LAKE ARAL TO TASHKEND 
57 
As I had nothing further to do in Kazalinsk, I continued 
my journey up beside the stream with the patyorka. The 
alluvial soil of yellow clay was as flat as the top of a table, 
and at short distances clay mounds, with a bunch of 
kamish (reeds) on the top, have been built to guide the 
yamshtchiks (post-drivers) in the winter, when everything 
is buried under the snow, and it is impossible to discern 
any trace of the road. These mounds are the beacons 
and sea-marks of the desert ocean. The scene was as 
ANOTHER VIEW OF THE SYR-DARIA, NEAR KAZALINSK 
desolate as ever, neither people nor habitations being 
met with during the whole day’s journey, except a couple 
of Kirghiz on horseback, driving a hundred camels or 
so into the steppe. The noble Syi^-daria was the only 
other object which arrested the attention. 
The road followed the bank of the Jaxartes (Syr-daria) 
as far as the unimportant garrison- town of Karmakchi, 
generally called by the Russians Fort No. 2. It consisted 
of seventy Mohammedan (nativ^e) and nine Russian houses. 
At this place we again turned into the steppe, to make 
the detour round the extensive marshes of Bokali-kopa, 
which are annually inundated by the Syr-daria. In this 
