Sven Anders Hedin

“ We leave the cairn and the fire, its smoke covering the summit of the pass as with a torn veil, and follow the brook, of which the water will some day reach the warm sea after a thousand experiences. I turn a page and begin a new chapter in my life as an explorer; the desolate Chang-tang remains behind me, and Targo-gangri sinks below the horizon—shall I ever see its majestic peaks again?
We descend rapidly with the wind in our faces. Large 36 blocks of ice fill the valley bottom between walls of black schists and porphyry. ”

“ The north-east monsoon is blowing freshly, and the salt foam hisses round the bow of the Delhi and falls on the deck in fine spray lighted by the sun. There is little sea, for we are in among the islands which check and subdue the violence of the waves. At noon we glide in between a small holm and the island into the excellent and roomy harbour of Hong Kong, well sheltered on all sides from wind and waves. A flotilla of steam launches comes out to meet us as we glide slowly among innumerable vessels to our anchorage and buoys. ”

“ Would it not be better to land and wait for the day? Yes, let us land and get into the lee of the landspit. The sun sinks, the storm grows in strength, we can hear it howling through the chasms to the south; fine spindrift flies like a comet’s tail over the crests of the waves; it is a most critical and trying moment. The dust clouds have disappeared, and the western horizon is dimly perceptible. The sun sinks to its rest, a ball of liquid gold, and a weird, mysterious gleam spreads over the whole country. Everything is coloured red except the dark-blue white-edged lake. ”

“ Here the ice on our left hand has been piled up into hummocks, 6 feet high, of grand transparent green flat slabs, but on the right, as far as we can see over the southern basin, the ice spreads its level smooth sheet of a beautiful dark green colour like leaves of laurel and lilac. We feel the usual fascination of the ice, and stand and stare down into the dark cold depths. Drifting snow sweeps like comets’ tails over the smooth course. We stand on the very point of the promontory, with the narrowest part of the Arport-tso in front of us, for the lake is contracted like a wasp’s waist. ”

“ The caravan is already on the move, so we pack up and follow in its trail.
The sky seems very unpromising, and is clouded all over. The desert is as level as a floor; not a mound as high as a kneeling camel. The sun sinks in the west. Like a red-hot cannon-ball it shines through a rift between dark clouds, and a shaft of dazzling red rays streams over the desert, the surface of which shines like a purple sea. To the north the sky is of a dark violet colour, and against this background the camels stand out brick-red. ”

“ After four-and-a-half hours we are up on the small terrace-shaped halting-place, Singrul, and the bluish-grey smoke of the fires of yak dung floats over the soil, scantily carpeted with grass and traversed by a rivulet of crystal clear water. An alpine, cold, barren landscape surrounds us. Muhamed Isa sits enthroned like a pasha in his fortress of boxes and provender sacks, the usual sheep is killed and cut up, and is then thrown into the general cauldron, stomach, entrails, and everything. The head and feet are broiled before the fire on stones. ”

“ Light, restless, motionless to the eye, but riven by the upper winds like old prayer-streamers on a pass, the clouds sailed at sunset in the vault of heaven. The moon, the friend of all nocturnal wanderers and sleepers in the open air, illumines the surroundings of our tents, among which the blue smoke of the camp-fires lies like a veil over the ground. The yaks stand still as shadows, and now and then their teeth are heard grinding against the cartilaginous process of the upper jaw. The Tradum Gova and his servants hum their evening prayer and rattle their prayer-mills. ”

“ All who, after Stanley, have travelled through the great primeval forest in the heart of Africa have likewise described its suffocating hot-house air, the peaceful silence, only broken by the cries of monkeys and parrots, its deep, depressing gloom. If the journey is of long duration men get wearied, experiencing a feeling of confinement, and long for air, freedom, sun, and wind. It is like going through a tunnel, no country being visible on either side. ”

“ Then we cower again over the cold ashes of our fire. We constantly look to the east and watch the new day, which slowly peeps over the mountains as though it would look about before it ventures out. At five o’clock the highest peaks receive a purple tinge, and we cast a faint shadow on the bottom of the boat, and then the sun rises, cold and bright-yellow, over the crest to the east. Now the springs of life revive. Rehim Ali has disappeared for an hour, and now we see him tramping through the swamp with a large bundle of wood, and soon we have kindled a sparkling, crackling fire. ”

“ Many other peaks and domes with eternal snow rise over this sea of tumbled waves, but, after all, the finest sight is the lake itself, which charms and fascinates the spectator by its intense ultramarine hue, a couple of shades deeper and stronger than turquoise. When one first comes to the saddle of the pass and this wealth of colouring strikes the retina, one can scarcely restrain an exclamation of astonishment and admiration. We look down straight on the lake, and its southern shore is just below us. ”

“ The deepest silence surrounds the ashes of the man who in his lifetime filled the world with the roar of his cannon and the thunder of his legions, and who within the space of a few years completely changed the map of Europe. Pale and subdued, the light falls over the crypt where the red porphyry speaks of irresistible power, and the white goddesses of victory are illumined as it were with a reflection of the years of glory. ”

“ Holy and thrice holy are these mountains, which from their cold lap give birth and sustenance to the river celebrated from time immemorial in legend and song, the river of Tibet and Assam, the river par excellence, the son of Brahma. One generation after another of black Tibetans has in the course of thousands of years listened to its roar between the two loftiest mountain systems of the world, the Himalaya and the Trans-Himalaya, and one generation after another of the various tribes of Assam has watered its fields with its life-giving floods and drunk of its blessed water. ”

“ All the colours become subdued and greyish-yellow, like the lion's hide. Everything is yellow and grey, even the dromedaries which carry him, his tent and baggage, from well to well. He can hardly tell why he finds this country pleasanter than the forests and streams on the slopes of the Atlas Mountains; perhaps owing to the immense distances, the mysterious horizon afar off, the blood-red sunsets, the grand silence which prevails everywhere so that he hardly dares speak aloud. It is the magic of the desert that has got hold of him. ”

“ But high above the dark-grey ridge rises a world of mountains which seems to belong to the heavens rather than the earth, so lightly and airily is it poised above the rest of the earth under a canopy of white clouds. It is so far from us that the individual contours are indistinguishable, and it rises like a wall of a universal light blue hue, which, however, is a little deeper than the colour of the sky. ”

“ We seem to stand on a promontory jutting out into endless space, which yawns around us and in front. And where is now the holy lake, which yesterday nearly robbed us of life, and on which the storm was so furious that I still seem to feel the ground quaking under my feet? Has the Gossul monastery been changed by some whim of the gods into an air-ship which is bearing us away to another planet? Its streamers hang motionless on their poles, and nothing can be seen of the mountains, country, and ground. ”

“ At any rate the Linga monks have a splendid view of an artistically sculptured corner of the world. From their loopholes of windows and their flat roofs they can see winter spreading its white carpet over the mountains and putting the rivers in fetters, and then the spring shedding its gold over the valleys, the summer conjuring out new fresh grass, and lastly the rain torrents of early autumn washing the slopes and swelling the rivers. ”

“ We leave the lake and mount gently up the Rhone valley between wild rocks. It becomes narrower as we ascend. The Rhone, a tumultuous stream, roars in its bed, now quite insignificant compared to the majestic river at Geneva. In the valley tilled fields are laid out, dark green spruces peep out of the snow on the slopes, while above all the snow-white summits of the Alps are enthroned. ”

“ I feel the skin of my face cracked by the burning of the sun. The hours crawl so slowly over the lake; patience, patience. The clouds display wonderful tone-effects; white and grey, sharply defined, they lie in different stages before the mountains, and behind them dark blue and purple curtains seem to hang down. We might be gliding over the bright floor of a temple hall, its walls richly decorated with flags and standards, which hang down from golden hooks on the ceiling of the sky, and touch the dust of earth with their fringes. The genii of Siva’s paradise seem to hover round us. ”

“ The road is one of the most charming and magnificent in the world. The little railway climbs up the steep flanks in the boldest curves, descends the slopes into deep and narrow ravines, passes along steep mountain spurs, where the train seems as though it would plunge into space from the extreme point; then the train crosses bridges which groan and tremble under its weight, enters pitch-dark tunnels, and again emerges into the blinding sunshine. ”

“ With fresh horses we speed along the bank of the Syr-darya. Here grow small woods and thickets where tigers stalk their prey, and in the dense reed beds wild boars dig up roots. The shy gazelles like the open country, hares spring over the shrubs, ducks and geese quack on the banks, and flocks of pheasants lure the traveller to sport. The setting sun sheds a gleam of fiery red over the steppe, and as it grows dim the stars begin to twinkle. The monotonous ring of the bells and the shouts of the driver never cease, whether we are near the river or far off in the dreary steppe. ”

“ Their waters are born in the reservoirs of the firmament, and they roll down their floods to the lowlands to yield life and sustenance to fifty millions of human beings. Up here white monasteries stand peacefully on their banks, while in India pagodas and mosques are reflected in their waters; up here wolves, wild yaks, and wild sheep, roam about their 214 valleys, while down below in India the eyes of tigers and leopards shine like glowing coals of fire from the jungles that skirt their banks, and poisonous snakes wriggle through the dense brushwood. ”