

ANNOTATIONS AND ADDITIONS. 83 



That outside of the Thibetian highlands and of the Gobi, 

 the boundaries of which have been denned above, there are 

 in Asia, between the parallels of 37 and 48, considerable 

 depressions and even true lowlands, where one bound- 

 less uninterrupted plateau was formerly imagined to exist, 

 is shewn by the cultivation of plants which cannot thrive 

 without a certain degree of heat. An attentive study of the 

 travels of Marco Polo, in which the cultivation of the vine 

 and the production of cotton in northern latitudes are 

 spoken of, had long called the attention of the acute Klaproth 

 to this point. In a Chinese work, entitled " Information 

 respecting the recently-subdued Barbarians (Sin-kiang-wai- 

 tan-ki-lio)," it is said, " the country of Aksu, somewhat to 

 the south of the Celestial Mountains (the Thian-schan), near 

 the rivers which form the great Tarim-gol, produces grapes, 

 pomegranates, and numberless other excellent fruits; also 

 cotton (Gossypium religiosum), which covers the fields like 

 yellow clouds. In the summer the heat is exceedingly great, 

 and in winter there is here, as at Turfan, neither severe cold 

 nor heavy snow." The district round Khotan, Kashgar, 

 and Tarkand, still pays its tribute in home-grown cotton as 

 it did in the time of Marco Polo. (II Milione di Marco 

 Polo, pubbl. dal Conte Baldelli, T. i. p. 32 and 87.) In 

 the Oasis of Hami (Khamil), above 200 miles east of Aksu, 

 orange trees, pomegranates, and vines whose fruit is of a 

 superior quality, grow and flourish. 



The products of cultivation which are thus noticed 

 imply the existence of only a small degree of elevation, and 

 that over extensive districts. At so great a distance from 



