Directory_and_Chronicle_1850 — Page 328

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Notices of the Sagalien River.

JUNE,

ledge on all these matters in the vast basin of the Sagalien is exceeding- ly meagre and doubtful. This whole region lies on the northeastern slope of the table land of Central Asia, and this river carries off most of the superfluous waters between the Desert of Cobi and the Pacific, north of the Ala-shán and Corea; while at the same time it affords the means of knowing more of its geographical features and the nature of its productions.

The headwaters of the Sagalien rise in the Burkan-kaldun or Kentei mountains,

a spur of the Altai, which branching off southerly from the main chain, east of the R. Selenga, forms the watershed between the central and eastern parts of the Plateau on its northern side, and const.tutes the boundary between the Tsetsen and Túchétú khanates. The two streams which flow from the Kentei Mts. take their rise nearly in the same meridian (109° E.), about 120 miles from each other, the Onon

being on the north side

喀魯倫河

near the Russian frontier, and the Kerlon on the south. This region is celebrated in Mongolian history as the place of

the birth and early life of Genghis khan (see d'Ohsson's Histoire des Mongols, Vol. I. page 30). The Onon runs easterly for about 160 miles, and then northeast for nearly 320 miles, mostly in Russian territory, till it joins the Ingoda at Goroditch, in long. 115°, 80 miles above the town of Nertchinsk.

In this part of its course, it receives the Kioursou

, the Agoumtza, the Onon-borzia, the Ounda, the Aga, and many smaller streams, nearly all of which are north of the Chinese frontier. The Ingoda rises in the mountain range which incloses the basin of Lake Baikal on the east, and after running almost due north to the town of Tchitinsk, collecting the drainings on its eastern declivities, it turns eastward, receiving the contributions of the Tchita and Qu- rioun țui rivers, in a course of about 400 miles, and joins the Onon. Their united waters take the name of the Shilka, and flow in a north- eastern direction for 250 miles to long. 121° E., and lat. 53° 23′ N., at Fort Baklanova. The Shilka is joined by the river Nertcha, at the town of Nertchinsk, and by the Tcherna at the town of Koularsk, about 175 miles further east. From this point to its junction with the Arguni it forms the boundary between the Chinese and Russian empires.

The other great source of the Sagalien, called the Kerlon, is larger than the Onon. It rises in about lat. 48° in a part of the Kentai Mts. lying east of the town of Kurun, called the Bayencharuk

集魯克山:: along whose eastern sides it flows south and southeast