Explorations in Tibet 



353 



brought it into general recognition. In 

 the regions named it took the lead as a 

 commercial tree, especially for such pur- 

 poses as fence posts, telegraph and tele- 

 phone poles, and railroad ties. 



Its value for most of these purposes 

 has been quite fully demonstrated. As 

 a post timber it has given excellent sat- 

 isfaction. It ranks with Black Locust 

 and Osage Orange in durability, while 

 it surpasses them in rate of growth, 

 form, penetrability, and freedom from 

 checking. Altogether, as a post timber 

 suitable for growing in a large section 

 of the Middle West it has no equal. 

 For telegraph and telephone poles its- 

 only deficiency seems to be a tendency 

 toward crookedness, but possibly this 

 can be overcome by special treatment. 



As a railroad-tie timber the Hardy 

 Catalpa has not had sufficient trial to 

 demonstrate what its rank should be. 

 Experiments have left no doubt as to 

 its resistance to decay. The only ques- 

 tion lies in its resistance to wear. So 

 far as tried, it does not stand the wear and 

 tear of a railroad track so well as White 

 Oak, especially under heavy traffic. In 

 the Middle West, however, the traffic on 

 many railroads is comparatively light, 

 while the decay of timber is particularly 

 rapid. Under these peculiar conditions 

 Catalpa will probably outlast Oak as a 

 tie timber. The main commercial plan- 

 tations of Catalpa are in Iowa, Kansas, 

 and Nebraska. Kansas especially has 

 a number of large and highly successful 

 plantations. 



EXPLORATIONS IN TIBET 



AN interesting account is given in 

 a late number of the N. Y. 

 T) ibiine of some recent explo- 

 rations in the heart of Tibet by a Rus- 

 sian subject, G. Z. Zoubikov, who suc- 

 ceeded in residing quietly at Lhassa for 

 some months. Zoubikov' s success de- 

 serves especial credit in view of the 

 recent unsuccessful attempts to enter 

 Lhassa by Sven Hedin and Colonel 

 Kozloff. 



M. Zoubikov is a Bouriat and a gradu- 

 ate of the Oriental Faculty of the Uni- 

 versity of St Petersburg. As a born 

 Buddhist and familiar from childhood 

 with Tibetan, he found no difficulty in 

 passing for a llama. He brought back 

 a great number of photographs and 

 other illustrations of the life of the 

 country, and his book, which will soon 

 be published, will contain much infor- 

 mation hitherto unobtainable. 



M. Zoubikov made an extended re- 

 port of his journey at a meeting of the 

 Geographical Society a few da)-s ago. 

 He was immediately awarded the 



Przhevalsky prize, which is conferred 

 in honor of the first Russian Tibet ex- 

 plorer. 



The frontiers of Tibet, which were 

 closed to European travelers after the 

 French explorers Hue and Gabet were 

 expelled from Lhassa, in 1846, have not 

 been absolutely shut against a certain 

 portion of Russian subjects, namely, 

 the Buddhistic Bouriats of the Baikal 

 region. The Bouriats are talented 

 people, and the same value attaches to 

 M. Zoubikov' s observations as would 

 be the case were he a European. His 

 stay lasted over a year. 



In the summer of 1900 M. Zoubikov 

 entered Tibet from the north as a mem- 

 ber of a caravan of seventy pilgrims, in- 

 cluding" many llamas. He approached 

 central Tibet by the Boumza Mountain, 

 where Przhevalsky was turned back in 

 1870. The road led through a treeless 

 country with snow-topped mountains 

 extending east and west in parallel 

 chains. The people in this region were 

 few and nomadic. An agricultural 



