326 RESEARCH IN CHINA. 
At Liang-ho we left the P’u-ho, which flows south by west to the 
Han-kiang, and crossed the hills to Shi-ts’tian-hién. In this stretch we 
first became distinctly aware of the deep decay which the schists of the 
region have suffered. In the degree of surface disintegration the saplite 
resembles that of the southern Appalachians in a parallel latitude, but the 
streams get down to hard rock in the shallower channels and it is probable 
that the depth of decay is not so great. The district is a hill country of 
moderate relief, the tops rising probably not more than a thousand feet 
above the valley, and the streams branch extensively in the soft surface. 
On the larger stream near Fan-chan-tan and Ssi-yen-pa small ox-bows 
wind about remnants of valley terraces which are about 150 feet, 45 meters, 
above the river, at points where ledges of hard quartzite form narrows in 
the valley. 
Review of the Ts’in-ling-shan.—Considered in a broad section from 
north to south, the Ts’in-ling-shan is a mountain region which is high 
near its northern margin, slightly higher one-third of the way across it 
southward, and low in its southern slope. Its ridges rise from the plain 
of the Wei-ho in a few miles to an altitude of 7,000 feet, 2,100 meters, 
and maintain that elevation southward across the main divide, whence 
they gradually decline. It follows that along the northern margins the 
rivers debouch upon the plain from deep canyons, whereas the valleys 
of the southern slope become shallower and more open as they descend. 
If we regard the higher features we find that the mature surface of the 
Ts’in-ling stage lies high in the north, and along the northern front ends 
abruptly a short distance south of the fault-scarp where it is cut away by 
the retrogressive work of the accelerated streams. It remains elevated 
across the main divide, being represented in the pass at W6n-kung-miau 
and in all the high spurs and ridges east and west. Above it rise numerous 
broad pyramidal summits, which were the hills surviving at the stage of 
its fullest development, and which then had a relative altitude of 1,000 
to 2,000 feet, 300 to 600 meters, but which now are the highest summits 
of this great mountain range and stand 8,000 feet, 2,400 meters, above 
the plain of the Wei valley. Passing over the divide, we see this Ts’in- 
ling surface sinking gradually until, on the lower P’u-ho and in the vicinity 
of Shi-ts’tian-hién, it is represented by cols and old valley levels at an 
elevation of about 2,500 feet, 750 meters, above sea, instead of over 7,000 
feet, and the hills which diversified it probably do not rise more than 
700 or 800 feet, 210 or 240 meters, higher. Thus, in the elevation of this 
old surface, as well as in the depths of the canyons, we find evidence that 
the mass of the Ts’in-ling-shan is warped, the northern portion having 
been raised along a normal fault, the central portion having been warped 
somewhat higher, and the southern less elevated or relatively depressed. 
