64

INDIA

Both Balkh and Mazar-i-Sharif possess considerable strategical
 importance from the fact that they dominate all communication
 between Kunduz (or Badakshan) and Kabul, as
well as those lines of approach which lead southward from
the ferries and crossings of the Oxus at Kilif,
From the eastern end of Lake Victoria (where now
stands the pillar which denotes the introduction of scientific
methods of geographical analysis into High Asia, and the
junction of Indian and Russian surveys) an irregular line
of pillar demarcation extending eastwards for about go
miles brings the Russo-Afghan boundary to a trijunction
with China amidst a scene of such mountain grandeur as the
world can but seldom present. Here the three empires
professedly meet. In order to render the geographical
relations of India with Russia and China clear it will
be as well to give a slight sketch of the central lines of
these stupendous mountain formations which distinguish
the ¢« world’s roof.”
Between the vast elevated plateau of the Pamirs
on one hand and the comparatively low level of the
plains of Chinese Turkestan on the other, there exists
an imposing mountain barrier (which we now call
Sarikol), which assumes a meridional form where it
bounds the eastern limits of the Pamirs. This barrier
has been known in history either as the Taurus of
classic literature, or as the Bolor Mountains of mediaeval
writers. It is divided into two distinct and approximately
parallel chains, the westernmost of which is the true
watershed between the Ozxus and the Pacific, and the
eastern, now known in our maps as the « Kashgar” range
(through which the drainage of the western watershed
forces its exit to the plains), is capped and pinnacled by
the highest mountain-peaks of Asia north of the Himalayas.
This eastern range, which is really subsidiary to the true
watershed, far out-tops and dwarfs the western. It is here
that the Muztagh Ata of Sven Hedin, 23,000 feet above sealevel,
 rears its white dome and pinnacles to the sky ;. and
there are several other peaks but very little inferior to
Muztagh Ata in altitude.