Only two travellers had visited the regions to which Sir MARTIN CONWAY carried his exploration, namely Colonel GODWIN-AUSTEN and Captain YOUNGHUSBAND. In the service of the Great Trigonometrical Survey of India Godwin-Austen visited the Kara-korum Mountains in 186o-61. He had crossed the Skoro-la, ascended the Baltoro Glacier and the Punmah Glacier to one of the Mus-tagh Passes. He had mounted five miles along the east bank of the Biafo from its snout, descended the Braldo River, went up the Basha valley, reached Nushik-la from the south, returned to Arundo, Shigar and Skardo. Younghusband in 1887 re-opened the disused Mustagh Pass, which gives access from the north to the basin of the Baltoro by way of the Piale tributary.
In 1892 Sir MARTIN CONWAY started for our regions, accompanied by M. MC CORMICK, M. ZURBRIGGEN, M. ROUDEBOUSH and Lieutenant C. G. BRUCE. In all he spent 84 days on snow and glacier, and explored in their whole length the three longest known glaciers in the world outside the polar regions. A comparison between Conway's map and the corresponding sheets of the Indian Atlas will show how much new ground he covered.'
After having explored the Samayar, Barpu and Shallihuru Glaciers he began the most important part of his work, from Hispar toward the east, and accomplished a glacial journey which for ever will be reckoned amongst the classical performances in Asia, — a journey the results of which have hardly since been surpassed. Every one of Conway's successors in this field have had to follow his maps and add detail to them. But Conway had no other map than the one compiled from Godwin-Austen's excellent observations, which, however, were very much misunderstood in the drafting room. From a glaciological point of view Conway was breaking up untrodden ground
I Climbing and Exploration in the Karakorum-Himalayas. London 1894. — Conway has also published many articles as, for instance : The Nomenclature of the Karakorum Peaks. Proc. Roy. Geogr.
Soc. Vol. XIV. 1892, p. 857•
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