China and the Salween to the Bay of Bengal, while the Mekong, crossing Laos and Cambodia, after a somewhat devious course of at least two thousand miles reaches the Cochin-China delta.
The broken character of the Laos country gives the Mekong in its rapid descent from plateau to plateau during its upper course the velocity of a mountain-torrent as it tears along, with a noise like the roaring of the sea, through deep gorges overshadowed by rocky defiles. In Upper Laos the river is from six to eight hundred feet wide, and has in the dry season an average depth of twenty feet, while the banks are some twenty-five feet above the water, the difference between the ordinary height and flood-*mark being very great. The rainy season begins in April with the melting snow; the water rises gradually from that time to July or August, when the country is flooded.
It was at Garnier's suggestion that the great French commission of exploration was sent up this river through Laos and Yunnan to Thibet, 1866-68. Garnier being considered too young, the chief command was entrusted to Captain Doudart Lagrée. De Carné (the brilliant journalist of the Deux Mondes) formed a third, and an armed escort accompanied them. The pluck and resolute endurance of this gallant band of Frenchmen, who during two years of exposure and hardships toiled over some five thousand
