The sandhills--_kuzupchi_, as the Mongols call them--appear north of the Ala shan and along the Yellow River, and when the wind sets them in motion they gradually travel before it, and form a great danger to travellers who try to cross them. One Chinese author says, “There is neither water, herb, man, nor smoke;--if there is no smoke, there is absolutely nothing.” The limits of the actual desert are not easily defined, for near the base of the mountain ranges, streams and vegetation are usually found. Near the meridian of Hami, long. 94° E., the desert is narrowed to about 150 miles. The road from Kiayü kwan to Hami runs across this narrow part, and travellers find water at various places in their route. It divides Gobi into two parts--the desert of Lob-nor and the Great Gobi--the former being about 4,500 feet elevation, and the latter or eastern not higher than 4,000 feet. The borders of Kansuh now extend across this tract to the foot of the Tien shan. The eastern part, or Great Gobi, stretches from the eastern declivity of the Tien shan, in long. 94° to 120° E., and about lat. 40° N., as far as the Inner Hing-an. Its width between the Altai and the Ín shan range varies from 500 to 700 miles. Through the middle of this tract extends the depressed valley properly called Sha-moh, from 150 to 200 miles across, and whose lowest depression is from 2,600 to 2,000 feet above the sea. Sand almost covers the surface of this valley, generally level, but sometimes rising into low hills. The road from Urga to Kalgan, crossing this tract, is watered during certain seasons of the year, and clothed with grass. It is 660 miles, and forty-seven posts are placed along the route. The crow, lark, and sand-grouse are abundant on this road, the first being a real pest, from its pilfering habits. Such vegetation as occurs is scanty and stunted, affording indifferent pasture, and the water in the small streams and lakes is brackish and unpotable. North and south of the Sha-moh the surface is gravelly and sometimes rocky, the vegetation more vigorous, and in many places affords good pasturages for the herds of the Kalkas tribes. In those portions bordering on or included in Chihlí province, among the Tsakhars, agricultural labors are repaid, and millet, oats, and barley are produced, though not to a great extent. Trees are met with on the water-courses, but not to form forests. This region is called _tsau-ti_, or Grassland, and maintains large herds of sheep and cattle. It extends more or less northward towards Siberia. The Etsina is the largest inland stream in this division of Gobi, but on its north-eastern borders are some large tributaries of the Amur. On the south of the Sialkoi range the desert-lands reach nearly to the Chang-peh shan, about five degrees beyond those mountains. The general features of this portion of the earth’s surface are less forbidding than Sahara, but more so than the steppes of Siberia or the pampas of Buenos Ayres.