86 Mr. C. G. Danford on the 
Coots and Pygmy Cormorants were in legions and many 
Eagles sailed about, scaring the Ducks, but too lazy and well 
fed to make a dash at them. There must be some peculiar 
feeding to attract such quantities of wildfowl to this lake, 
the excellent flavour of all species of Ducks killed on it 
being an additional proof of this. 
By this time our men had found another craft ; so, proceed- 
ing together, we crossed an open piece of water, and pushing 
through some long winding reed alleys, arrived at the island, 
a place which even the Sarilar people had described as too 
filthy to visit. It is a miserable patch of ground, almost level 
with the water, and, being covered with a deep débris of Coots’ 
wings and fishbones, has the most “ancient and fish-like 
smell” conceivable. The mhabitants of the eight or nine 
reed huts are of a very peculiar type; ideed the description 
given by Prjevalsky of the lake-dwelling population of Lob- 
nor so exactly suits the natives of the Giaour-geul, that one 
cannot help thinking that these few isolated bemgs must be 
a relic of some similar tribe. 
Pressingly as they entreated us to stay, we found five 
minutes of the stench enough, and, quitting their domain, set 
te work looking for small birds; but the day being cold and 
windy, only a few Bearded and Penduline Tits and some 
Warblers (Sylvia melanopogon &c.) were visible. 
Leaving the lake, the road passes by the village of Ali oglu, 
over some bush-covered hills, along the banks of the Ak-soo, 
through that stream, and across marshy ground to the town 
of Marash, on the barren red-earthed slopes of the Achyr-dagh, 
which forms part of the Taurus. 
The Giaour-dagh runs up to this range almost at right 
angles, being here separated from it by the valley of Ak-soo, 
and further on by the river Jihan. In most maps of Asia 
Minor the geography of its south-eastern corner appears to be 
inaccurate. For instance, the mountains of the Giaour-dagh 
are shown as disconnected from those of the Lebanon, 
whereas they really seem to form a continuous range, the 
Anti-Lebanon being also prolonged by the hills running to 
the north of Aintab. Between these lines of elevation is a 
