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0107 History of the Expedition in Asia, 1927-1935 : vol.1
History of the Expedition in Asia, 1927-1935 : vol.1 / Page 107 (Color Image)

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doi: 10.20676/00000210
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That these conditions were unacceptable was perfectly natural. ANDREWS was travelling for the account of a museum of natural science for the purpose of adding to its collections. If he was not to be allowed to keep the collections he made, his expedition would be meaningless. For why should his first-class experts work like slaves for the account of Chinese museums and at their own expense to boot! My aims were different. I was not collecting for any particular museum. It was enough for me that my palaeontologists collected, classified and published accounts of their finds to make them known to science. Whether the collections themselves landed up in Peking or Stockholm was a matter of secondary importance.

ANDREWS goes on to say that the treatment he received at the hands of the committee aroused such indignation all over the world that for the next, and last, year's (193o) campaign he succeeded in obtaining acceptable conditions. However, he limited his research activities to palaeontology, geology and topography.

Definition of the term »Central Asia»

Sinkiang and Russian Turkistan, Afghanistan, the Pamir, and the western part of Outer Mongolia are the parts of innermost Asia that in general should be understood in connection with the term »Central Asia ». The parts of Mongolia where ANDREWS'S expeditions were at work belong rather to the peripheral regions or, according to RICHTHOFEN'S division of the continent, to intermediate zones between Central Asia and the peripheral regions. »A New Conquest of Central Asia » is thus a title that covers only a rather small part of the area we refer to as »Central Asia ».

But whatever we may call the tracts that ANDREWS and his expeditions explored so thoroughly and so well, they none the less cover a vast extent of territory; and even if ANDREWS'S activities were cut short by the Chinese opposition they are in any case in themselves an organic and complete chapter of pioneering importance. The work carried out by ANDREWS, GRANGER and their comrades will always be accounted a milestone of the first order in the history of Asiatic exploration; and in the record of scientific geographic research their names are assured a permanent and honourable place.

Whether it was I who by yielding to the demands of the Chinese raised obstacles in the way of later foreign-led expeditions on Chinese soil, or whether it was the expeditions that immediately preceded mine that with their acquisitions of specimens in the fields of natural history, archaeology and art made it so difficult for me to come to an agreement with the Chinese is now of no practical consequence and is scarcely of any historical interest. What conditions may follow the establishment of a more or less stable peace we do not know. There are certainly no grounds for over-optimistic hopes.

As far as I myself am concerned, I never had occasion to regret my acceptance of the conditions laid down by the Chinese.

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