GEOGRAPHICAL PROGRESS. 



261 



will cost nearly $40,000,000, and will be completed 

 in eighteen years. 



The following ship canals have been authorized 

 in Austria by an act that became law June 11, 

 1901: 



1. From the Danube to the Oder. 2. From the 

 Danube to the Moldau at Budweis, connected with 

 canalization of the Moldau from Budweis to 

 Prague. 3. From the Danube-Oder Canal to the 

 upper Elbe at Pardubitz, connected with canaliza- 

 tion of the Elbe from Jaromirz, above Pardubitz, 

 to Melnik. 4. A connection of the Danube-Oder 

 Canal with the system of the Vistula and with 

 a navigable section of the Dniester. The prelimi- 

 nary work is to be finished in 1904, and the whole 

 to be done in twenty years, the cost to be borne 

 by the provinces in proportion to the benefit re- 

 ceived. 



Asia. The Founder's and Patron's medals for 

 1900 were awarded by the Royal Geographical 

 Society to Capt. H. H. P. Deasy and James Mc- 

 Carthy to Capt. Deasy for the exploring and 

 survey work of his two expeditions in central 

 Asia, lasting three years, and to Mr. McCarthy, 

 who is the Government surveyor of Siam, for 

 his explorations in all parts of that kingdom. 

 The other awards were as follow : The Murchison 

 award to M. Henryk Arctowski for the valuable 

 oceanographical and meteorological work which 

 he performed on the Belgian antarctic expedition; 

 the Gill memorial to Mr. Vaughan Cornish for his 

 researches, extending over several years, on sea- 

 beaches, sand-dunes, and on wave-forms in water; 

 the Back grant to Mr. Robert Codrington for his 

 journeys in the region between Lakes Nyassa and 

 Tanganyika, during which he removed, in behalf 

 of the society, the section containing the inscrip- 

 tion from the tree under which Livingston's heart 

 was buried; and the Cuthbert Peek grant to Mr. 

 T. J. Alldridge for his journeys during the past 

 ten years in the interior of Sierra Leone, during 

 which he has done valuable geographical work. 



In 1896 Capt. Deasy explored the border be- 

 tween Chinese East Turkestan and Tibet, from 

 Ladak by way of Polu to Khotan; on his second 

 journey, 1897-'98, the eastern Pamir, especially 

 the upper course of Yarkand river, which he deter- 

 mined, in the face of almost insurmountable ob- 

 stacles, as far as the point reached by the Rus- 

 sian explorer Grombtschewsky, where the river 

 bears the name Raskamdaya. With the help of a 

 native Indian surveyor, he triangulated the whole 

 territory, making numerous designations of lati- 

 tude and several of longitude, thus filling a great 

 gap in the map of Asia. He has, in all, surveyed 

 40,000 square miles of new country. He found 

 that the great peak Muztagh-Ata is the highest 

 point fixed north of the Himalayas. 



" The obscurity," says Petermann's Mitteilung- 

 en, "which reigns over the course of the Yang- 

 tse-Kiang on the unknown stretch between 100 

 and 102 east longitude, because the swift cur- 

 rent and the steep banks prevent the following of 

 the course of the river, is beginning to lighten. 

 Five years ago C. E. Benin, on the journey from 

 Tali-Fu northward by way of Likiang to Jung- 

 ning, saw, a little south of that place, at about 

 28 north latitude, a powerful stream, which he 

 believed must be identical with the Yang-tse- 

 Kiang, which he had crossed at Likiang, at 27 

 north latitude, while the maps attributed a south- 

 easterly course to the stream from Likiang; Gre- 

 nard gave it even a wide curve eastward, turning 

 it southward again in the lower course of the 

 Ya-long-Kiang. Benin's opinion is now confirmed 

 by Edward Amundsen. While Bonin did not 

 actually reach the river at Yungning or Yung-Lin, 



Amundsen passed along the nort]ic:n |. :i;i k by the 

 abrupt bend, so that doubt ot UK; identity with 

 the Kin-sha-Kiang, as the upper ,-,,M, , '.,f the 

 Yang-tse-Kiang is here called, is exd.icied. But 

 Grenard's supposition is not confirm- ;. tor the 

 Kin-sha-Kiang turns at 101 east longitude in 

 an abrupt bend back to the south until ,<,,,) at 

 28 north latitude, where it again turr..- East- 

 ward." 



The latest intelligence at hand from the S\ved 

 ish traveler Dr. Sven Hedin is a despatch pub- 

 lished in October, based upon a letter from him 

 dated July 10. He was then at the foot of the 

 Akka Tagh, in northern Tibet, and intended to 

 proceed in the direction of Ladak in order to sur- 

 vey the region about the source of the Indus. 

 He proposed to return next spring to Osh via 

 Kashgal. Meanwhile a caravan of 15 horses has 

 arrived at Kashgar, bringing the results of two 

 years of the traveler's work in the form of scien- 

 tific collections, maps, photographs, and diaries. 

 Dr. Sven Hedin speaks in the highest terms of his 

 Cossack escort, provided by the Czar, and extols 

 their courage, endurance, and resource in critical 

 situations. Up to the time of writing he had been 

 in no way molested by the Chinese. 



Dr. Hedin reached Kashgar on Sept. 1, 1899, 

 and organized his caravan. He sent the bulk of it 

 by the great north road through Ak-su and Korla 

 to Lob-Nor, while he with a small following made 

 for Lailik, on the Yarkand-daria, which he pro- 

 posed to follow to Lob-Nor. The journey from 

 Kashgar to Lailik occupied five days. At the lat- 

 ter place he bought one of the ferry-boats for 

 carrying caravans across the Yarkand, and fitted 

 it up for his voyage down the river. He rigged 

 up a tent amidships for his own use, and a dark 

 room in which to develop his photographs. Four 

 ferry-men were engaged to manage the craft, on 

 which Dr. Hedin spent the next three months, 

 floating slowly down from Lailik to Yangi-kul. 

 Only once, in the neighborhood of Maral-bashi, 

 where the irrigation canals had drained the 

 water from the river, was it found necessary to 

 enlist the services of 100 natives, to drag the ferry- 

 boat over the shallows. Dr. Hedin describes the 

 journey along the Yarkand-daria and Yarim rivers 

 as a delightful experience. The river wound in 

 all directions, and in places the scenery was ex- 

 tremely picturesque. Dr. Hedin mapped the whole 

 course of the river between Lailik and Yangi-kul 

 on 60 large sheets, with great minuteness. He 

 took 60 measurements of the volume of water, 

 and several times every day calculated the dis- 

 tances by means of a special instrument, which 

 gave the rapidity of the stream. On reaching 

 Yangi-kul, where the caravan sent round by the 

 road had arrived, Dr. Hedin established a winter 

 camp. He himself, with 4 men and 7 camels, after 

 ten days at Yangi-kul, set out across the desert 

 to Cherchen. The journey lasted twenty days, 

 across interminable wastes of sand, but only one 

 camel was lost. From Cherchen Dr. Hedin made 

 an excursion to Andere, to the west-southwest. 

 He reached camp on Feb. 24 of last year, after an 

 absence of sixty-six days, during which he had 

 traversed and mapped a very large area of new 

 country. 



Setting out on March 5, he followed the south- 

 ern slopes of the Kuruk-taj range and the dried- 

 up bed of the Kum-daria, or " river of the desert," 

 until he came upon an ancient lake bed with ex- 

 tensive salt deposits and dead trees and sedge. 

 On the shores of this ancient lake bed were the 

 ruins of a town with artistic wooden sculptures 

 and an old road. The discovery confirms the 

 theory put forward in his book Through Asia as 



