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| 0172 |
Southern Tibet : vol.3 |
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OCR Text
understand: ›The northern boundary of Tibet is formed by the great chain north of
the Indus, to which Humboldt, following Chinese geographers, has given the name
of Kouenlun. Our knowledge of the appearance and course of this chain of moun-
tains, by which Tibet is separated from Yarkand and Khotan, is so extremely limited
that, except as to its general direction, very little can be said regarding it.› If
Kwen-lun should be the great chain north of the Indus one would have to reckon
all the mountains belonging to the Kara-korum system, and situated between the
Indus and the Kwen-lun, to this last-mentioned system. Thomson, who visited the
Kara-korum pass himself, ought not to have accepted any influence from Humboldt
who had never seen the country. Here is another example of the danger of blind
belief in authority. Ptolemy stopped all geographical progress for more than a
thousand years by the authority of his name. And on the other hand Thomson by
his own great authority made it still more likely that the Kara-korum belonged to
the Kwen-lun. Although Thomson was the first European to reach the Kara-korum
pass, he did not bring it in any relation to the Dzang range of Humboldt. A few
years later Hodgson, as we have seen, promulgated the continuity as pretty cer-
tain, although he had never been in the country. But his assertion was only con-
jecture built upon maps.
Sir Joseph Hooker's journeys in Sikkim, 1848—50, form an epoch in Hima-
layan investigation from the point of view of natural history.¹ His exploration brought
him up to the north to the Sikkim-Tibet frontier. The peak which he called Forked
Donkia and which is on the Tista watershed ›is the termination of a magnificent
amphitheatre of stupendous snow-clad precipices, continuously upwards of 20 000
feet high, that forms the east flank of the upper La choong. From Donkia top
again, the mountains sweep round to the westward, rising into fingered peaks of
extraordinary magnificence; and thence — still running west — dip to 18 500 feet,
forming the Donkia pass, and rise again as the great mural mass of Kinchinjhow.
This girdle of mountains encloses the head waters of the Lachoong, which rises in
countless streams from its perpetual snows, glaciers, and small lakes: its north drai-
nage is to the Cholamoo lakes in Tibet; in which is the source of the Lachen, which
flows round the north base of Kinchinjhow to Kongra Lama› and belongs to Tista.
Regarding the interior of southern Tibet his experience consists chiefly in distant
views. From the Donkia pass, 18 470 feet, he took a splendid panoramic view
which is reproduced in his book,² and is of interest to us. At his feet to the
north he had the lake Cho lamoo, further on a range and, ›beyond this range, lay
the broad valley of the Arun, and in the extreme northwest distance, to the north
of Nepal, were some immense snowy mountains, reduced to mere specks on the
horizon. The valley of the Arun was bounded on the north by very precipitous
black rocky mountains, sprinkled with snow; beyond these again, from north to
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