IIIF Color HighRes
National Institute of Informatics - Digital Silk Road Project
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| IIIF Color HighRes |
| Southern Tibet : vol.7 |
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Citation Information
316
Tibet, his verdict is certainly very unjust. Similar mistakes as those of the Schlagintweits have been made by all explorers, but no explorers of their time had promoted science to such a wide extent as they did. Rawlinson says:
It is true that they ascended the Kara-Koram pass and made a détour beyond the range in the direction of Khotan, which occupied them for twenty-six days and extended to about three hundred miles, but they seem to have been as unsuccessful both in observing and recording their observations, as they were bold in assigning positions on insufficient
evidence.
Sir Henry Rawlinson made a mistake himself in defending on insufficient evidence the theory of a plateau-land which could be travelled over by wheels from the Niti Pass to Khotan.' It is true that the Schlagintweits were mistaken in saying they were the first Europeans to cross the Kara-korum and Kwen-lun, as it had been done before both by YEFREMOFF and D ANIBEG. But this is a mere question of records, and I think very few geographers had ever heard the names of the two Russians. In the popular account of their journeys, HERMANN VON SCHL,AGINTWVEIT says everything that can be said of Danibeg.2 Sir Henry once more returns to the great features of the orography.
The whole country between India and Tartary may be considered as one broad mountain range , the Himalayas forming the southern crest , and the Kuen-Luen the northern ; while the interior is sometimes cheered with lovely valleys like Cashmere, but is more usually broken into rocky ravines, through which the affluents of the Indus force their way towards the plains, or else stretches away in those vast treeless uplands which are one of the chief characteristics of the range through its whole extent.
There is a northern »range» — the Tian-Shan.
According to Humboldt's system, which is still adopted generally as the groundwork of our maps of Asia, the northern and southern ranges were united to the west of Kashgar by a transverse ridge, which he names the Belût-Tagh, or ),Cloud Mountains); but recent observation assures us that there is no such separate connection chain.
At the S. E. extremity of Pamir the table-land is lost in the rocky summits of the Muz-tagh.
DIFFERENT VIEWS REGARDING KARA-KORUM IN THE YEARS 1871-1880.
' I don't know whether it was on account of this extraordinary view that statesmen once talked of a railway across the Kara-korum. Dr. E. SCHUYLER says: »Subsequently it was proposed, instead of M. de Lesseps' railway to Tashkent, Samarkand, Kabul, and Peshawur, to turn it eastward frone Tashkent to Khokand and Kashgar, and then over the Karakorum to Ladak, a work which would demand more engineering skill than any railway yet constructed. The divergence in views of the Russian and English Governments, with regards to Asiatic affairs and the character and political condition of some of the countries through which a railway to India must pass, will probably for a long time prevent the construction of any such railway, and therefore, so much of it as concerns India may be left out of the question.» Turkistan. Notes of a Journey in Russian Turkistan, Khokand, Bukhara and Kulr ja. Vol. I. London, 1876, p. 2 23.
2 Reisen in Indien und Hochasien. Vol. II, i 87 i, p. 6, and Vol. IV, 188o, p. 297. Richthofen says: es ist das Verdienst der Herren v. Schlagintweit, durch ihre Reise über den Pass hinweg nach dem wirklichen Zug des Kwen-lun die Trennung der beiden Gebirgszüge nachgewiesen zu haben. China, I, p. 228.
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