Rensselaer Republican, Volume 18, Number 31, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 April 1886 — Salt Lakes. [ARTICLE]

Salt Lakes.

In the Murghab Valley, Afghanistan, are two lakes of solid salt, which Captain Yate has ridden oyer and described. One, from which the Tekke-Turko-mans of Merv get their supplies of salt, is in a valley about six miles square, which is surrounded by a steep, almost precipitous descent, impassable for baggage-animals except by a single road. The bed of the lake, which is about 1,430 feet above the sea, is one solid mass of hard salt, perfectly level and covered by only an inch or- two of water. To ride over it was like riding over ice or cement. The bottom was covered with a slight sediment, but when that was scraped away the pure white salt shone out below. No one has ever got to the bottom of the deposit. The second lake is the one from which the Saryks of Penjdeh take their salt and is about 800 feet above the sea. The salt in this lake is not so smooth as in the other one and does not look so pure. It is dug out in flakes or strata, generally of some four inches in thickness and is loaded into bags and carried off for apfle without further preparation. ~