Western Himalaya and Tibet Part 14

Where platforms of alluvium occupy the lateral ravines, they attain a very great thickness, seldom less than two hundred feet, and occasionally at least twice as much. They are generally cut off in steep cliffs by the river, beautifully showing the structure of the alluvium. In the sections of these ma.s.ses of boulders and clay, I several times observed that the strata, instead of being horizontal, were highest in the middle and sloped gently downwards on either side.

This would indicate, I think, a local origin of these deposits, which probably commenced under water, close to a ravine on the mountain-side, and gradually extended, by the addition of successive layers, till they met similar acc.u.mulations, derived from the opposite side of the valley.

[Sidenote: VILLAGES.

_October, 1847._]

In the upper part of the district of Chorbat, the villages are few and very insignificant, but lower down several are of great extent.

Chulungka, the highest village, consists of three or four houses, on a small platform about fifty feet above the river. This village stood formerly on the low ground close to the Shayuk, but the cultivable soil at the lower level was entirely swept away by the flood of 1842, so that the inhabitants were obliged to change the position of their houses. The first considerable village is Turtuk, on the south side of the river. Pranu, on the north side, is remarkable for the great extent of its cultivation, and for several isolated rocks, behind which the alluvium has acc.u.mulated to a thickness of at least six or seven hundred feet.

All the villages are surrounded by fine orchards of apricot-trees.

Walnut and mulberry trees are also common; and at Turtuk I saw a few vines; these latter are, however, by no means generally cultivated in the district. Willows are less frequent than in Nubra, but there are plenty of poplars. The black poplar is the common species, but a white downy-leaved species (_P. alba_), which is cultivated also in Kunawar, and which seems to be indigenous in some of the Himalayan valleys south of Kashmir, occurs for the first time at Turtuk. The fields are everywhere terraced, and water seems to be very abundant.

[Sidenote: ROCKS OF CHORBAT.

_October, 1847._]

A very remarkable outburst of granite commences at the junction of the Boghdan ravine with the Shayuk, and continues as far as Siksa, altering the secondary rocks so that they can scarcely be recognized.

The granite is frequently in great ma.s.s, and usually occupies the lowest part of the valley, sending out gigantic veins or branches into the overlying slates, which are often transformed into a coa.r.s.e serpentine. The hard conglomerate which is a.s.sociated with the slate, seems the same as occurs in Lower Nubra, so that probably the slates are also a continuation of the same series, and the whole may even be connected with the conglomerates and slates of the Giah valley and of the Indus below Le, the strike of which to the N.W. or N.N.W. would carry them nearly in the direction of Chorbat. Here the intrusion of the granite renders both dip and strike obscure, the beds being frequently quite vertical.

From Siksa, close to which there is a small fort or castle on an isolated rock, a road leads across the Hanu pa.s.s into the valley of the Indus. By this route Mr. Vigne proceeded when he abandoned his intention of penetrating by the Shayuk to Nubra, and it has since been crossed by several travellers at different times. It is, indeed, a route very commonly adopted in travelling from Iskardo to Le, as the lower part of the Shayuk is more open and practicable than the Indus below the junction of the river of Dras.

[Sidenote: PLAIN OF KHAPALU.

_October, 1847._]

Below Siksa, the valley of the Shayuk continues narrow for eight or ten miles. It then begins again to expand, and its width continues to increase as far as Khapalu, which is situated near the centre of a wide plain similar to that of Nubra, and, like that, coincident with the junction of a large river from the north. It is certainly worthy of note, that it is always at the point of junction of large tributaries that the valley of the Shayuk is widest, and that the evidences of the former existence of lakes are most evident, while in the intermediate parts of its course the valley is narrow and rugged, and shows no certain indications of having been at any period lacustrine.

[Sidenote: MACHULU RIVER.

_November, 1847._]

The great axis of the plain of Khapalu is from south-east to north-west, in the direction of the river Machulu, which runs through a very open and wide gravelly plain, apparently for a considerable distance. This stream, which is probably at least as large as the Nubra river, has its source in heavily-snowed mountains to the north.

The general surface of the plain is gravelly, and its appearance on the whole is so similar to that of Nubra that no detailed description is necessary. The river divides in the open gravelly plain into numerous branches, which separate to a considerable distance from one another, and ramify very irregularly. There is not much alluvial acc.u.mulation in this plain, except in the immediate vicinity of Khapalu, where a very curious isolated rock of black slate rises abruptly in the middle of the plain, its base being washed by one branch of the Shayuk, now (after its junction with the Machulu) too deep to be forded. Behind this rock there is an acc.u.mulation of alluvium, forming a steep ridge six or seven hundred feet in height; which it is necessary to cross in travelling from Surmu to Khapalu, as the abruptness with which the clay-slate rock rises out of the water, completely prevents a pa.s.sage along the margin of the river.

On the 2nd of November I forded the Shayuk a little below the village of Abadan, where it runs in two branches, each about a hundred yards wide, and with an average depth of about two feet. A little further down it is joined by the Machulu, and it does not appear to be anywhere fordable in its further course, even in winter, so that probably the influx of water brought by that stream is very considerable. I did not, however, see the junction, which is situated on the north side of the plain, quite out of the direct road towards the town of Khapalu.

Where the valley is widest, the mountain ranges on both sides of the river are well seen. The range south of the Shayuk rises close at hand into a very steep mountain ma.s.s, now much snowed. A pa.s.s which leads from Khapalu to Kartash was (I was informed) already shut up by snow, and impracticable for travellers. To the north, up the wide valley of the Machulu, the mountains are more distant, and the main chain of the Muztagh is evidently fully in sight; the absence of hills close at hand allowing a considerable extent of it to be seen; it was very heavily snowed. The nearest, and apparently loftiest peak, bore N. 13 W. (Magn.) from Surmu.

[Sidenote: KHAPALU.

_November, 1847._]

The princ.i.p.al villages of this open tract are Surmu and Khapalu, both on the south side of the Shayuk, and separated from one another by a high alluvial ridge, which rests on a bold scarped rock rising immediately out of the river. Surmu has a very long and narrow tract of cultivation, skirting the gravelly river-bed. It occupies the slopes of a projecting platform of alluvium of no great height. In this village many fields, on a level with the river, have evidently been destroyed by the flood of 1842, as fruit-trees were still standing among the gravel and shingle of the river-beds. Khapalu, on the other hand, which is situated at the point of junction of a considerable stream, occupies the surface of a thick bed of alluvium of great extent, sloping very steeply from the apex of the triangle in a recess among the mountains to its base, which is formed by the Shayuk. The fort of Khapalu is perched at a great height on a remarkable projecting scarped rock, just at the mouth of the ravine behind the village. The cultivation has a width of not less than two miles, and, as it abounds in fruit-trees, it must in summer, when the fields are green and the trees are in leaf, be a place (for Tibet) of considerable beauty. From the abruptness of the slope of the alluvial platform, the terrace-walls of the fields are very high, often as much as six feet. The fruit-trees are the same as those commonly cultivated in Nubra and Chorbat; the elm and _Elaeagnus_ of Nubra are also common, as well as the white poplar. At Khapalu there are also a few plane-trees, which do not extend further east.

The _Lycium_ of Nubra, which had entirely disappeared in the narrow and rocky parts of the Shayuk, reappeared as soon as the valley spread out into a gravelly plain, being common at Abadan, and abundant at Surmu and Khapalu. A species of berberry, a genus wanting in the higher parts of the Shayuk (except in the mountains, where a small alpine species is occasionally seen), was found in Surmu. The species was apparently identical with the common berberry of Europe, which extends even into the drier valleys of the Himalaya. I also recognized a few other new plants--a small, almost herbaceous _Sophora_ was one of these, and, still more remarkable, _Peganum Harmala_, a species which extends from the Mediterranean flora as far east as the Punjab, and which indicates a very considerable amount of summer heat.

The shrubby _Hippophae_ is still very plentiful, but, either from more careful cultivation, or because the nature of the slopes prevents the formation of swampy margins to the little irrigation streams, it does not spread to so great an extent over the cultivated tracts, which, therefore, in the winter season look considerably more bare than those around the villages of Nubra.

The height of the bed of the Shayuk at Khapalu may be roughly estimated at about 8000 feet, as the determination of the boiling-point of water at my tent, which was high up in the village, gave an elevation of 8300 feet. I arrived at Khapalu from Surmu on the 3rd of November, and remained there during the 4th. The weather, which for some days had been very unsettled and disagreeable, suddenly cleared up on the 2nd of November, and continued for nearly a week very fine, the days being uniformly bright and sunny, with a gentle wind blowing up the valley of the Shayuk. The temperature in the sun was extremely agreeable, though the shade maximum was never much higher than 50. The nights were clear and cold, the thermometer falling at Khapalu more than 14 below the freezing-point.

A little below Khapalu I found a number of people washing the sand of the Indus for gold; but the produce seemed to be very trifling, and the work is only carried on during winter, when labour is of no value for other purposes. I purchased for a rupee (paying, I believe, a good deal more than the value) the produce in gold-dust of one man's labour for three weeks. I suppose, however, he only worked occasionally.

[Sidenote: BRAGHAR.

_November, 1847._]

Below Khapalu the valley of the Shayuk again begins to contract, but the open plain may be considered to extend for some way below the village of Braghar, where a large tributary joins from the north, and to which place there is a great deal of cultivation, especially on the right bank. Immediately below Braghar, there is a remarkable saline gra.s.sy plain, very swampy, and traversed by numerous small streamlets, in which a _Chara_ and a linear-leaved _Potamogeton_ were abundant.

Below this plain the mountain spurs close in upon the river, contracting its channel very much, and frequently preventing all pa.s.sage along the bank. The narrow portion of the river extends within a few miles of Iskardo, or for at least thirty miles of river distance. Throughout this tract the valley is very similar to that between Nubra and Chorbat. Villages are numerous, occupying very elevated platforms, on which there is frequently luxuriant cultivation. In many of the narrowest and most rugged places there is no pa.s.sage along the river, and the road crosses spurs of considerable elevation.

Between Kunes and Kuru the narrowness of the river is probably at its maximum, as the road lies altogether along a ridge, elevated perhaps a thousand feet, to which the ascents and descents are extremely abrupt.

Many parts of this ridge are capped with alluvium, which occurs in many places along this part of the course of the Shayuk in very great quant.i.ty. The largest village on this part of the river is Kiris, situated just above the junction of the Shayuk and Indus, on a nearly level alluvial platform of large size. Round Kiris there is a very extensive deposit of lacustrine clay, very fine, and horizontally stratified. Good sections of this, sometimes at least fifty feet in thickness, are exposed east of Kiris, not far from the Shayuk. I did not observe any fossils; but in so cursory an inspection as I was able to make, it is very probable that I may have overlooked them.

[Sidenote: JUNCTION OF SHAYUK WITH INDUS.

_November, 1847._]

The junction of the Shayuk and Indus rivers takes place a little way below Kiris. The Shayuk is considerably wider and more rapid than the Indus, but much less deep, so that neither river so decidedly preponderates over the other as to enable their relative size to be determined at a glance. Probably the discharge of the two will be found nearly equal. The direction of the united streams is the same as that of the Shayuk, which the Indus joins nearly at a right angle.

The granitic and slate rocks of the district of Chorbat are continued unaltered as far as the junction of the Indus and Shayuk. In many places the granite so predominates as to form almost the whole ma.s.s of the mountains, but more generally there is also a good deal of slate.

The schists are of very various appearance; a very hard black slate is the most common, but in contact with and near the granite many portions of the slaty ma.s.s are quite undistinguishable from gneiss.

The direction and inclination of the dip vary extremely. In general the granitic veins appear to be parallel to the strata of schist, but instances are not unfrequent where vertical strata of schist are cut through by horizontal veins of granite.

[Sidenote: NAR.

_November, 1847._]

On the 9th of November I encamped at Kiris, and next day I pa.s.sed the junction of the Indus and Shayuk. The direction of the united streams soon becomes nearly due north, and it flows for many miles through a very narrow ravine, along which the road is of a most difficult nature, partly high on the mountains, partly on platforms of alluvium, and occasionally over angular blocks of rock, which are piled in enormous heaps along the banks of the river. At the most northerly point of the river, where the ravine is narrowest, I pa.s.sed through the cultivated lands of the village of Nar, which extend for more than two miles on the surface of an alluvial platform many hundred feet above the bottom of the valley. Leaving this village, I continued to ascend, and entirely lost sight of the Indus, which flowed to the south-west, while the road kept winding among rocky hills, gradually ascending to the crest of a low pa.s.s, among rocks of black slate, which entirely prevented me from seeing the nature of the surrounding country. From the summit of the ascent I descended gradually down a narrow valley, and emerging at last rather suddenly on an open plain, I found myself in sight of the valley of Iskardo, which presented to the eye an expanse of level ground much greater than I had seen since leaving Khapalu, to which and to Nubra the district round Iskardo bears a very close resemblance.

When the road entered the open country, at the north-east corner of the plain of Iskardo, it lay for miles over loose sand, utterly barren, forming low undulating hills, which rested upon a deposit of pure white clay. Three miles from Iskardo, a spur from the northern mountains advances close to the river, and the road skirting the latter is for a short distance rocky and uneven. Soon, however, it again enters a tract of bare sand, which extends as far as the ferry immediately above the town of Iskardo. The river, being here unfordable, is crossed by means of a flat-bottomed boat.

[Sidenote: ISKARDO.

_November, 1847._]

The plain of Iskardo, which surrounds the junction of the Shigar river with the Indus, is nearly twenty miles in length, and has an average breadth of about five miles. It is elevated about 7200 feet above the level of the sea. In its very centre, on the south bank of the Indus, and opposite to the junction of the Shigar river, an isolated rock of black slate rises to the height of nearly a thousand feet, directly overhanging the Indus, parallel to which it stretches for nearly a mile. It is faced on all sides by perpendicular cliffs, inaccessible except at the west end, where a steep and difficult path leads to the summit, which is a long narrow ridge.

The name Iskardo is a Mahommedan corruption of a Tibetan name Skardo, or Kardo, as it is very commonly p.r.o.nounced; but as the first-mentioned name is most familiar to foreigners, and is likely to become universal, as well from the inhabitants of the district being all Mahommedans, as from the country being now subject to Kashmir, it is better, I think, to retain it, than to attempt to subst.i.tute the more pure Tibetan p.r.o.nunciation.

[Ill.u.s.tration: ISKARDO _From South-east of the Valley._

_Pl. II._

J. W. del. W. L. Walton, Lithog.

Printed by Hullmandel & Walton.]

The mountains which surround the Iskardo plain rise at once with great abruptness, and are very steep and bare. Those on the south side, derived from the range which separates the Indus from the table-land of Deotsu, the axis of which is not more than ten or fifteen miles distant, rise very abruptly in rocky pinnacles, covered, at the time I reached the valley, with much snow. Two spurs from this range run forward to the Indus, one five miles east of Iskardo, the other about three miles to the west of it, dividing the whole south side of the valley into three deep bays, each watered by a considerable stream, whose source is in the southern mountains. The mountains on the north side, the terminal spurs of two great branches of the Kuenlun or Muztagh, which flank the Shigar river, are considerably lower, but equally barren and desolate.

The river Indus traverses the open valley in an extremely winding course. At one time it washes the base of the cliffs which terminate the projecting mountain spurs; at another it flows between high banks of alluvial conglomerate or of fine clay. Not unfrequently these clayey cliffs recede to a considerable distance from the river, in which case the intervening s.p.a.ce is generally sandy. A small branch of the stream, at times little more than a chain of pools, often runs close to the cliffs, indicating a former channel of the river; and when this is the case, the low ground between the two channels is often swampy and gra.s.sy.

The bed of the Indus in this part of its course is very little inclined, the stream flowing in general very gently over a sandy bed, its surface quite smooth and tranquil, occasionally only a little rippled in turning round a projecting rocky spur, where its bottom is gravelly and the inclination perhaps a little greater. Opposite Iskardo the Indus is even in the depth of winter a n.o.ble stream, often more than 500 feet wide, and nine or ten feet deep in the centre.

Iskardo occupies a nearly level plain of fine alluvial clay elevated fifty or sixty feet above the river, and extending from the isolated rock which overhangs the Indus towards the mountains on the south side of the valley. To the right and left of the rocky hill, two small streams have excavated for themselves out of the soft clay deep and wide ravines, which are covered with coa.r.s.e gravel, and are faced by more or less steep banks of clay or sand. The surface of the platform on which all the cultivated ground lies is watered by means of artificial ca.n.a.ls, brought from a distance of nearly two miles, from the point where the streams issue from among the hills.

The neighbourhood of the rock of Iskardo was doubtless selected as the site of the princ.i.p.al town of the kingdom of Balti, from the advantages which it afforded as a place of defence; and in the days of the independence of the country a fortified palace occupied its eastern extremity, while the western and more accessible end was apparently protected by a series of rude works. The princ.i.p.al buildings of the palace seem to have been at the very base of the rock. A ma.s.s of ruins, showing large blocks of well-hewn stone, fragments of marble fountains, and some solid walls supporting terraces, which appear at one time to have been gardens, alone remain to show the former magnificence of the place. A mausoleum, raised to the memory of the last independent king, Ahmed Shah, perched on a rock perhaps 300 feet above the plain, is still untouched and uninjured.