120

VERNA.L JOURNEY TO ASTRAKHAN-

and there alfo, befides the Aßragalus tragoides y the Iris junc't-folla * fiourifhed exuberantly.

We were obliged to fufFer the inconvenience of the fand tiliwe reached Baranova Vataga ; as we wifhed to continue the reftof our journey along the fhore of the Volga to Lebälhie, or theout-poft of the fwans, which is twenty-four verfts diftantfrom Samyangorodok. We purfued our route the fame dayto Solänka, and fiept in a place fituated oppofite Aftrakhan.

Below Lebäfhie there are deep hillocks of quickfand, thebafes of which rife but a little above the furface of the Volga.Between thefe we obferved in different places a faline foil,covered with a white incruftation of falt, about one-eighth ofan inch thick. In the dells between the hillocks we obfervedthe willow and the tamarifk, as well as the Aßragalus tragoides ywhich blooms in all parts of this neighbourhood, and has longluxuriant fiower-ftalks, owing to the moiftnefs of the foil.

The incruftations above mentioned, firft afforded by cryftal-lization a beautiful Glauber's falt, with an alkaline bafis ; andthe mother lye contained a digeftive falt, fuperfaturated withalkali, which was not fufceptible of a cryftalline form.

On the 25t.l1 I was ferried over the Solänka, as its bridge hadbeen carried away by the fiood; and thence I proceeded in aboat on the Volga to Aftrakhan.

All that I have to fay of that important place, the principalfeat of our Afiatic commerce, and the general magazine of fifhfor the whole Rufllan empire in Europe, with my obfervations

* Iris tenuifolia, •oarietas ? Pallas's Travels, Part üi. Supplement, page 714.N. 66. Plate C Fig. 2.

and