1 LADAKH. 5
2 which have no grounds of existence in nature.” ! At Rupshu, at # ra, xviii. 251.
3 the elevation of sixteen thousand feet, it freezes every night even
4 at midsummer; but the heat of the day so far coun‘trvails the
5 cold of night, that the lake Chamoreril, fifty mile? in circum-
6 ference, is free from ice during the summer months.? At Le, He peg oe
7 considerably lower, having an elevation of about ten thousand rel aes
8 feet,? frost, with snow and sleet, commences early in September, 3 Vigne, fi. 341.
9 and continues until May, and the thermometer, from the middle
10 of December to February, ranges from 10° to 20° ;4 even in June, erat
11 the rivulets are often, at night, coated with ice. Notwithstanding 1885, Sept. Dec.
12 this general low temperature, as the heat of the sun’s rays, > 17
13 during the day, in the summer months, is very great, and
14 scarcely ever intercepted by a cloud, Tartarian oats, and other
15 crops requiring a high temperature but during only a short period,
16 succeed bere, though they have been found to fail when tried on
17 the mountains of Europe having a much higher mean tempera-
18 ture.5 Moorcroft found the thermometer, when exposed to the
19 sun’s rays at midday in July, to range from 134° to 144°.
20 The atmosphere is in general dry in all parts of the country,
21 * nearly all the moisture which the soil receives being from snow.
22 Moorcroft,6 who lived in the country above a year, says— ®1. 209.
23 ‘‘ During our stay, rain fell but on ten days, and then in very
24 small quantities, between the end of April and the middle of Sep-
25 tember, and this, we were informed, much exceeded the average
26 fall.” In the very elevated tracts the parching effects of the
27 attenuated and dry air are represented as greater than in the
28 most sultry wastes of the torrid zone. Gerard?’ states, ‘ The 7 As. Res. xvill.
29 dryness was quite withering; every thing flexible is con-~”
30 verted into a coriaceous hardness.” Butchers’ meat is dried up
31 and preserved from putrefaction at a temperature of 66° or 68°.
32 Things do not rot, they merely fall into dust in a long course
33 of ages; the argillaceous roofs of the houses are actually baked
34 by the sun’s rays till they become like tile; timber is nearly
35 indestructible, insomuch that in ruined buildings it remains
36 unchanged for centuries, while the walls crumble away.® The * Gerard, ut supra,
37 vegetation, consisting of a short spiky grass, or of furze and 7
38 other thorns, a few inches high, is never green, having at all
39 seasons a brown and scorched appearance. This is the only
40 food of the indigenous sheep, remarkable for size, the quality
41 5 Gerard, As. Res.
42 xvili. 252,
43 - of the flesh and wool, and for strength, activity, and endurance,