timately connected. In these two parts will be found descriptions by each of the scientifically schooled members of the main features of their journeys and their essential scientific results. These parts were also to have included the résumés of Professor Yu ur and Dr PARKER C. CHEN; but owing to the interruption of postal communications by the war we shall probably have to leave them over for the time being. Meantime, we hope that the monographs promised by these two Chinese members will in due course enter into our series. These five parts thus form a whole in themselves, and will thus enable such universities, academies, libraries and geographical societies as cannot afford to acquire all of the projected fifty-five volumes to get a clear survey both of the history of the expedition and of its results.
The material upon which the History of the Expedition is based is fairly comprehensive. The first three chapters I wrote especially for this book in 1939, from my diaries for the period. The subsequent description, from page 75, has been taken partly from the eighty-three letters I wrote in the course of the journey for newspapers and journals, and partly from my detailed letters home; and finally, also, from the six popular works I published during and after the expedition. The description of the years 193o, 1931 and 1932, that I spent in Peking, Stockholm and Chicago, is for the most part based upon diaries and letters.
When, not least on account of failing sight, I found it too much of a task to go through and sift the rich material and from the various original documents select what was essential for this historical account, I addressed myself to my faithful fellow-traveller and friend, FOLKE BERGMAN, and gained his help. As I have mentioned above, he had been with us during the whole expedition. He was familiar with the situation as was no other, and he loved innermost Asia, its desolate and majestic scenery, its many languages and the life on unknown paths. I have fully approved the selection he has made from the scattered sources. The result of FOLKE BERGMAN'S laborious and time-consuming work is an even, easily read and clear account of the course of the expedition. Without his aid these three parts could never have seen the light, for no other, either within or — and still less — outside our staff could with such expert knowledge and criticism have selected and brought together the essential features of our great enterprise. I cannot thank him warmly enough for his valuable and sterling cooperation.
Even if this History of the Expedition is thus a mosaic, the innumerable pieces of which have been selected by BERGMAN from notes and books earlier written by myself, it is none the less thanks to him that the work is as complete as it is, for he has on repeated occasions drawn my attention to details that I had either forgotten or misapprehended. He has also made a number of additions in the form of notes, signed with his initials, F. B.
The translation into English has been carried out by Mr DONALD BURTON, Stockholm, in a most careful and accurate way.
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