The peak of Palandöken is a well-defined feature; and equally prominent is the break-off in a cliff-like form of the high ground west of the village of Madrak. The outline of that high ground is continued for a long distance westwards (b, b), until it declines behind the ridges in the west. Between Bingöl and that outline, which we may call the Madrak line of heights, the land forms are insignificant and vague. It is that country of rolling downs at a great elevation over which we journeyed from Madrak to Kherbesor. I would ask my reader to observe how the ridges in the west die out into that extensive block of water-worn plateau. Let him follow the outline (c) from a somewhat pyramidal summit on the east of Sheikhjik; or let him notice, both in this drawing and in the one which I shall presently offer, the direction of the Sheikhjik ridge (a), and its tendency to extend into the watershed of the Araxes. West of Sheikhjik he sees quite a sea of ridges; but in the middle distance all the forms are flat and the surface even—the surface of the Bingöl plateau.
Bingöl! the thousand tarns—one grasps the significance of that poetical name at this season of the year. The feature is largely due to the peaty soil which has been deposited by the action of glaciers in ancient times. The lakes and pools which collect the meltings of the deep canopy of snow would be almost impossible to count. In the foreground, between Aghri Kala and the horn of the western cirque, lies such a conspicuous flash of blue water. I am inclined to regard this particular pool as the source of the Araxes; for although it be possible that one or other of the streams which rise outside the rampart may have a slightly longer course, this source is probably the most elevated of all. But the most interesting of all the features in the middle distance is the outline, as seen from behind, of the plateau itself (e, e). Its equality of surface is due to the liquid nature of the lava—a grey, basaltic augite-andesite—and not to flows of tuff. In the west it must fall away to a river valley, separating it from the sea of ridges in that quarter which we noticed from our first encampment on Bingöl. The outline in that direction is in some places the edge of a cliff; but at others it assumes a vaulted form. I shall presently show that this latter shape is due to rounded hills of serpentine, which have acted as a dam to the lavas. A hill of the same form is seen much further east, quite close to the western cirque. Although we did not examine this particular eminence, it is probable that it consists of the same old rock, representing the former configuration of the land. The Bingöl plateau merges insensibly into the highlands of Tekman, and the collective figure may be known for geographical purposes as the Central Tableland.
But that long break-off upon the west to a river valley—with the wild ranges, a solecism in the landscape, towering up upon its further side—is such a strange and fascinating characteristic that, even apart from its great geographical significance, it merits careful study upon the spot. Let me therefore take my reader a distance of many miles and place him upon the summit of a lofty hill at the head of that valley, just west of the village of Gugoghlan. The position is clearly indicated in my sketch from Bingöl Kala, and forms the standpoint of my second sketch ([Fig. 195]). The hill itself is built up of limestone—probably Eocene—overlying serpentine, and capped by recent lava. On the left of the picture you see in perspective the Bingöl rampart, with Bingöl Kala rising boldly at its western end. You observe the serpentine hills damming up the lavas in two separate zones. The break-off of the Bingöl plateau is now exposed in face, and a conspicuous feature are the cliffs which it forms (e). The head waters of the Araxes are fanning towards us in pronounced cañons, deflected at first by the one zone of serpentines, and a little further by the second zone. But it is the general level of the plateau surface which in fact determines their new direction, and prevents them flowing into the basin of the Euphrates. And this level is due to the massing of the lavas against the bases of the serpentine hills.
Deep down in the valley below you meanders the Merghuk Su, on its way to the Murad. It soon winds away from its almost southern course, to thread the ranges, which already commence to rise from its right bank, with a direction which will probably average south-west. What a contrast between these ridges and the plateau on the east! They have the appearance of stepping up to its very margin, for their axis is about west-south-west and east-north-east. Tier upon tier they rise, one behind another, extending into the far horizon on the south-west. Their eastern limit, as seen in the perspective of the drawing, is the bold mass, like a sentinel, of Sheikhjik. But north of that mountain you observe the gentler outlines (b and c) which were so prominent in the last sketch. The abrupt ending of the outline b—the Madrak line of heights—figures as boldly in this landscape as in that from the summit of Bingöl. And the way in which both outlines die away into the block of the tableland is not less clearly and unmistakably defined.
I might write many pages were I to pursue this subject further; I must content myself with a statement in a very summary form of the conclusions at which I arrived. In the first place it is misleading, and indeed it is incorrect, to speak of a meridional line of elevation with orographical significance as connecting Palandöken with Bingöl. It is strange that such a practised observer as the great Abich should have fallen into such a grave error.[7] The lessons which may be derived from the landscape of this important region may, in this connection, be grouped under two heads.
In the first place the fundamental line of elevation is that almost latitudinal line with which we are so familiar, and which may be specified as a west-south-west—east-north-east line. The lie of the country is determined in the principal degree by the strike of the stratified rocks. Between Bingöl and Palandöken the ridges in the west tend to die out into a single block of elevated land. Further east this central tableland becomes split up, and gives rise to mountains rising on the margin of lake-like plains. Such mountains are represented in a striking manner by the Akh Dagh; and we have already observed the commencement of this transition in the outline a, as seen from Bingöl Kala. But the country on the east still maintains its essentially plateau-like character; while the region on the west and south-west of Sheikhjik and the hill of Gugoghlan is continued in all its wildness between the two branches of the Euphrates, into the districts of Kighi and Terjan. The great height of the ridges points to the conclusion that, in addition to the activity of denuding agencies, they owe their characteristics to a more pronounced or less impeded operation of the forces which have determined the elevation of the country as a whole.
In the next place it appears plain that, although volcanic action has no doubt been a factor of considerable importance in producing the level surface of the districts on the north, south, and east, the tendency to a strongly pronounced plateau country is independent of such action. A striking example of this tendency on a very large scale may be derived from the manner in which the outlines north of Gugoghlan mass together and die out into the region of Tekman. Throughout this country, as elsewhere in Armenia, the lava streams have played an important part, and have done more than any actual lines of volcanic mountain-making to determine the drainage of the land.
A little incident of our stay on Bingöl may deserve to be recorded, if only because it furnished us with an opportunity of admiring the vast extent and strange brilliance of the heaven above us during a whole summer’s night. On the last day of our visit we gave orders to our people to move our encampment across the rampart into the western cirque. Oswald and I, accompanied by two or three zaptiehs, proceeded to the eastern extremity of the principal ridge, and remained there, mapping and drawing, until near sunset. Before it commenced to grow dark we descended into the eastern cirque; but the light had already faded before we could surmount the ridge from Kara Kala, and we became involved among its crags and stones. For nearly an hour we groped our way, leading our horses, and coming near to breaking their legs. When we obtained a view over the snow-sheet and the tumbled bosses in the western cirque, we searched in vain for any sign of our camp-fire. By the light of a crescent moon we proceeded to the margin of the snow at the foot of the cliff on the north of the basin. Even from this eminence we could not discover any sign. We then rode down the cirque, towards the open country; still not a trace of our people. The zaptiehs endeavoured to discharge their rifles; and one man accomplished the feat after several misfires. We ourselves filled the air with the reports of our revolvers; but no answering signal came. We were surprised at the absence of any Kurdish encampment in the neighbourhood of the mountain. There was not a glimmer of the lights of a yaila near or far. Was the tale of the frequency of such summer-quarters on Bingöl a fable, or had the Kurds been scared away by the dread of Suleyman Pasha, who might require them to make some show for his paper regiments? Or had we courted an attack by dividing our forces, and were our servants and our papers and our baggage at the mercy of thieves?
It was clearly not to much purpose debating such questions; we had no alternative but to pass the night where we stood. Both were clothed in the thinnest of garments; but our zaptiehs lent us their overcoats, of such material as they were. We established ourselves within a circle of loose boulders, which had probably been reared by shepherds as a pen. The wind came sighing down from the snowfield in the cirque, and blew through the apertures of the low wall. Our poor horses shivered and starved. Oswald and I attempted sleep under the partial cover of a small camp table which we had with us for our mapping. It was to no purpose, for our limbs became numb. Meanwhile the moon had vanished; but the heaven was still alight; one could scarcely see the stars to greater advantage than from the open flats of such a lofty platform. These last nights we had been observing the advances of Jupiter to Venus—a stately and not too intimate intercourse, as becomes gods and stars. Venus, the most engrossing of all the dwellers in the firmament, a true mother of the inhabitants of heaven, had been receiving the somewhat distant approaches of Jupiter, and the wooer had almost mingled with his bride. To-night they had travelled apart—we reflected upon the mournful omen, with something of the impertinence of the astrologers of old who presumed to connect the operations of the celestial bodies with the puny fate of a kingdom or a king. Pacing to and fro, we realised the paradox of perfect discomfort and keen pleasure. One of our zaptiehs appeared to encompass the same result by surrendering his senses to quite an orgy of ecstatic prayer. When at last the suffused splendour of the Milky Way became pale, and the first flush of dawn was thrown over the dim land forms, we emerged from our flimsy harbour and rode towards the west. A little later horsemen were seen, coming towards us at a dangerous speed over the sheet of snow and the rocky ground in the south. They proved to be our escort, wild with excitement, and quite speechless when they arrived. It is strange that none of the natives have the smallest conception of locality; they had encamped miles away from the appointed place. They had been riding all night in quest of their charge, and had by fortune, as a last chance, extended their search to the scarcely ambiguous position of our prescribed tryst.
