Note 2 — Chapter XVIII · ROUND NIMRUD BY LAKE NAZIK

From Tadvan we directed our course towards the head of Mush plain across the volcanic plateau west of Lake Van.2 Our track conducted us past a projecting outwork of the opposite range, well wooded and consisting of mica-schist. The extremity towards Nimrud is faced with lava. You mount gradually above the fertile surroundings of the lake to arid and, therefore, sterile ground. A few patches of burnt grass, some beautiful hollyhocks, with very large white flowers, are about the only vegetation which it supports. On the right hand rises the Kerkür Dagh, covered with flourishing brushwood, and, behind Kerkür, the immense mass of the Nimrud crater. In the opposite direction the barrier of the Kurdish mountains is less bold and imposing than at other points. This is partly, no doubt, due to the flooding against them of volcanic matter. The plateau attains its highest level at about a third of the whole distance from the point where we gained its surface to the head of Mush plain. The altitude by boiling-point was 6320 feet, or 680 feet above Lake Van.