Page:Mongolia, the Tangut country, and the solitudes of northern Tibet vol 1 (1876).djvu/53

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AUTHOR'S PREFACE.
xlv

the places we visited—500 to 600 kinds of plants represented by 4,000 specimens. Our small mineralogical collection contains samples of the minerals of all the mountain ranges we visited.

Such are the scientific results of our journey; and these met with warm approbation, not only from the Geographical Society, but from the different men of science who volunteered their services to classify them.

The academician K. T. Maximovitch kindly undertook the description of the flora, which will form the third volume of the present edition of our travels. The second volume will comprise our special studies on the climate of those parts of Inner Asia that we visited, and notes on the zoology and mineralogy will be contributed by A. A. Inostrantseff and K. T. Kessler, professors at the St. Petersburg University; A. T. Moravitz, the entomologist; N. A. Severtsoff, W. K. Tachanoffsky, the zoologists; and A. A. Strauch, academician. All these savants have generously assisted me in classifying the different kinds of animals, plants, and minerals mentioned in the pages of this book.

Lastly, I must express my earnest gratitude to Colonel Stubendorff of the Staff Corps, and Colonel Bolsheff of the Topographical Department, who have taken a keen interest in compiling the map from my route survey; and also to Fritsche, director of the Peking Observatory, who gave me hints as to the astronomical and magnetic observations, and kindly undertook to work these out. This first volume of