As we advanced, the country became more fertile and less mountainous, until at length, we reached the vast and magnificent pasturage of Koukou-Noor. There vegetation is so vigorous, that the grass rose up to the stomachs of our camels. Soon we discovered, far before us, quite in the horizon, what seemed a broad silver riband, above which floated light vapours that, rising, became lost in the azure of the heavens. Our pro-cameleer informed us that this was the Blue Sea. His words filled us with a tremulous joy; we urged on our animals, and the sun had not set when we planted our tent within a hundred paces of the waters of the great Lake. [Picture: Leaf of the Tree of Ten Thousand Images] [Picture: The Blue Sea] CHAPTER IV. Aspect of the Koukou-Noor—Tribes of Kolos—Chronicle of the Origin of the Blue Sea—Description and March of the Great Caravan—Passage of the Pouhain Gol—Adventures of the Altère-Lama—Character of our pro-cameleer—Mongols of Tsaidam—Pestilential Vapours of the Bourhan-Bota—Ascent of the Chuga and Bayen-Kharat mountains—Wild Cattle—Wild Mules—Men and Animals killed with the Cold—Encounter with Brigands—Plateau of Tant-La—Hot Springs—Conflagration in the Desert—Village of Na-Ptchu—Sale of Camels, and Hiring of Long-tailed Oxen—Young Chaberon of the Kingdom of Khartchin—Cultivated Plains of Pampou—Mountain of the Remission of Sins—Arrival at Lha-Ssa. The Blue Lake, in Mongol Koukou-Noor, in Thibetian Tsot-Ngon-Po, was anciently called by the Chinese Si-Haï (Western Sea); they now call it Tsing-Haï (Blue Sea). This immense reservoir of water, which is more than a hundred leagues in circumference, seems, in fact, to merit the title of sea, rather than merely that of lake. To say nothing of its vast extent, it is to be remarked that its waters are bitter and salt, like those of the ocean, and undergo, in a similar manner, flux and reflux. The marine odour which they exhale is smelt at a great distance, far into the desert. Towards the western portion of the Blue Sea there is a small island, rocky and bare, inhabited by twenty contemplative Lamas, who have built thereon a Buddhist temple, and some modest habitations, wherein they pass their lives, in tranquil retirement, far from the distracting disquietudes of the world. No one can go and visit them, for, throughout the entire extent of the lake, there is not a single boat of any kind to be seen; at all events we saw none, and the Mongols told us that among their tribes no one ever thought of occupying himself in any way or degree with navigation. In the winter, indeed, at the time of the more intense cold, the water is frozen solidly enough to enable the shepherds around to repair in pilgrimage to the Lamasery. They bear to the contemplative Lamas their modest offerings of butter, tea, and tsamba, and receive in exchange, benedictions and prayers for good pasturage and prosperous flocks.