344 NO IMPORTANT STREAMS TRAVERSE THE AXIS OF THE CHAIN. 
is in the parallel of Ekaterinburg. Two other transverse roads to the north of 
that town are, indeed, practicable, hut they run for a certain distance only ; the 
one serving as the line of communication between the Imperial Zavods of Kush- 
vinsk and Serebriansk, to effect through the latter a junction with the Tchus- 
sovaya river ; the other passing from the Zavod of Nij ny Tagilsk by Vissimo Shait- 
ansk to Ilinsk on the same stream, which, from the point where it is navigable, 
becomes the medium for the transport of the heavy merchandize that passes from 
Siberia into Russia. Still further to the north lay the old high road from Perm, 
Viatka and Solikamsk to Verkhoturie, or that by which in earlier days the Russian 
exiles were transported to Siberia, hut being disused it has now relapsed into an 
impassable wilderness 1 . 
Checked in our wish to traverse the chain by that line, we were enabled, through 
the kindness of our deceased friend the Prince Butera 2 , to pass it on horseback by 
a track which had not been used for many years, and which leading us by the 
picturesque and lofty rocks of Katchkanar, placed us in communication with the 
Imperial Zavods on the east, in the parallel of 58° north latitude. 
Enough has already been said of the impediments in the North Ural to rapid 
scientific researches ; but our readers, who have seen how in the flat regions of 
Russia, we acquired a knowledge of the subsoil by interrogating the river banks, 
might naturally ask, Why not resort to the same method in the mountains? In 
truth we did so, to as great an extent as our limited time and the nature of the 
region would permit ; but a glance at the Map wall show how T rarely, in the absence 
of roads, we could avail ourselves of such facilities. 
Though on the whole a very low chain, the Ural completely plays the part of 
the Alps and some great mountains, by throwing off its waters to either flank of a 
central axis ; for throughout its wdiole range, from the uncolonized and savage 
wilds of the North to the parallel of Orenburg, the “ divortia aquarum” are nowdiere 
cut through by any great transverse fissure, and are not, therefore, crossed by any 
stream. In the neighbourhood of the central depression and to the south of Eka- 
terinburg, it is true, that in its upper part, the Tchussovaya, where it is very small, 
winds obliquely through the central hills ; and a similar example, as cited by Hum- 
1 A still more northern route is marked upon the Map of Humboldt and Rose, viz. from Tscherdyn 
to Petropavloslc, hut we apprehend that it also is not passable, except in winter. 
- Married to the Russian proprietress of these mines, cited by Baron Humboldt as Countess Polier in 
a previous marriage. 
