330 RESEARCH IN CHINA. 
It slopes gently northward and about the Hing-an basin is represented 
by the hilltops which approximate 1,900 to 2,000 feet, 580 to 600 meters. 
Many hills rise above it, some of them reaching altitudes of 3,500 feet, 
1,075 meters. ‘They present pyramidal and sometimes angular forms, 
characteristic of the residual heights between watersheds established in 
essentially homogeneous and rather soft rock, such as the schist is. In 
crossing the divide to Liu-wang-miau, we traversed part of a ridge approxi- 
mately 3,000 feet, goo meters, above sea, which seemed to have that corre- 
spondence with adjacent ridges which might suggest a remnant of a higher 
and older surface. 
Descending to Ling-kuan-tién, we reach the valley of a river which, 
lacking the native name, we will call the P’ing-li river after P’ing-li-hién. 
It is a clear swift stream 50 meters across, which frequently breaks over 
gravel bars, where it may be forded on foot. The valley exhibits those 
features of partial adjustment which were noted on the upper P’u-ho, 
there being stretches where the main stream cuts across hard rocks and 
little parallel valleys are being opened on softer belts. Such an instance 
occurs just south of Ling-kuan-tién, where the trail leaves the river and 
returns to it a mile and a half further up. Proceeding upstream toward 
P’ing-li-hién, the valley widens, and from the coal-mines a mile and a half 
above the city it extends as a broad open channel southeastward. It is 
said to continue in that general direction across a low divide about 30 miles, 
50 kilometers, to Chu-ki-hién, in the valley of the eastward flowing Nan- 
kiang. A small brook now occupies the open river valley into which 
the P’ing-li river flows with a northeasterly course, opposed to that which 
it takes after entering the valley. The relations of the abandoned valley 
and its tributary are such as to indicate that formerly a river flowed south- 
eastward past the coal-mines, probably to join the Nan-kiang at Chu-ki-hién. 
That stream has been checked by warping, which reversed the slope of its 
bed and afforded opportunity for its diversion to the present northerly 
course beyond Ling-kuan-tién. The sluggish stage of the old river, prior 
to its diversion but subsequent to the beginning of the warping, is 
apparently represented near P’ing-li by 10 or 15 feet, 3 or 4 meters, of 
gravel capping a terrace about 4o feet, 12 meters, high, the lower part of 
which is a recent rock cut. 
South of P’ing-li-hién the route avoids the canyon for a few miles, 
and after a sharp ascent follows for some distance the surface of the old 
valley level which is here at an elevation of 2,700 feet, 825 meters, above 
sea (Fig. A, Plate XLV). At Pa-li-kuan we again descend to the river and 
meander beside it to Pa-kua-miau. It runs in an exceedingly picturesque 
and fertile valley, with [little stretches of bottom-land cultivated as rice- 
