YAK, the wild (and domesticated) ox of the Tibetan plateau; a species nearly allied to the bison group. The yak, Bos (Pöephagus) grunniens, is one of the finest and largest of the wild oxen, characterized by the growth of long shaggy hair on the flanks and under parts of the body and the well-known bushy tail. In Europe a false impression of the yak is prevalent, owing to the fact that all the specimens imported have belonged either to a small domesticated breed from Darjiling, or to half-breeds; the latter being generally black and white, instead of the uniform black of the pure-bred and wild animal. None of such half-breeds can compare with the magnificent half-tamed animals kept by the natives of the elevated Rupsu plateau, S. of the Indus, where they afford the only means of transport by this route between Ladak and India. But even these are inferior to the wild yak, which stands nearly 6 ft. at the shoulder, and is absolutely confined to the arid central plateau of Tibet. Yak have the great disadvantage that they will not eat corn, and the large pure-bred animals will not live at low elevations. The tails are used in India as fly-whisks, under the name of chowris. The title of “grunting ox” properly belongs only to the domesticated breed.
Domesticated Yak, Bos (Pöephagus) grunniens.
YAKUB KHAN (1849-), ex-amir of Afghanistan, son of the amir Shere Ali, was born in 1849. He showed great ability at an early age, and was made governor of Herat by his father, but broke into open rebellion against him in 1870, and was imprisoned in 1874 in Kabul. However, when Shere Ali in 1878 fled before the British, he handed over the government to Yakub, who, on his father's death in the following February, was proclaimed amir, and signed a treaty of peace with the British at Gandamak. He agreed to receive a British resident, and was in turn to receive a subsidy and support against foreign attack. But in September of the same year his revolted troops attacked the British residency, and the resident, Sir Louis Cavagnari, and his staff and suite were cut to pieces. This outrage was instantly avenged, for in October Earl (then Sir Frederick) Roberts with a large force defeated the Afghans on the 6th and took possession of Kabul on the 12th. Yakub Khan thereupon abdicated, took refuge in the British camp, and was sent to India on the 13th of December.
YAKU-SHIMA, an island belonging to Japan, lying S. of Kiushiu, in 30° 30′ N. and 130° 30′ E. It is an irregular pentagon, 14 m. in width and the same in length. It is separated from Tanega-shima by the Vincennes Strait (Yaku-kaikyô), 12¼ m. wide, and its surface is broken by lofty mountains, of which Yae-dake rises to a height of 6515 ft., and Eboshi-dake to a height of 4840 ft. It is covered with dense forest, in which are some of the finest cryptomeria in Japan, known as Yaku-sugi.
YAKUTSK, a province of E. Siberia, including nearly the whole of the basin of the Lena, and covering an area of 1,530,253 sq. m. It has the Arctic Ocean on the N., the governments of Yeniseisk and Irkutsk on the W., and Irkutsk and Amur on the S., and is separated from the Pacific (Sea of Okhotsk) by the narrow Maritime Province. The Vitim plateau, 2500 to 3500 ft. in altitude, bordered on the S.E. by the Stanovoi Mountains, occupies the S.E. portion of the province. Its moist, elevated valleys, intersected by ranges of flat, dome-shaped hills, which rise nearly 1000 ft. above the plateau, form an immense desert of forest and marsh, visited only by Tungus hunters, save in the S.W., where there are a few gold-mining settlements. The high border-ridge of the plateau (see Siberia) stretches from the South Muya Mountains towards the N.E., thus compelling the river Aldan to make a great bend in that direction. An alpine country skirts the plateau all along its N.W. margin, and contains productive gold-mines in the spurs between the Vitim and the Lena. The latter stream drains the outer base of this alpine region. It is a wild land, traversed by several chains of mountains, all having a N.E. strike, and intersected by deep, narrow valleys, down which the mountain-streams tumble uncontrolled. The whole is clothed with dense forests, through which none but the Tunguses can find their way. The summits of the mountains, 4000 to 6000 ft., mostly rise above the limits of tree vegetation, but in no case pass the snow-line. The summits and slopes alike are strewn with débris of crystalline rock, mostly hidden under thick incrustations of lichens, amid which the larch alone is able to find sustenance. Birch and aspen grow on the lower slopes; and in the narrow valley bottoms thickets of poplar and willow or patches of grass spring up on the scanty alluvium. All the necessaries of life for the gold-diggings have to be shipped from Irkutsk down the Lena, and deposited at entrepôts, whence they are transported in winter by means of reindeer to their destination. A line drawn from the mouth of the Vitim N.E. towards that of the Aldan separates the mountain regions from the elevated plains (1500 to 2000 ft.) which fringe the highlands all the way from the upper Lena to Verkhne-Kolymsk, and probably to the mouth of the Kolyma. Vast meadows, sometimes marshy, extend over these plains in the S.W.; farther N. mosses and lichens are the predominant vegetation. The surface is much furrowed by rivers and diversified by mountain-chains (Verkhoyansk, Kolymsk and Alazeya) about the real character of which little is known. Beyond the elevated plains vast tundras, carpeted with mosses and lichens, stretch to the shores of the ice-bound ocean.
The Arctic coast is indented by several bays—Borkhaya and Yana E. of the Lena delta, and Omulakh, Kolyma and Chaun still farther E. The islands fall into three groups—the Lyakhov, the Anjou or New Siberian and the De Long Islands. The Medvyezhie (Bear) Islands off the Kolyma and the two Ayun Islands in Chaun Bay are merely littoral. Wrangel Land seems to be the outer island of a great and as yet unknown archipelago. Every year a narrow passage close to the coast is left almost free of ice, enabling a ship or two sometimes to reach the estuary of the Yenisei, or even the delta of the Lena.
The great artery of Yakutsk, the Lena, rises on the W. slope of the Baikal Mountains, close to Lake Baikal. About 60° N. it receives from the right its first great tributary, the Vitim (1250 m. in length), which is navigable by steamers in its lower course. The Olekma (700 m.) is navigable only in the very lowest part of its course, and the Aldan (1155 m.) is navigated from Ust-Maysk. On the left is the Vilyui (1300 m.), which has an immense drainage area on the lower plains, and has been navigated since 1887. The lower course of the Lena is subject to terrible inundations when the ice breaks up on its upper reaches. The Olenek (1200 m.), which enters the Arctic Ocean to the W. of the Lena, is also a considerable river; the Yana (750 m.), Indigirka (950) and Kolyma (1100) all rise in the mountain region between 61° and 62° N., and flow N. and N.E. into the Arctic Ocean.
The granites, granitic syenites and gneisses of the high plateau are wrapped about by a variety of crystalline slates, Huronian and Laurentian; and Silurian and Devonian limestones and sandstones extend over vast areas. Farther N. the Carboniferous, Cretaceous and Jurassic formations are spread over a wide region, and the whole is covered with Glacial deposits in the highlands and with post-Glacial elsewhere. The mineral wealth of Yakutsk is very great; but gold and salt (obtained from springs) only are worked. Coal has been discovered on the Vilyui and on the lower Lena.
Yakutsk has unparalleled extremes of cold and heat. At
