and the Kuen- 

 liin is no unbroken plain or table land, but that it is inter- 



VOL. I. G 



