PREFACE TO THIRD EDITION
The favourable reception accorded this work by the general reader and the Press is gratifyingly evinced by the fact that two editions have been practically exhausted within a few months of its first appearance, notwithstanding the high price which the unusual profusion of its illustrations had entailed. It is with pleasure, therefore, that I find the publishers, in response to a demand for a less costly edition, are now able to issue the book in its present form at a very much cheaper rate, yet nevertheless containing all the original letterpress and nearly all the numerous original illustrations—most of the latter being of permanent historical importance, and unique, in that they are reproduced from my own photographs, taken by myself at critical moments during the progress of the famous "Mission," and are not to be found elsewhere.
The Natural History notes on the newly explored country recorded in the Appendices have been expanded in this edition to include an interesting list of the numerous wild flowers collected by me around Lhasa.
Politically, it is a striking sign of the tremendous upheaval made in Tibet by our Mission, that over a year after the withdrawal of our troops from that country, the Grand Lama of Tashilhumpo, one of the "Living Buddhas," and the recognised successor of the fugitive Dalai Lama of Lhasa, should have broken through all the traditional isolation of centuries, and, for the first time in the history of Tibet, has crossed the Himalayas, braving the long journey of many weeks over dangerous passes, to offer homage at Calcutta to the son of the Emperor of India.
London, January 1906.
