256 



miles apart and it is difficult to travel much farther in a day 

 through so mountainous a country. 



As we followed up the Scinde Valley from Kashmir, the moun- 

 tains became grander and there was more snow in the sheltered 

 valleys and on the mountain tops. Everywhere we found the 

 principle applying, that the northern slopes, where the snow 



.'i'ft-!; 





Fig. 2. Old bridge over the Indus, Khalatze, Western Tibet. Even a desert like 

 the surrounding country can be made to blossom when it is irrigated. 



melted more slowly, were better wooded, until we passed the 

 Zoji Pass. The Great Range of the Himalayas is so high that 

 it stops the rain clouds which have passed the lower ranges and 

 almost abruptly we get another change of flora just as we did 

 when we left the plains of India. From a rich flora we passed 

 in a day's march to that of an Alpine desert. There is a transi- 

 tion zone but it is hardly twenty-five miles wide. On the pass 

 Thomson found only six Tibetan plants out of the i lo he enumer- 

 ated while at Dras, the second stage beyond on the Tibetan side 

 the figures are almost reversed. 



Western Tibet or Ladak, while Tibetan in flora, customs, race ' 

 and sympathy, is politically a part of the Kashmir state, so it is 

 possible for Europeans to get permission to travel, while Tibet 

 proper is still closed to the foreigner. It is a highly mountainous 



