others directing the course of rivers, either to the Tsanpu or through the gorges of the Southern Range. Most of the region between the Central and Southern Ranges is within the territory of Tibet. Much of our knowledge of this part of the country is still dependent on the map compiled by D’Anville in 1783, from the survey of the Lamas, and the rest is mainly derived from native explorers.
To the eastward, in an entirely unknown country, the Central Range is drained by numerous tributaries of a great river, called the Lopra-cachu, which appear to break through the Southern Range and reach the plains of Assam, under the name of the Subanshiri, or Lohit. In this eastern part of the Central Range is also situated that remarkable lake of Palti, Peiti, or Yamdok-chu, which is delineated by D’Anville as surrounding a large central island, like a moat encircling a castle. But the western shore alone has been described, and Mr. Manning is the only Englishman who has ever seen it. Both he and the Pundit of 1866 describe it as being separated from the valley of the Tsanpu by a range of mountains, called the Khamba-la,[1] a spur from the Central Range; and the Pundit adds, that the lake has no outlet. Our information respecting Lake Palti will be found condensed in a note to Mr. Manning’s narrative at page 244.
To the westward of the Lopra-cachu basin there appears to be a high saddle, connecting the Central and Southern Ranges, for the river of Painam, already referred to, flows north from the Chumalhari Peak to the Tsanpu, forcing its way through the Central Range.
Farther westward our principal informant respecting the Central Range, and the region between it and the Southern Himdlayas, is Colonel Montgomerie’s explorer of 1871, known as No. 9.
West of the Painam basin various lofty spurs from the
- ↑ The Chinese geographers, quoted by Klaproth, name the Khamba-la as on the boundary between the provinces of U and Tsang.
