File:Stories of persons and places in Europe (1887) (14597225307).jpg

Identifier: storiesofpersons00bene (find matches)
Title: Stories of persons and places in Europe
Year: 1887 (1880s)
Authors: Benedict, E. L. (from old catalog)
Subjects:
Publisher: New York, London, G. Routledge and sons
Contributing Library: The Library of Congress
Digitizing Sponsor: The Library of Congress

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she came up withVazuza and looked at her so angrily that Vazuza was frightened andbesought Volga to take her in her arms and bear her to the Caspian. So tothis day Vazuza is the first to awaken in the spring, but Volga overtakesher and carries her to the Caspian. A Great Salt Lake.—As the Volga nears the end of its journey itpasses through a wide sandy plain, shelving gradually to the borders of theCaspian and continues there, under the water, its gentle slope, down to nearlyone-third of the length of the sea. Where the Caucasian Mountains strikethe sea at Cape Apsheron, there the plain breaks, and the bottom of the seabecomes at once deeper and uneven. The dry part of the plain—the steppecountry—contains quantities of salt and sea shells mixed with the sand,showing that it has once been a part of the bed of the sea. But why shouldthe water have dried away, when all the while the Volga, the Ura, and severalsmaller rivers, are pouring into it such immense volumes of water that it
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18 Persons and Places in Europe. would seem as if it must overflow instead of drying up ? Because the highwinds and the heat of the sun carry away by evaporation more than therivers can bring in. The process can be seen going on all around thenorthern borders of the Caspian, where there is a thick fringe of narrowinlets, each extending for some distance inland and spreading out into ashallow ):>an—a natural evaporator. In some of these there is considerablewater and only a thin layer of salt around the banks ; in others there is lesswater and a thick pavement of salt all over the bottom and about the sides;in others the waters has disappeared entirely and the salt bed is coveredwith sand. This is already a part of the steppe. East of the Caspian is an immense salt pan, into which, by a narrowchannel, the water is constantly running from the sea, and spreading out todry. It is thought that fully three hundred and fifty thousand tons of saltis carried out of the Caspian every year

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