1887] | Geography and Travels. 561 
Asiatic. Notes.—Messrs. James, Younghusband, and Fulford 
eae recently travelled from Mukden, the capital of South Mant- 
uria, up one of the tributaries of ‘the Yalu, and through the 
ae chain of mountains by a pass two thousand seven hundred 
feet high to the Chang Peishan, or ever-white mountain. This 
is a recently extinct volcano, with a clear lake in its crater. The 
loftiest of the peaks around this crater is seven thousand five 
hundred and twenty-five feet above the sea. The sides are com- 
posed of disintegrated pumice. This mountain is the centre of 
the river-system of Manchuria, since the rivers Yalu, Tumen 
and Sungari all have their sources there. Descending the Sun- 
gari, the party went to Kirin, and thence to Tsitsihar, the capital 
of Northern Manchuria. Southeast of Tsitsihar they crossed a 
high and taiating steppe, with numerous brackish lakes, 
from the earth of the shores of which soda and salt are ob- 
tained. 
M. Potanin left the Koko-Nor June 25, 1886, crossed the Gobi 
from south to north, and discovered four ae mountain-ranges 
cree es from the region drained by the Hoang-ho is composed 
hree mountain-ranges, with passes twelve thousand eight 
eae feet high and valleys ten thousand feet above the sea. 
On his way north he fell in with the a tribe of 
leg. He surveyed the country passed ov 
Sr. E. Modigliani has visited Nias, an sage some thirty miles 
from the west coast of Sumatra. The natives are abe! savages, 
everywhere addicted to head-hunting, and the rajah of Bavolo- 
valani had no idea of collecting skulls except from the living: 
subject. Owing to local feuds the explorer did not go far into 
and they work jda brass, ‘und gold for themselves. They have 
Take: Their shields are heavy and coated with buffalo-hide, 
and they make curious iron helmets. Their swords are sheathed 
in wood, and have a globular wicker or rotang basket in front. 
Every young man must have cut off one head,—no matter if of 
man, woman, or child. 
MM. Bonvalot and Capus, the French travellers who have 
the French Geographical Society that the country between Te- 
heran and Meshed belongs to the steppe region of Central Asia 
by its fauna, flora, and geology. The journey between these 
places was, for most of the way, on the edge of an immense 
basin, the bottom of which is the Khevir, or great salt desert. 
