The renowned traveller and explorer, Colonel Prejevalsky, to whom a reference is made in our St. Petersburg letter, arrived there on his return journey from Mongolia, the earlier part of the present month. A correspondent of the London Times says that this expedition of Colonel Prejevalsky, lasting two years, and costing over 43,000 roubles of government money, has been the most remarkable one ever undertaken in the wilds of Mongolia and Tibet. The intrepid explorer, as his published letters have already shown, literally fought his way into these inhospitable regions, at the head of a well-armed party of thirteen Cossacks, four grenadiers, and a host of other attendants; and, as he stated at Moscow, more than one hundred natives, who at different times waylaid the explorers, were made to feel the deadly effects of the Berdan rifle-fire. The exact numbers of the killed and wounded were stated in the extremely interesting letters addressed to the Grand Duke, at various stages of the journey. This is scientific exploration with a vengeance, and goes beyond anything that Mr. Stanley did with his 'six-shooter' among the negroes of Africa.
In the last of the above-mentioned series of letters, the colonel also expressed the ardent with of the Mongolian natives to be taken under Russian protection, and shielded from Chinese oppression. The same idea he has again impressed upon his friends, in answer to their many inquiries, as they greeted the tall, sun-burnt traveller. The Viedomosti, referring to this, says, "Among the natives visited by Colonel Prejevalsky there exists a deep conviction that sooner or later the 'great white czar' will enter their country and take them under his domination. At one place the explorer showed a portrait of the emperor to one of the natives, who went into raptures over it, and soon large crowds of inhabitants, with women and children from the neighbouring districts, gathered round the colonel and implored him to show them the likeness of the 'white czar.'"
The regions visited by Colonel Prejevalsky are generally supposed to be, nominally at least, within the dominions of the emperor of China. No wonder, therefore, that rumors of a protest have come from Peking. The grenadiers who accompanied the expedition have been promoted, and, besides receiving pecuniary gratifications, have had their portraits distributed throughout the regiment. Colonel Prejevalsky has given a number of Russian names to newly-discovered places, such as the 'Moscow-Chain,' the 'Kremlin Rock,' and the 'Czar-liberator's Mountain.' One hundred and fifty photographs and sketches were taken, and a large number of geological and other specimens were collected. The expedition will no doubt have important scientific, and perhaps other results.
-- Bibliographical information: Science, Vol. 7, No. 159 (Feb. 19, 1886).
Foreign retirees in Manchuria
Prejevalsky's Exploration in Mongolia
Was Prejevalsky the father of Stalin?
The Third Asiatic Expedition in Mongolia
Waiting in Ulaan Baatar
My first trip to Tibet
The Expulsion of Count Tolstoi
Russian names in English
