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

66 GEOLOGICAL RESEARCHES IN
E. W., exists, and to its disturbing influence are due some of the most important
and beneficial features in the structure of the country.
Between the Wei river of Shensi and the Sz'chuen boundary, two ranges, parallel
branches of the prolonged Kwenlun, with a general trend from west to east, penetrate far into Central China. Some of the peaks of these chains are said by Klaproth, on Chinese authority, to rise above the snowline. The numerous gold localities in this region point to an extensive development of the older metamorphic
rocks, while the presence of stalactitic caves and other indications of limestone seem
to show that this formation flanks the ranges in question.
The trends of the upper courses of the rivers Han and Kialung, and the communication said to exist between these streams at Ningkiang C. seem to indicate
that the space between these ridges is an elevated table-land, divided by a low
watershed that separates the sources of the Han from those of the Kialung. This
watershed would be in the line of the limestone range represented as crossing
Shansi, Shensi, and Western Sz'chuen.
The disturbances caused by the northernmost of these ridges ceases in Honan,
but the southern member seems to continue farther east, apparently crossing Hupeh
into Nganhwui.
Of the mountains in Southern China that belong to this system, we know as little
as of those just mentioned. They are spoken of as containing snow-capped peaks
and high table-lands in Kwangsi and Kweichau, and are supposed by Humboldt1
to be the continuation of the Himalaya mountains. The hydrography of Yunnan,
as shown on the great map of Kanghi, would seem to indicate the existence of a
more or less elevated plateau, which, beginning west of the Lantsan river, trends
nearly east, entirely across Yunnan, occupying a region in which rise tributaries
both of the Yangtse and the Si Ho, and of the rivers that flow to the Gulf of Tonquin. The little that is known of the climate of the city of Yunnan F. (in about
25~ N.) tends to confirm the supposition that it is on an elevated table-land.2 This
plateau seems to extend to the western part of the province, where it appears to
terminate abruptly toward the plain of the Irawaddi river, for Marco Polo required
two days and a half to descend from the city of Yungchang F. to the lowlands of
Ava, and speaks of the descent as being very great ("grandissima discesa.")3
Toward the east these highlands are represented by Klaproth as forming two
diverging ranges of mountains, the northernmost of which is crowned with snowy
peaks and glaciers till near the head waters of the Yuen river.4 There seems to be
little doubt that in the meridian of Kweilin F., and to the east of that point, this
northern branch forms a comparatively low range, and is nearly lost in the N. E.
S. W. system.
1 Asie Centrale. 2 Ritter, Asien, III, 754. 3 Ritter, Asien, III, p. 746.' Ritter, Asien, III, p. 660. Klaproth, Mag. Asiat., II, pp. 139, 156.