132 



THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



required by the decisions of the inter- 

 national conference at London. It may 

 be assumed that they will then be avail- 

 able to any one at the cost of paper and 

 printing-, as is now the case with the 

 topographic atlas sheets prepared under 

 the same auspices. 



ALL GOVERNMKNTS UNITE TO COMPI.ETf; 

 THE MAP 



The unanimous conclusions of the 

 London conference have pledged the 

 great powers to the standard map of the 

 world, which Professor Penck proposed 

 eighteen years ago. The need of that 

 map is greatest concerning the countries 

 which have been least adequately 

 mapped, and among these we must count 

 both Americas, as well as Africa, Asia, 

 and Australia. Good maps exist of all 

 of Europe, ranging in scale all the way 

 from one to twenty thousand up to one 

 to one and a half millions. 



Eor Europe the data are all available, 

 and the preparation of the one-millionth 

 map is a question of a contract between 

 some one of the great publishing houses 

 of England, France, or Germany and 

 the sfovernments that are interested. It 



was understood at the conference that 

 the work would thus be committed to one 

 establishment, so far as Europe was con- 

 cerned, in order that uniformity miglit 

 be secured. 



But the United States government is 

 gathering the original data for the 

 mother maps of this country, and is com- 

 piling and publishing them at a cost 

 much below that which a European pub- 

 lisher would necessarily charge. It 

 therefore, through its delegates at Lon- 

 don, declined to send the original data to 

 Europe, and reserved to itself the prepa- 

 ration of these original maps. It is to 

 be hoped that the task may be prosecuted 

 with energy, and that the first edition of 

 the one-millionth map of the United 

 States as a part of the standard map of 

 the world may be engraved and pub- 

 lished within ten years. 



This compilation will then represent 

 the state of knowledge at the time of 

 completion of each sheet. As surveys 

 progress, corrections and additions will 

 be necessarv, and the progress of im- 

 provement in the map will become an 

 index to the progress of civilization in 

 our country. 



THE LAND OF THE CROSSBOW 



By George Forrest 



THE journey here described was 

 made with the object of explor- 

 ing botanically and geographically 

 that portion of the Salwin Valley lying 

 between 26° and 27° 30' north (for map 

 see page 147). 



The tract of country between the 

 parallels mentioned was "terra incog- 

 nita," and had been persistently shunned 

 by all, Chinese and Europeans alike, as 

 inhospitable, barren, and unnegotiable ; 

 certainly, as will be found hereafter, 

 we found it so, but despite these dis- 

 advantages it had one point of absorbing 

 interest. Here in this region, com- 

 prising the whole of the basin of the 



Salwin, was supposed to be the home of 

 the Lissoo race ; from that point the ofif- 

 shoots spread northeast, east, and south 

 over practically the whole of the province 

 of Yunnan and parts of northwestern 

 Szechuan. 



Starting from Teng-yueh-ting in per- 

 fect weather, we traveled due north, and 

 on the fourth day passed the last Chinese 

 village and entered the country of the 

 Lissoo, camping near the h'amlet of Ta- 

 chu-pa. This, in keeping with most of 

 the Lissoo villages, was only a miserable 

 collection of a half dozen rain-sodden 

 huts, thatched with coarse grass, and 

 with eaves so low that to enter one 



