THE SARMATIAN POLECAT. 



CHAPTER IV 



The Caspian Area 



By Dr. Paul Matschie, who has devoted much attention to the definition of the 

 Mediterranean region, the Caspian area is regarded as an outlying transitional 

 subresrion, whose fauna is connected on the one hand with that of the Holarctic 

 region to the north (especially as represented by the so-called Pontic area of 

 eastern Europe), and on the other with that of what he terms the Chinese region 

 in the east, while to the west it is as intimately connected with the typical 

 Mediterranean region. This tract includes the catchment basins of the rivers 

 flowing into the Caspian and the Sea of Aral, although only the lower course of 

 the Volga and that portion of the Urals situated south of Uralsk lie within its 

 limits. The southern portion, that is the tract between the Caspian and the 

 Hindu Koh and the districts around the upper course of the two large rivers 

 discharging into the Sea of Aral, may on the whole be characterised as a semi- 

 desert. The rest of the area has for centuries been known as the steppe. This 

 steppe is mainly situated between the lower course of the Volga, and the Caspian 

 on the west, and the Tian-Shan Mountains on the east, and forms with its 

 central Asiatic continuation the north-eastern branch of the northern African and 

 Arabian desert, and, unlike the desert beyond the Tian-Shan, is neither hilly nor 

 mountainous. 



The Caspian plain, like the central Asiatic highlands, lies within the temperate 

 zone, and is subject to sudden changes of temperature and great dryness of the 

 air, the cold winter giving the sparse vegetation an appearance differing greatly 

 from that of the desert-region to the south-west. The influence of the winter is 



distinctly shown in the oases and on the banks of the rivers, where the most 



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