IT was a little over a year ago that a telegraphic despatch announcing the terrible experience and hairbreadth escape of A. Henry Savage Landor in an exploring expedition into the remote regions of Tibet went the rounds of the press and awakened general interest and sympathy. The first bare outline of the story was later supplemented by further facts and scattered details, so remarkable in their revelation of suffering and endurance that the full account of Landor's adventures was awaited with keen interest. This account has now appeared, and it takes instant rank as one of the most remarkable records of fortitude, determination, and devotion to geographic research that have been given to the world.

It was in May, 1897, that Landor, fortified with the experience gained in previous scientific journeying, set out from Northern India on his perilous expedition. It was in October that, half paralyzed and partially blind, he returned, a living witness to the Tibetans' determination to make their "Sacred Province" truly a "forbidden land" to the invading white man. Of his sufferings, the world has already heard-how he was tortured on the rack, blinded with a redhot iron, lacerated, and subjected to the danger of a savage death, from which alone his indomitable courage saved him; and this simple word-of-mouth narrative proves once more that for the most tense interest, the most moving romance, we must turn to fact rather than to

fiction.

Aside from its dramatic qualities, it abounds in curious information concerning the strange ceremonies and tenets of Lamaism, and the manners, customs, and characteristics of the Tibetans; the natural features of the country are graphically described; and the grandeurs of the Himalayan peaks and glaciers are brought before us with a vividness that proves the writer's literary heritage.

The two handsome volumes have been brought out by Harper & Brothers with all the accessories of fine paper, broad, clear pages, and rich binding. The hundreds of illustrations call for a special word. They include beautiful fullpage color plates of Himalayan scenery and of Tibetan types, many full-page drawings, and an abundance of text illustration, from sketches or photographs made upon the spot, portraying the strange scenes, the characters, and dramatic incidents of the journey. Especially striking are the two portraits that show the young explorer before and after his dread experience, and that in their shocking contrast are a revelation of age, suffering, and privation, that tells in itself the story of the book. A full map of the region traversed is also given, and the appendix contains the documents in the official inquiry conducted by the Indian Government to confirm Landor's story. In matter, in manner, and in outward guise, this narrative of the "forbidden land" is one of the most notable productions of the year.

"Follow after! follow after! We have

watered the root,

And the bud has come to blossom that ripens for fruit.

Follow after! follow after! For the harvest is sown.

By the bones by the wayside ye shall come to your own."

TRUE

RUE as is this refrain of the pioneer in all lands and in all ages, it has a special force and meaning to Americans. We have seen within the span of a man's life the ever-extending conquest of savagery by civilization; the transformation of wild prairies and mountain ranges into smiling grain-fields and busy centres of industry-the reaping of that harvest sown by the explorer, the trapper, and the hardy pioneer. Yet we who have 'followed after" seldom pause to look back upon the trail, and hardly realize how few are the years since our rushing Western cities, with their crowded streets, their steam and electricity, and tall office buildings, were forest solitudes, the haunt of wandering Indians and the other free wild creatures of wood and plain.

There is no way in which this mighty change may be so fully and so truly realized as from the simple narrative of those who were instruments in its miracle. The diaries of Pike, of Lewis and Clarke, the annals of Astoria, the story of Bonneville's adventures and experiences, have not only all the charm and romance of adventure, but a deep and vital value as actual materials of history. In "Astoria" Irving has preserved for us the record of the first American development of the far Northwest, and in

"The Adventures of Captain Bonneville" his skilful and sympathetic pen has given enduring life to one of the most interesting chronicles of our American annals.

It is but twenty years ago, in June, 1878, that Benjamin L. E. Bonneville died, yet his narrative transports us at once into the days when the Mississippi marked almost the boundaries of civilization, and when "the West" was a synonym for the wilderness. Born in France, at the close of the eighteenth century, Bonnevi le's active life was passed in America, and his long record of army service extends from exploring days of the early 30's. through the Mexican War and the Gila boundary expedition of 1857. to and beyond the great struggle of 1861, in which he won the rank of brevet major-general. Of an ardent and adventurous temperament, his assignment after graduation from West Point to various frontier posts brought him in contact with trappers and traders, and awakened an intense desire to penetrate for himself into the perilous and picturesque regions of the unknown West. Gradually this desire crystallized into purpose, and finally, after many disappointments, the young soldier obtained leave of absence to conduct, at his own expense, an exploring expedition to the Rocky Mountains, with the aim of obtaining information as to their natural resources and characteristics, the possibilities of trade, and the observation of Indian tribes.

It was on May 1st, 1832, that Captain Bonneville set out on his expedition from the frontier post of Fort Osage, on the Missouri, a

From "The Adventures of Captain Bonneville."

Copyright, 1895, by G. P. Putnam's Sons.

little east of the present site of Kansas City. He was at the head of a goodly company of a hundred and ten men, experienced Indianfighters, seasoned trappers, and shrewd traders, and his train was swelled by a long line of heavy wagons drawn by oxen or mules and laden with camp supplies and the rude merchandise of the forest trader. For three years the expedition vanished, swallowed up in the wilderness. Its leader was reckoned as dead or lost, and his name was stricken from the army list. Then, in the late autumn of 1835, a tatterdemalion band, the remnant of that imposing company, made its way to one of the frontier settlements east of the Platte, whence Bonneville

of "The Adventures of Captain Bonneville, U. S. A."

The publication of "Captain Bonneville" completes the series of beautiful volumes in which, year by year, Messrs. G. P. Putnam's Sons have enshrined the works of Washington Irving. They have given the chronicle in its original simplicity, but they have added a feature that enhances its interest and value, in the admirable sketch map that illustrates the region traversed by Bonneville, whose route extended from Missouri to Northern Washington, embracing eight of our present Western and Pacific States. This Pawnee edition of the brave Captain's narrative is, indeed, a fitting successor to the

hastened eastward to make his peace at Washington. It was on his homeward way that he met Irving at John Jacob Astor's country-seat at Hell Gate, and charmed that eager listener with his narrative of stirring adventures, "given with mingled modesty and frankness and in a gentleness of manner and a soft tone of voice, contrasting singularly with the wild and often startling nature of his themes." This narrative, completed and extended from his diaries and travelling notes, Bonneville placed later, in manuscript form, at Irving's service; and it is the Captain's simple record of his own experience that has been fused by Irving's genius into the vivid, graceful, and spirited chronicle

Tacoma edition of "Astoria." Its two handsome volumes, richly bound in dark blue, with gold ornamentation of Indian totems; its broad pages, wreathed with graceful borders in which matchlocks, powder-horn, arrows, paddles, and peltry point to hunting adventures, and woven vine and crossed swords typify the adventurer's French chivalry; its striking frontispieces and many fine photogravures and other illustrations of scenes and incidents in the American wilderness-all these combine to make this edition of "Captain Bonneville" a delight to all who love good books, and a worthy companion to the volumes that have preceded it.

son.

Cisunderstood

UNDER the above title we have a series of animal biographies from Ernest Seton Thompson, representing one of Charles Scribner's Sons' most important issues of the present seaThe work is quite an unconventional one and is not designed as a text-book in natural history, although the information it gives is unique, and draws us into closer sympathy and knowledge of special wild animals than any volume we can now recall. The book may be read by young or old. We venture to say no one of any age will begin it without finish ing it, and forever afterwards holding in his memory its almost human heroes.

The stories the author tells us are all true. The animals

whose tragical histories he has chronicled lived the lives he has depicted, and showed the heroism and personality more strongly even, he believes, than he has described. The volume opens with the story of "Lobo, the King of Currumpaw" Currumpaw is a vast cattle range in Northern New Mexico. It is a land of rich pastures and teeming flocks and herds, a land of rolling mesas and precious running

waters. The king, whose despotic power was felt over its entire extent, was an old gray wolf. Old Lobo, or the king, as the Mexicans called him, was the gigantic leader of a remarkable pack of gray wolves that had ravaged the Currumpaw Valley for years. He was the terror of all the cattle of that region and the despair of the shepherds and ranchmen. Mr. Thompson made the acquaintance of Lobo in 1893, when he went to New Mexico to try if he could do anything with this predatory pack, for the head of whose leader one thousand dollars had already been offered. After going into Lobo's past life, he tells in detail his efforts to catch him and the causes of his downfall-love, as tragic and pathetic as comes into a man's heart, conquering at last this fierce and bloodthirsty animal. The story is most thrilling and most astonishing in its illustrations of Lobo's intelligence and power and ingenuity. In "Wully, the Story of a Yaller Dog," the hero is of the Jekyll and Hyde order, his biography being as weird as that of some