FROM KULJA TO KUMUL 469 



tamarisk mounds, these should fall under the category 

 of mounds of from 500 to 1,000 years old. 



In addition to the tamarisk mounds was a forest of 

 stunted, unhealthy poplars with the dry stumps of many 

 dead trees, — another obvious proof of a deficient rainfall. 

 Many trees were already dead, others were giving up 

 the struggle, for the stamp of decay was on them, and 

 they were doomed to a slow and lingering death. In 

 comparison with the desert surroundings the forest 

 seemed out of place; it was as if the earth had 

 been blasted, and some of the vegetation alone had 

 managed to survive. Those that had succumbed stood 

 hke ghosts, their withered stems and twisted branches 

 preserved by the dry atmosphere. It was a depressing 

 scene, and we gloomily picked our way in and out amongst 

 the crooked, white-trunked giants which must once 

 have given welcome shade to the traveller. 



The poplar forest, which had once covered the greater 

 part of the basin, was now restricted to the northern 

 edge, where there was still a small number of living 

 trees. The living poplars were small, of about 30 ft. in 

 height, with a meagre growth of branches at the summit 

 of a bare trunk; the dead stumps, however, showed an 

 immense girth, far surpassing any of the great poplars 

 of Russian Turkestan. The present condition of the 

 tamarisk mounds and the dead and dying forests of the 

 basin of Chi-ku-ching made us realize that no such factors 

 producing such devastating results were at work in 

 Dzungaria. We recalled the poplar forests near Manas 

 as being in a comparatively healthy condition ; we could 

 not remember even one tamarisk mound ; and when, 

 during our subsequent journeys in the following summer, 

 we reached the central plains and the hmit of the water- 



