Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 71, No. 437, March 1852Various
General
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 71, No. 437, March 1852
Various
England -- Periodicals; Scotland -- Periodicals
The book which the missionaries have produced is not altogether
satisfactory. It too well justifies its title of _Souvenirs_ by the
lamentable paucity of dates, of which there are not half-a-dozen
in the whole narrative of their two years' pilgrimage. Even the
period of their starting is not stated at the time, and is only to
be distinctly gathered from some retrospective calculations. Their
geographical starting-point, too, is as obscure as the chronological
one. Our maps help us little in following the details of their
travels; and that which is inserted in their book is of as little
aid as any other, being, in fact, dated five years previous to
their journey. Nor, we fear, will they be found to have added much
to the materials of future geographers; their work contains no
indication of a single bearing or altitude, nor indeed had they the
necessary instruments. The possession, indeed, of MS. maps would
have endangered their lives in any collision with Chinese authority,
such as actually befel them at Lhassa; but many valuable data
might have been recorded without graphical embodiment. The worthy
men, however, make no pretensions to science; they record of the
Ko-ko-noor or Blue Lake on the north-east frontier of Tibet, that it
has a flux and reflux of tide, without any further particulars of
so marvellous a phenomenon, though they were some time encamped on
its banks: they ascribe unquestioningly their sufferings, in passing
certain lofty mountains, to poisonous exhalations from the soil; and
they quit Tibet without a word as to the vexed question regarding
the course of the Sanpoo. But they have given us a most readable and
interesting personal narrative of a life of continued hardships,
and of frequent suffering and danger in remote regions, the routes
through which were partly never before recorded in detail, and
partly never before trodden by any European.
FOREST LIFE IN CANADA WEST.[19]
[19] _Roughing it in the Bush; or, Life in Canada._ By SUSANNA
MOODIE. In 2 vols. London: 1852.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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