observations. We had many long conversations together, and I remember being particularly struck with a remark of his regarding the feeling between the French and the Germans. He said that neither he nor the majority of Frenchmen desired to bring on a war with Germany, but that if the Germans ever brought a war on he would at once enlist as a private soldier. In the Franco-German war he had served as an officer.
Having secured the necessary transport, M. de Rhins, with his companion, set out for Tibet. Macartney and I rode out of the town with them, and we parted with many assurances of goodwill, and after making arrangements to meet one day in Paris. I afterwards received a couple of letters from M. de Rhins, from Tibet ; but he never returned from there. He was attacked by Tibetans, his arms were bound to his body with ropes, and he was thrown into a river and drowned ; and so died one of the most hardy, plucky, and persevering of explorers whom France has sent out. Three years after leaving Kashgar his companion, M. Grenard, returned to Paris, and is now engaged in publishing the results of the journey.
These were our visitors, but we had also the company of a permanent European resident in Kashgar, Père Hendriks, the Dutch missionary, whom I had met here in 1887, and who still remains there. Regularly every day he used to come round for a chat and walk with us, and even now he writes to me every few months. His is lonely and uphill work, and he often appeared pressed down by the weight of obstacles which beset his way. But his enthusiasm and hopefulness were unbounded, and no kinder-hearted man exists. Many of his methods of conversion used to surprise me, and he certainly was not viewed with favour by the Russian authorities ; but he was a man who had travelled much and studied much, and he was ready to talk in any language, from Mongol to English, and upon any subject, from the geological structures of the Himalayas, to his various conflicts with the Russian authorities. It would astonish people
IIIFカラー高解像度
