OCT. — mar. 1858-59.] Selections. 319 



killed, is described as having a mole (tache naturelle) under his 

 right eye. 



[Our brother certainly had no such mole, but it is not impossible 

 that some scarred wound, of which we knew nothing, might be 

 meant.] 



In communicating this information, M. le Baron, I consider it 

 useless to observe how little credence it deserves. The inhabitants 

 of those distant regions where they were collected, generally speak- 

 ing, make no scruple of modifying their reports at pleasure, espe- 

 cially when Europeans are concerned. 



IV. Reports collected by Lieut. Colonel H. B. Edwardes, C. B., 

 Commissioner and Superintendent Peshdur Division. 



8. Letter to JR. Temple, Esq., Secretary to the Chief Commis- 

 sioner of the Panjdb. Peshdur \&th December 1858. 



Political Department. 



I am not aware whether the Chief Commissioner has yet received 

 a reliable account of the circumstances attending the death of the • 

 German traveller Mr. Adolphe Schlagintweit ; but at any rate it 

 will be satisfactory to Government, and his friends, to be able to 

 compare the enclosed narratives of the sad events. 



The first No. 9 is the verbal statement of a Kashmiri follower of 

 Mr. Schlagintweit' s named Abdullah*-, who arrived here via Bok- 

 hara and Kabul three days ago (15th December 1858). 



The second No. 10 is the written report of a native of Yarkandf , 

 named Mohammad Amin, who appears to have been provided by 

 Lord William Hay, as a kind of courier to Mr. Adolphe Schlagint- 

 weit. He writes from Kokand and Abdullah is the bearer of his 

 letter. 



From these statements, which appear to me substantially, trust- 

 ful, it seems that Mr. Schlagintweit was impelled by a desire to 

 find a road to Yarkand which need not pass through Ladak ; 



* His full name is Abdullah Mohammad. 



f In the official report Mohammad Amin was called a native of Ladak, 

 what we altered, since we knew Mohammad Amin, who was also our 

 chief guide in the previous during our travels in Turkistan, to be a na- 

 tive of Yarkand. Adolphe had however not seen him, he having left us 

 at Leh in Ladak. 



