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THE KHINGAN AND IN-SIIAN HIGHLANDS.
bling at every sound. The largest mammal in the Gohi is the dzeren, or Antilope
gutturosa, an animal probably unsurpassed for speed. Even when mortallywounded,
or with a broken leg, he will outstrip the fleetest horse, and such is his tenacity of
life that unless the bullet pierce his head, heart, or spine, he always escapes capture.
The herd consists usually of thirty or forty head, although they are occasionally
met in flocks of several hundreds, and even a thousand. Of birds the most common
are the vulture, which follows in the wake of the caravan, and the raven,
which will boldly perch on the camel's hump and draw its life-blood. Above the
grassy steppe hovers the lark, endowed with as sweet a song as the European
species, and also possessing the faculty of imitating the notes of other songsters. The
reedy marshes and lakes harbour multitudes of duck, which migrate in winter to
South China.
THE KHINGAN AND IN-SHAN HIGHLANDS.
Eastwards the Gobi is limited by uplands, which have not yet been thoroughly
explored, but which are known to form a long frontier range rising
Fig. 41. SOUTH-EAST CORNER OF THE MONGOLIA* PLATEAU.
Arcoi ding to FriUchc. Scale 1 : 3,600,000.
CO Miles.
above the
Manchurian plains, and the lower steppe lands commonly called the East, or Little
(jobi. Tliis is (he Khingan chain, which stretches northwards to the Argun
(Amur), and which deflects this river towards the parallel Stanovoi ranges. Accord-
ing to I'Yitsclit; none of the crests exceed ,s,:joi) fret, ilnis I'allinjr short- of the snow-
line. In tho last century the missionaries (jrerbilloa and Verbiest had spoken of