Southern Tibet : vol.3 / 214 ページ（カラー画像）

0214	Southern Tibet : vol.3
南チベット : vol.3

lies west of mine and as both routes *may* touch each other only in the pass, I pre-
fer to regard both as two different crossings, although situated quite close to
each other.

In the east, speaking only of the parts of the range near Tengri-nor, only
two Europeans have crossed the Transhimalaya, LITTLEDALE in Goring-la and DE
LESDAIN in Khalamba-la. They have not added any new information about the
system, whether they did not understand the importance of the problem or because
both had their wives with them I do not know. Littledale, at least, took a new pass,
which is always something to be grateful for.

At the distance of 485 miles between Suruge-la and Khalamba-la nobody has
ever crossed the system before 1907. So, considering as a whole the results of
the Pundits' journeys in connection with the Transhimalaya and admitting the great
importance of their work, which occupies an epoch in the history of exploration
in Tibet, we must say that they left the whole central part of the mountain system
unknown, when their work was finished. They had crossed it at its extreme ends
in four passes; otherwise they had only travelled along its borders and entered on
their maps some of its peripheric peaks. The rest, that is to say, the whole central
bulky massive, the orographical building, the geological structure, the hydrographical
systems, the nature, the distribution of nomads and shepherds, the existence of
villages, monasteries, roads, everything was quite unknown. Although Montgo-
merie says that he never took his attention from the country north of the Tsang-
po, he does not seem to have realized the importance of this field of exploration.
His Pundits were sent to the uppermost Indus, to the gold-fields of western Tibet,
to Shigatse, Lhasa, and Tengri-nor, up and down the Tsangpo valley, across and
along the Nepalese frontier and so forth, but never across the mountains north of
the Tsangpo, upon a line of 485 miles. Did he regard this system as sufficiently
well known from Chinese sources and Hodgson's map? I have shown above that
this was not the case. At any rate the Central Transhimalaya was left alone and
when, some 40 years later a European expedition entered these parts of the myste-
rious country, it was, by circumstances, forced to follow Nain Sing's road and to
improve his rough reconnaissance into a mathematically correct survey. But it did
not approach the interior any nearer than Nain Sing had done.

The British method of using intelligent Pundits as surveyors of unknown Tibet
has only to a very small extent been followed by the Russians. Thus ZYBIKOFF was
sent to Lhasa not very long ago, and returned with a description and a collection
of photographs of the sacred city. Although he crossed Transhimalaya he has, of
course, nothing to tell us of this mountain system. The Russians, however, have
tried to draw some information from journeys undertaken by natives. In the *Isvestiya
of the Imp. Russ. Geogr. Society*¹ J. P. SHISHMAREV and Baron FR. VON DER

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