1893.] Geography and Travel. 257 
the Ucayali Valley, according to Col. Church, is not more than forty 
thousand, and this is as many as can be supported with their modes of 
life. Life is not plentiful ; fish are scarce in the waters, and in correl- 
ation with this, birds are not abundant. The natives cannot procure 
iron. The eastern slopes of the Peruvian Andes are clothed with thick 
forests, among which cinchona trees abound. 
Asia.—Tue Pamirs.—During the last few years much has been 
written about the Pamir, a region the very name of which was unknown 
until recently. Many travellers have found their way across this now 
celebrated plateau, or rather congeries of plateaux, which may be con- 
sidered to form the western and narrower end of the great Tibetan 
table-land, the knot, in fact, from which the bounding ranges of that 
plateau take their origin. Among its late visitors have been the 
Frenchmen Bonvalot, (in company with the Prince of Orleans ), and 
Sauvergne, the Russian Grombchevysky, the Englishmen Younghusband 
and St. George Littledale, accompanied by his wife. The main object 
of the latter seems to have been the destruction of Ovis poli, yet they 
could scarcely avoid adding to our knowledge of this not readily acces- 
sible tract. 
The Pamir, or rather Pamirs, for there are several, the Little Pamir, 
the Great Pamir, that of Tagh-dum-bash, Alichur Pamir, and Sarikol, 
consist of a series of flat valleys surrounded by mountains, the really 
lofty crests of which do not rise greatly above the level of the valley 
ms. 
‘The Pamir is situated at the junction of three great empires, and the 
ownership of the comparatively barren region may lead to war. The 
lake on the Great Pamir has been named Victoria Lake, but is called 
by the Kirghis,Gaz Kul, a name also given to two or three other lakes. 
Victoria Lake is 13,980 feet above sea level, while the Khargash Pass 
to the north is 14,500 feet, and the Andenin Pass, between it and the 
Little Pamir, 15,500 feet. The Pamir River from this lake flows west 
into the Wakhan, which seems also to bear the name of Kala-i-Panj, 
and which, after its junction with the Murghab, becomes the Amu- 
Daria or Oxus. The Little Pamir Lake is said to be 13,850 feet above 
sea level, and its outlet is by the Aksu, which, after running north- 
east until it has rounded the Great Pamir, unites with the Aik Bailul 
to form the Murghab affluent of the Oxus, flowing through Roshan 
Valley. Between the westerly courses of the Wakhan River and the 
Murghab flows the Ghund-Dara, the chief sources of which seem to be 
Lake Yashil-Kuhl and the Alichur River—the valley of the Ghund- 
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