Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1904-08-11
FEATURES OF MANcHURIA.
Roads in Rainy Season Are Impass-
abie-Rank Growth of
Sorghum

The valleys of the Liau and the Yalu
are separated by TIE great backbone
ridge of mountains, known by a variety
of names, which stretch from near Kali
ping to the neighborhood of Vladi-
vostok, the highest points within the
area of the present military operations
not exceeding 1000 feet.
Just as in the Alps, says a London
paper, we find short valleys and abrupt
descents on the side Of Italy and easier
gradient with long and divergent val
leys on that of France, so in these Man
churian mountains, although the dis
tinction is much less marked, the north
ern slopes are sleeper than the south
ern and often fall in p~recipitous de-
scents. These hills are for the most
part wooded, the forest zone extending
from near Kaiping all along the water
shed to the Long White mountain and
northeastern Corea- The southern
slopes are more cultivated than those of
the north and are, covered with the
debris of d~isintegrated granite rock,
lhiSo MI SGllSI, WdoACu UOWA lhIO IAC
valleys by the rains.
The woods vary in character in diff
ferent localities. In some places the
local woodmen and charcoal burners
have made clearings; in others the trees
and underground have been uncut for
years.
When We speak of roads in Man
churia we speak of things that scarcely
exist. Apart from the mountain dis
tricts the roads in southern Manchuria
have the popularity of being below the
level Of the adjoining and cultivated
land. The reason for this is that the
c%ultivators annually steal thousands of
cart loads of soil from the roads in Or
der to mix it with the farmyard manure,
and they especially favor the mudholes
in the roads, which offer a richer soil.
In consequence the tracks in the low
lying districts 60 from bad to worse,
until they become mere stretches of
stagnant water, and fresh tracks are
then made across the fields, becoming
roads in their turn. AS there are no di-
visions between properties, carts travel
freely owe the fields when they are
hard frozen in winter, but in spring
there is endless friction between farm
ers and carriers when the latter attempt
to traverse the newly sown fields to
avoid the mudholes.
From the middle of June until the
middle oP J,1p oil ooo, tro f3o ooocac
on the roads in the low districts and
only the smaller and lighter carts car
travel at all. From about July 1 to
September Is all traffic stops on these
roads, which then become practically
impossible for wheeled vehicles. Move
ment is then confined to the passage
of light carts and pack animals along
the mountain tracks, and this continues
until some time after the close of the
rainy season.
The Lao plain and some of the richer
valleys nea Liauyang and Haicheng
have large areas covered with the most
characteristic crop of the country
namely, k%ao-liang (tall grain), or r
ghum. This crop is planted in drills
two feet apart, each plant being from a
foot to IS inches from the next. 1t has
the appearance of maize and the crop
is earthed up like an English potato
field. Once the rains begin in earnest
the kao-liang grows rapidly and shoots
up to IL feet or Is in height, complete
ly covering even mounted troops from
view and resembling a sugar plantation,
When this moment ome the Chinese
footpad is in season and so perfect is
the cover that the local authorities
make no attempt to effect arrests until
after the harvest.
When fully grown the stems of the
kao-liang are rough and impede move
ment; the ground is usually wet and
soft; as the crop covers three-fourths
of the Liau valley, it renders all move
ments of troops next to impracticable
for two months. The chief of the other
crops in southern M%anchuria are the
small yellow millet, the stalks of which
make capital fodder for horses; dwarf
beans and a grass resembling small mil
let with white grains. In the Siuyep
valley only a little kao-liang is grown
In patches, but there are maize, cotton,
small millet and beans.