CHAPTER LXXI. 
A BOAT EXCURSION ON THE NORTHERN LOP-NOR 
I N the previous chapter I have offered a brief outline 
of the Lop-nor problem and controversy, and of the 
new points of view which my discoveries led me to take 
up. It now remains that I say a few words about our 
further journeyings in that region. 
On April 4th we discovered that part of the northern 
Lop-nor which the Lop-men call Avullu-koll, and then 
for three days travelled along its eastern shore. The 
whole way we had extraordinary difficulties to encounter, 
chiefly owing to the fact that the sand-dunes, thirty to 
fifty feet in height, plunged straight down into the lake 
at an angle of thirty-three degrees. At intervals the 
sand drew back a space ; and there a poplar forest grew. 
Wherever the dunes dropped to a lower elevation, the 
poplars were replaced by tamarisks, each rising from the 
top of a huge mound formed by the roots of the tree 
itself So closely did these tamarisk mounds stand 
together in some places that we had to thread our way 
through a veritable labyrinth of them, so that it was often 
preferable to make a detour into the sandy desert to avoid 
them. 
The lakes of the northern Lop-nor were so overgrown 
with reeds (as we afterwards found that Kara-koshun was 
also), that we were unable to see the open water in the 
middle, except from the top of the highest dunes near 
their shores. Two or three times, in places where the 
water was shallow, or there was none at all, we tried to 
force our way through the reeds, although they were 
twice as tall as the camels, and grew as close as those 
88s 
