re 
desolation as far as the eye can pierce, not a tree nor a 
bush, anywhere. On approaching the stony slopes, however, 
low green tufts appear about 20—30 steps apart. They have 
long, thick, perpendicular roots and the withered remains of 
leaves and stalks cling like close tunics below the green. 
Several have beautiful bright flowers, Parrya eriocalyx pink, 
Hedysarum pumilum crimson, Oxytropis vermicularis violet, 
Smelowskia calycina, Sisymbrium Korolkowi and pamiricum 
and Chorispora macropoda yellowish-white or yellow. We 
found, too, the cushion plant Androsace villosa var. congesta. 
Other species than those mentioned here were not found. 
Below, in the river valley, where there is rich black clay 
between the stones, Dilophia salsa, Primula sibirica, Gym- 
nandra Korolkowi, Calamagrostis anthoxanthoides, Colpodium 
altaicum, Carex pseudofoetida, Kobresia stenocarpa and Oxy- 
graphis glacialis are growing. Of these the most common are 
Calamagrostis, Carex, and Kobresia, and they lend the yellow 
hue to the river valley. 
The lake Kara Kul is situated in northern Pamir south 
of Kisil Kul, at an altitude of about 4,000 métres. It is a 
large lake with colours like the ocean, clear green and deep 
blue. Promontories of low, dark, rounded mountains put 
out into its waters at both the northern and southern ends. 
Its shores are curving and emphasized by a broad margin 
of snow-white salt, extending the entire circur-ference of the 
lake. Absolute quiet and desolation reign, enhtaced, perhaps, 
by the presence of a few small white gulls w ı brown heads 
circling above the blue waters. A broad bezren plain en- 
compasses the lake, surrounded in turn on all sides by 
snow-covered mountains. On a clear day, wii: great white 
cumulus clouds drifting over the white mo *s, Kara Kul 
possesses a strange weird beauty. Th deserted lake 
in this dry silent country surre hu mountains 
forms a picture lacking perhar |  s«nbva picture of 
greatness and death, — an impression once ~ never effaced. 
