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174
ASIATIC RUSSIA.

Muk-su, which is formed by three head-streams, one of which is fed by a glacier over a mile broad, and at its lower extremity about 100 feet thick. The Sel-su valley is filled by a still larger glacier, at least 10 miles long, which Oshanin, the first explorer of this region, has named after the celebrated traveller Fedchenko.

Fig. 90—Routes of Explorers in the Western Pamir.
According to Krapotkin. Scale 1 : 3,600,000.
60 Miles.

West of the Alaï, where all the parallel chains converge in a snowy plateau sending down glaciers to the surrounding cirques, the two parallel Zarafshan and Hissar ranges are also pierced by river valleys. But here the chains begin to branch off like a fan, gradually falling towards the plains, where they reappear here and there in isolated rocky eminences. Between Samarkand and Hissar some