4 
238 National Geographie Magazine. 
of Siberia at the north, follows for some distance the line of the 
eastern coast and then strikes inland, trending to the southward 
and westward until it reaches the shores of the Yellow Sea. 
The loftiest ranges, therefore, are in the northern and eastern 
provinces. At the centre of the northern boundary is Paik-du- 
san, the “white-headed mountain,” in whose slopes rise the Yalu, 
Tuman, and Songari rivers, the two former defining the western 
and eastern sections of the frontier, the latter a tributary of the 
Amur, an important stream of southern Siberia. According to 
Messrs. James, Younghusband, and Fulford, of the British Indian 
and Consular services, who visited it in May, 1886, Paik-du-san is 
“a recently extinct voleano with a lovely pellucid lake filling the 
bottom of the crater, surmounted by a serrated edge of peaks 
rising about 650 feet above the surface of the water. The © 
height of the loftiest of these was found to be about 7,525 feet 
above the level of the sea.” 
Besides the rivers of the frontier are others of the interior that 
deserve a passing mention. ‘The mountainous nature of the 
country, as well as its proximity to the sea, implies the existence 
of numerous secondary water courses, but these as a rule are in- 
significant in size and so shallow as to permit of navigation only 
throughout limited portions of their extent. Among the larger 
streams that lie wholly within the country is the Taidong, flowing 
through Phyéng-an-do, the northwestern province, rising in the 
central ranges of the peninsula and flowing into the Yellow Sea. 
During the greater part of the year it is navigable as far as the 
city of Phyéngyang for native craft of the largest size. In mid- 
summer its waters rise rapidly during a short rainy season ; then 
quickly subside, the river resuming its former limits. To this 
sudden shoaling may be attributed the loss of the schooner Sher- 
man, captured by the Koreans in 1871, the vessel going aground 
without warning at a place where a few hours before abundant 
water had been found. 
The Han, the river of the capital, lies about one hundred miles 
to the southward of the Taidong, and flows westwardly in a 
nearly parallel direction thereto, from the central ranges of the 
peninsula into the Yellow Sea. Its many branches join in a com- 
mon estuary near the centre of the Yellow Sea coast, and their 
collective drainage area comprises a large portion of central 
Korea. Still farther to the southward is the Keum, traversing a 
fertile rice-growing country, while at the extreme south is the 
