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Digital Archive of Toyo Bunko Rare Books

PREFACE

IN the introductory remarks prefixed to this Memoir I have endeavoured to indicate briefly the objects and methods which guided me in the surveys of my three Central-Asian journeys and in the preparation of the maps which contain their final cartographical record. It only remains for me to acknowledge with gratitude my manifold obligations for the effective help which alone rendered possible the topographical tasks bound up with my explorations.

That I was able to plan and carry out those tasks was due to the fact that the Survey of India, accustomed ever since its inception to serve the interests of

   Help of Survey of   geographical research, not only within the vast area forming its own

India.   a b P   ~   Y   forming

sphere of activity but also beyond the borders of India, supported from the start my aims with the means best suited for them. In Chapter I, dealing with the history of our surveys, I have had occasion fully to note the services rendered by the experienced Indians whom the various Surveyor Generals deputed with me, and the extent of the help which I received by the provision of instruments, equipment and funds to meet the cost of their employment. To the Survey of India was due also the compilation and publication of the results brought back by our joint efforts from each successive journey.

The topographical results thus secured have not only helped me to make my journeys directly profitable for geographical study, they have also greatly facilitated my arehæological explorations in regions which, though largely desolate today in their physical aspects, have yet played a very important part in the history of Asia and its ancient civilizations. But apart from the gratitude I owe for this furtherance of my researches, the fact of my having been able to work in direct contact with the oldest of the scientific departments of India will always be remembered by me with deep satisfaction.

Ever since in 1899 the proposals for my first Central-Asian journey had received the Government of India's sanction, successive Surveyor Generals did

Interest of   their best to facilitate the survey tasks of my expeditions. I still

   Surveyor Generals.   Y   Y P

think back gratefully to the very helpful advice and instruction by which the late Colonel ST. GEORGE GORE, R.E., while at Calcutta during the cold weather of 1899-1900, showed his personal interest in the enterprise. His successor as Surveyor General, Colonel F. B. LONGE, R.E., was equally ready to meet my requests concerning the plans I had formed for my second and much more extensive expedition of 1906-08.

But my heaviest debt of gratitude is due to Colonel SIR SIDNEY BURRED, R.E., K.C.S.I., F.R.S., who as Superintendent of the Trigonometrical Survey

   Guidance of Sir   since 1899 had direct   the b charge of all arrangements or e surve work

Sidney Bnrrard.   survey

of my first and second expeditions, and who during his succeeding long term of office as Surveyor General was equally ready to extend to me unfailing support and guidance with regard to the third. Moreover quite as great a stimulus was the thought of his own lifelong devotion to the study of the geographical problems connected with innermost Asia and the great mountain systems which enclose it. I feel hence very grateful for being allowed to dedicate this record of our labours to Sir Sidney Burrard not merely as a most helpful friend and guide but also as a living embodiment of that spirit of scientific research which has never ceased to pervade the Survey of India since the days of Rennell, Lambton, and Everest.