slate, and porphyry. Scattered among the green grass
of the Steppe are coarse, brown, dry and saliferous
patches, the country in some places being clothed with
incrustations of salt, looking like snow-fields. Near the
town of Semipolatinsk high sand-dunes are prominent,
whilst close to the mountains the character of the
landscape presents considerable variety. The steppe
is clothed with coarse high grass, and is dotted over
with yourts or tents, around which wander camels and
horses with galloping Kirghese horsemen. On the
reedy banks of brackish streams, wading birds strut
about, whilst in the background rises the sharp, jagged
outline of the Arcat chain, consisting of piles of
granite, with needle-like peaks, and flat terraces
apparently formed of gneiss.
The division of the province into river basins would
be, first, the south-western or Balkhash, bounded on
the north-east by the Djenghis-Tau or “ hills of the
lakes” ; next the Upper Irtish or Zaisan basin, bounded
on the south and west by the Tarbagatai mountains ;
and lastly the Lower Irtish basin, bounded on the northeast
by the Altai, on the south-west by the Tarbagatai
and Djenghis-Tau, and having the north open. The
chief mountains of the province, apart from spurs of
the Altai and the comparatively small Kalbinsk range
in the south-east, are the Tarbagatai, a mass about
equal to the Pyrenees in length and height, rising in
a space about 250 miles wide, that separates the
massive eastern extremes of the Thian Shan and the
western Altai.*
* The mountains of the Tarbagam, or “ marmot,” consist of three
bran che s: one running west by north, called the Djenghis-Tau, with an
average height of 4,000 f e e t ; the north-east branch, separating the
Upper and Lower Irtish valleys, with an average height also of 4,000
f e e t ; and the south branch, with an average of 6,000 feet. In this last
The greatest gaps in the mountains are : The valley
of the Kara Irtish where it enters the Zaisan, at an
elevation of about 1,400 fe e t ; the valley of the Irtish
proper above the town of Ust-Kamenogorsk, about
1,300 feet; and that of the Urzubai at about the like
elevation. Besides these wide depressions, showing
by heaps of stones, such as are seen in moraines, that
glaciers have existed, there are several defiles, and
passes to the number of 14 in all, by which the
Tarbagatai is crossed.*
The one great river of the .province is the Irtish, of
which the Mongol name is “ Ertchis.” According to
Tatar traditions the name of this river was given by
the Tatar Khan Irtyshak, who ruled over Siberia late
in the fifteenth century. If the etymology be Tatar,
“ I r ” means earth, and “ ty sh ” fissure or crack, perhaps
because the chief of the two branches of the Irtish
falls in a cascade out of a mountain gap. It is supposed
to rise at a height of 10,000 feet amongst the
Chinese Altai snows. It flows in a straight course for
branch are found the highest peaks of the whole range, those of the
Muz-Tau, or ice mountain, 11,000 feet high, and the Saur, both being
snow-capped. The line of perpetual snow on the Tarbagatai is 9,000
feet, and on the Saur 10,700' feet. The southern branch of the T a r bagatai
is clothed with forests of firs and poplars, and below the forest
zone glaciers, in several places, extend into the valleys.. On the
southern slopes of a large portion of the western Tarbagatai no snow
is seen the whole year round, except on the Tas-Tau (9,614 feet high), a
double-peaked mountain, solitary apd bare of vegetation, composed of
clay and dolomite, together with granites and porphyries, one peak of
which the Chinese call the Standard, from their annually unfurling
there a flag. The elevated side of these mountains,-and of the Altai
spurs on the north, is the south-east, that being part of the Central
Asian plateau.
* That of Chagan-Obo, south of the Saur, 6,000 feet high ; Burga-
Sutai, at the east end of the range, 4,670 fe e t ; Khabar-Assu, in the
middle of the range, 3,750 f e e t ; Alet, at the west of the range, 5,850
fee t; and that of Sergiopol, crossed by the post-road, 1,210 feet.