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FROM

POLE TO POLE

A BOOK FOR YOUNG PEOPLE

BY

SVEN HEDIN

DR. SVEN HEDIN IN TIBETAN DRESS.

MACMILLAN AND CO., Limited
LONDON · BOMBAY · CALCUTTA
MELBOURNE

THE MACMILLAN CO. OF CANADA, Ltd.
TORONTO

1914
First Edition 1912
Reprinted 1914

PUBLISHERS' NOTE

This translation of Dr. Sven Hedin's Från Pol till Pol has, with the author's permission, been abridged and edited for the use of English-speaking young people.

PART I I. Across Europe— PAGE Berlin to Constantinople 8 Constantinople 13 The Church of the Divine Wisdom 15 The Bazaars of Stambul 20 II. Constantinople to Teheran(1905)— The Black Sea 26 Trebizond to Teheran 29 III. Through the Caucasus, Persia, and Mesopotamia(1885-6)— St. Petersburg to Baku 34 Across Persia 37 Arabia 40 Baghdad to Teheran 42 IV. The Persian Desert(1906)— Across the Kevir 46 The Oasis of Tebbes 51 V. On the Kirghiz Steppe(1893-5)— Into Asia from Orenburg 55 Samarcand and Bukhara 59 The Pamir 62 "The Father of Ice-Mountains 66 A Kirghiz Gymkhana 69 VI. From Persia to India (1906)— Tebbes to Seistan 72 A Baluchi Raid 75 Scorpions 80 The Indus 82 Kashmir and Ladak

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align="right">87 VII. Eastern Turkestan (1895)— The Takla-makan Desert 89 Across a Sea of Sand 90 The End of the Caravan 93 Water at Last 97 VIII. The Desert Waterway (1899)— Down the Yarkand River 102 The Tarim 105 The Wandering Lake 107 Wild Camels 109 IX. In the Forbidden Land (1901-2, 1906-8)— The Plateau of Tibet 111 Attempt to reach Lhasa 115 The Tashi Lama 124 Wild Asses and Yaks 126 X. India— From Tibet to Simla 130 Delhi and Agra 131 Benares and Brahminism 134 The Light of Asia 137 Bombay 141 The Useful Plants of India 142 Wild Elephants 145 The Cobra 148 XI. From India to China (1908)— The Indian Ocean 152 The Sunda Islands 153 Penang and Singapore 156 Up the China Sea 157 XII. China— To Shanghai 161 ""The Middle Kingdom" 164

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align="left">The Blue River 169 In Northern China 172 Mongolia 176 Marco Polo 179 XIII. Japan (1908)— Nagasaki and Kobe 185 Fujiyama and Tokio 190 Nikko, Nara, and Kioto 193 XIV. Back to Europe— Korea 197 Manchuria 199 The Trans-Siberian Railway 202 The Volga and Moscow 207 St. Petersburg and Home 210 PART II I. Stockholm to Egypt— To London and Paris 215 Napoleon's Tomb 218 Paris to Rome 222 The Eternal City 225 Pompeii 229 II. Africa— General Gordon 236 The Conquest of the Sudan 247 Ostriches 250 Baboons 252 The Hippopotamus 253 Man-eating Lions 256 David Livingstone 261 How Stanley found Livingstone 275 The Death of Livingstone 282 Stanley's Great Journey 287 Timbuktu and the

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Sahara 297 III. North America— The Discovery of the New World 306 New York 317 Chicago and the Great Lakes 326 Through the Great West 333 IV. South America— The Inca Empire 341 The Amazons River 351 V. In the South Seas— Albatrosses and Whales 358 Robinson Crusoe's Island 362 Across the Pacific Ocean 365 Across Australia 372 VI. The North Polar Regions— Sir John Franklin and the North-West Passage 377 The Voyage of the "Vega" 386 Nansen 392 VII. The South Polar Regions 404

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Dr. Sven Hedin in Tibetan Dress Frontispiece I. Berlin 6 II. Constantinople 13 III. Oil-Well at Balakhani 36 IV. A Persian Caravanserai 43 V. The Author's Riding Camel, with Gulam Hussein 46 VI. Tebbes 51 VII. A Baluchi Nomad Tent 76 VIII. Srinagar and the Jhelum River 87 IX. Digging for Water in the Takla-makan 94 X. The Author's Boat on the Yarkand River 102 XI. Tashi-lunpo 125 XII. Simla

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href="@public@vhost@g@gutenberg@html@files@20709@[email protected]#Page_131" tag="{http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml}a">131 XIII. The Taj Mahal 134 XIV. Benares 136 XV. Tame Elephants and their Drivers 147 XVI. On the Canton River 159 XVII. The Great Wall of China 165 XVIII. Gate in the Walls of Peking 176 XIX. A Japanese Ricksha 189 XX. Fujiyama 190 XXI. The Great Buddha at Kamakura 192 XXII. A Sedan-Chair in Seoul 199 XXIII. The Kremlin, Moscow 208 XXIV. Paris 216 XXV. Napoleon's Tomb 219 XXVI. The Colosseum, Rome 228 XXVII. Pompeii 233 XXVIII. The Great Pyramids at Ghizeh 238 XXIX. A Hippopotamus 254 XXX. The Fight on the Congo 294 XXXI. A Group of Beduins 300 XXXII. "Sky-Scrapers" in New York 323 XXXIII. Niagara Falls 331 XXXIV. Cañons on the Colorado River 339 XXXV. Cotopaxi 344 XXXVI. Indian Huts on the Amazons River 353 XXXVII. A Coral Strand 369 XXXVIII. Country near Lake Eyre 373 XXXIX. The "Fram" 393

LIST OF MAPS

PAGE 1. Map showing journey from Stockholm to Berlin 2 2. Map showing journey from Berlin to Constantinople 10 3. Plan of Constantinople

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tag="{http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml}a">13 4. Map showing journey from Constantinople to Teheran, latter part of journey to Baku, and journey from Baku across Persia to Baghdad and back to Teheran 30 5. Map showing journey from Orenburg to the Pamir 56 6. Map showing journey from Teheran to Baluchistan 73 7. Map of Northern India, showing rivers and mountain ranges 82 8. Map of Eastern Turkestan 90 9. Tibet 112 10. Map of India, showing journey from Nushki to Leh, and journey from Tibet through Simla, etc., to Bombay 132 11. The Sunda Islands 154 12. Map showing voyage from Bombay to Hong Kong 158 13. Map of Northern China and Mongolia 174 14. Map showing journey from Shanghai through Japan and Korea to Dalny 184 15. The Trans-Siberian Railway 203 16. Map showing journey from Stockholm to Paris 216 17. Map showing journey from Paris to Alexandria 230 18. Map of North-Eastern Africa, showing Egypt and the Sudan 237 19. Livingstone's Journeys in Africa 262 20. North-West Africa 298 21. Toscanelli's Map 308 22. North America 325 23. South America 343 24. The South Seas 366 25. The North Polar Regions 378 26. The South Polar Regions 405

PART I

I

ACROSS EUROPE

Stockholm to Berlin

Our journey begins at Stockholm, the capital of my native country. Leaving Stockholm by train in the evening, we travel all night in comfortable sleeping-cars and arrive next morning at the southernmost point of Sweden, the port of Trelleborg, where the sunlit waves sweep in from the Baltic Sea.

Here we might expect to have done with railway travelling, and we rather look for the guard to come and open the carriage doors and ask the passengers to alight. Surely it is not intended that the train shall go on right across the sea? Yet that is actually what happens. The same train and the same carriages, which bore us out of Stockholm yesterday evening, go calmly across the Baltic Sea, and we need not get out before we arrive at Berlin. The section of the train which is to go on to Germany is run by an engine on to a great ferry-boat moored to the quay by heavy clamps and hooks of iron. The rails on Swedish ground are closely connected with those on the ferry-boat, and when the carriages are pushed on board by the engine, they are fastened with chains and hooks so that they may remain quite steady even if the vessel begins to roll. As the traveller lies dozing in his compartment, he will certainly hear whistles and the rattle of iron gear and will notice that the compartment suddenly becomes quite dark. But only when the monotonous groaning and the constant vibration of the wheels has given place to a gentle and silent heaving will he know that he is out on the Baltic Sea.

We are by no means content, however, to lie down and doze. Scarcely have the carriages been anchored on the ferry-boat

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before we are on the upper deck with its fine promenade. The ferry-boat is a handsome vessel, 370 feet long, brand-new and painted white everywhere. It is almost like a first-class hotel. In the saloon the tables are laid, and Swedish and German passengers sit in groups at breakfast. There are separate rooms for coffee and smoking, for reading and writing; and we find a small bookstall where a boy sells guidebooks, novels, and the Swedish and German newspapers of the day.

From Pole to Pole: A Book for Young People