Note 4 — Chapter XXXVIII · THE SHILKA.

Here the Shilka ends its course of 700 miles, and is joined by the Argun, after a course of 1,000 miles. The Argun proper rises among the Nertchinsk ore mountains, at an elevation of from 2,000 to 3,000 feet, and very near to the source of the Onon, the two streams running down the northern and southern slopes respectively of the mountain-range. The upper part of the Argun, however, rises as the Kerulen to the south-east of Kiakhta, in the Kentai (or Khangai) mountains. For 550 miles the Kerulen traverses one of the most inhospitable tracts of the Gobi. It then runs through the Dalai Nor or Lake, and flows into the Argun proper, by which name the lower course of the river is known; and then, after flowing 420 miles further, it joins the Shilka at Ust-Strelka.