Geological researches in China, Mongolia, and Japan, during the years 1862-1865.

CHINA, MONGOLIA, AND JAPAN. 43
Indeed the only direction from which a river of any importance could have come,
was from the west, in which case it could only have been the Hwang Ho (Yellow
river). Let us examine into the possibility of the existence of a communication
between the valley of the Yellow river and the lake basins. When I was in the
valley of the Te Hai, I saw distinctly that the break in the plateau continued to
the W. S. W. as far as the eye could reach. A low, hilly country, much below the
level of the plateau, appeared to shut in the valley at the distance of about twenty
miles from the lake. Now on Klaproth's large map of Central Asia, on which, so
far as my experience goes, the streams of this region are laid down with a remarkable approximation to accuracy, a branch of the Tourgen GolP is given as rising in
the very region occupied by the low hills observed by me. A native map of the
province of Shansi, not always correct in its details, represents this stream as rising
in the Te Hai.
Thus, I think, there is little doubt that a communication exists between the valley of the Te Hai and that of the Tourgen Gol, sufficiently depressed to be below
the surface level of the terrace deposits. The Tourgen Gol is a tributary of the
Yellow river, and if the watershed between the Te Hai and this river was below
the level of the ancient lakes, these must have occupied part of the valley system
of the north bend of the Yellow river, and must have left a corresponding deposit.
Now, although we have no information concerning the occurrence of the terrace
deposit in the valley of the Tourgen Gol, we have direct testimony with regard to
its existence over a large area in the land of the Ortous -the desert region inclosed
by the northern bend of the Yellow river. Abbe Huc passed through this country
on his way to Tibet, and describes it as a flat, sandy desert, frequently cut up by
deep ravines, in the sides of which he observed, in one place, dwellings excavated
in the same manner as those at Siwan.2
Indeed, all the information we possess concerning this region goes to show that
it has been the basin of a great lake, which once extended from the northern bank
of the Yellow river southwards to the mountains crowned by the Great Wall.3
Thus I think there can be little doubt that the terrace deposits, so common in
the system of the Ykang Ho, were precipitated in a chain of connected lakes, extending from Yenkingchau, N. N. W. of Peking, to near Ninghia (fu) in Kansuh, a
Haishui of the Chinese. The valley of Tourgen Gol is probably also connected with the valley
of the Kir Noor; see p. 29.
2 "When the Chinese establish themselves in Tartary, if they find mountains the earth of which is
hard and solid, they excavate caverns in their sides. These habitations are cheaper than houses, and
less exposed to the irregularities of the seasons. They are generally well laid out; on each side of
the door there are windows giving sufficient light to the interior; the walls, the ceiling, the furnaces,
the kang, everything inside is coated with plaster so firm and shinirng that it has the appearance
of stucco. These caves have the advantage of being warm in winter and cool in summer.....
These dwellings were no novelty to us, for they abound in our mission of Siwan. However, we had
never seen any so well constructed as these of the Ortous."-Abbe Hiuc, Travels in Tartary, etc.,
Vol. I, p. 180.
8 Compare Ritter's Erdkude. Asien, especially Vol, especially p. 153-160; also Hu, Vol. I, p. 235;
end Travels of Gerbillon, in Du Halde.